The Feminine Mystique - Betty Friedan [121]
Properly manipulated (“if you are not afraid of that word,” he said), American housewives can be given the sense of identity, purpose, creativity, the self-realization, even the sexual joy they lack—by the buying of things. I suddenly realized the significance of the boast that women wield seventy-five per cent of the purchasing power in America. I suddenly saw American women as victims of that ghastly gift, that power at the point of purchase. The insights he shared with me so liberally revealed many things….
The dilemma of business was spelled out in a survey made in 1945 for the publisher of a leading women’s magazine on the attitudes of women toward electrical appliances. The message was considered of interest to all the companies that, with the war about to end, were going to have to make consumer sales take the place of war contracts. It was a study of “the psychology of housekeeping” “a woman’s attitude toward housekeeping appliances cannot be separated from her attitude toward homemaking in general,” it warned.
On the basis of a national sample of 4,500 wives (middle-class, high-school or college-educated), American women were divided into three categories: “The True Housewife Type,” “The Career Woman,” and “The Balanced Homemaker.” While 51 per cent of the women then fitted “The True Housewife Type” (“From the psychological point of view, housekeeping is this woman’s dominating interest. She takes the utmost pride and satisfaction in maintaining a comfortable and well-run home for her family. Consciously or subconsciously, she feels that she is indispensable and that no one else can take over her job. She has little, if any, desire for a position outside the home, and if she has one it is through force or circumstances or necessity”), it was apparent that this group was diminishing, and probably would continue to do so as new fields, interests, education were now open to women.
The largest market for appliances, however, was this “True Housewife”—though she had a certain “reluctance” to accept new devices that had to be recognized and overcome. (“She may even fear that they [appliances] will render unnecessary the old-fashioned way of doing things that has always suited her.”) After all, housework was the justification for her whole existence. (“I don’t think there is any way to make housework easier for myself,” one True Housewife said, “because I don’t believe that a machine can take the place of hard work.”)
The second type—The Career Woman or Would-Be Career Woman—was a minority, but an extremely “unhealthy” one from the sellers’ standpoint; advertisers were warned that it would be to their advantage not to let this group get any larger. For such women, though not necessarily job-holders, “do not believe that a woman’s place is primarily in the home.” (“Many in this group have never actually worked, but their attitude is: ‘I think housekeeping is a horrible waste of time. If my youngsters were old enough and I were free to leave the house, I would use my time to better advantage. If my family’s meals and laundry could be taken care of, I would be delighted to go out and get a job.’”) The point to bear in mind regarding career women, the study said, is that, while they buy modern appliances, they are not the ideal type of customer. They are too critical.
The third type—“The Balanced Homemaker”—is “from the market standpoint, the ideal type.” She has some outside interests, or has held a job before turning exclusively to homemaking; she “readily accepts” the help mechanical appliances can give—but “does not expect them to do the impossible” because she needs