The aviation industry and gender inequality
The aviation industry has been around since the year 1903, and it has been a source of employment to many people both male and female. The inescapable fact is that there are roles that have been held by men only such as pilot and others held by women only such as air hostess. Gender stereotypism has been in existence since. There is also gender equality in the aviation industry in that those people working in the same position such as air hostess and air host. This paper is going to provide a discussion of gender inequality and equality in the aviation industry with respect to the research study conducted to answer the question as to the aviation industry is referred to as the "cockpit."
Gender Inequality and Equality in the Aviation Industry:
The aviation industry has never had enough or nearly enough pilots. As a result, the commercial airline is always highly demanding for more aeronauts. Since the 1980s, the airline sector of the United States of America experienced a decrease in the airline pilots (Chalabi, 2017). If in the United States of America only, approximately two hundred thousand pilots since the year 1980 and this implies that more pilot seats have opened up around the world in the past less than 40 years. In addition to that, there has a further decrease in pilots since the 9/11 act as most pilots resigned due to insecurity and therefore, more job opportunities were left vacant.
Pilot shortage in the aviation industry
It is not only the commercial companies in the airline industry that have experienced pilot shortage but also the military. The research conducted by Peter Gall, The US is facing a severe lack of airline pilots’ author, provides that the United States Navy is projected to have a 10% decrease in airline pilots by the year 2020 (Gall, 2018). This implies that about one thousand pilots opportunities opening up by 2020. Another primary cause of pilot shortage is the fact that most pilots have overgrown their career and as a result, they are retiring. This begs for more pilots in the industry as airline companies become more desperate.
Gender disparity among pilots
The fact is that despite the increasing opportunities for the airline pilot positions, there have been a small number of employees entering the industry. The research indicates that almost all pilots in the industry are men yet many of the flight attendants are women. The least number of new pilots entering into the industry are women. This will ensure that the number of women holding pilot position will remain smaller than that of men holding the pilot position.
Increase of female pilots
The research conducted by Mireille Goyer, the president and founder of the Institute for Women of Aviation Worldwide shows that 6% of commercial airline pilots are female in America and 3% worldwide (Goyer, 2018). According to her, for one to be able to meet a pilot that is of the female gender, one has to meet approximately 5,623 American women. There are very few aviation schools around the world and if by any chance there were efforts in place to increase the number of female pilots in the commercial industry (Payne, 2009). The inescapable fact about education in the aviation industry is that there is a small number of females choosing to undertake a career in the aviation industry with the aim of becoming pilots.
Rise of male flight attendants
The ratio of female pilot to that of the male pilot will likely remain very small not only because very few female learners choose to pursue a career in aviation but also because the number of male people learning to become pilots is very high. On the other hand, the number of male flight attendants has risen drastically. As a result, more women flight attendants had to be pushed out of the aviation industry to create room for incoming men flight attendant. The inquiry by Mona Chalabi in her online article, “Dear Mona, How Many Flight Attendants Are Men” shows that from the year the 1980s to date, the number of male flight attendants has increased to about 24% which is double the initial number (Chalabi, 2017).
Stereotypes and gender roles
The reason that Chalabi provides as to why more female positions are being taken over by the male people is because of age. Previous research studies found that people who usually want to be flight stewards are mainly men that are young and those that are already in the position are trying their level of best to stay in their position or be promoted to new jobs. All of this causes a decrease in the number of women in the cabin and most of them are stay-at-home parents raising families and working as a pilot regarded as a man’s job. The fact is that the stereotype that being a pilot is a man’s job has hardly contributed to the fact that men have taken over flight attendant positions but men have slowly taken over flight attendant positions which are viewed as feminine jobs. This is clear as the women’s social standard staying at home with the primary role being, raising the family as it makes it impossible for them to engage in air travel and raise their families simultaneously.
The article produced by the Population...
Reference
Bureau referred to as The Changing Demography of U.S Flight Attendant provides that the increase in the male flight attendant is due to the civil rights of the mid-1960s encouraging employment without discrimination. Based on the same civil right companies in the airline industry are trying to bring about equality by hiring not only male flight attendant but also to balance in terms of race (Goyer, 2018). The research that was done by Svetlana Kuptsova at the Center for Speech Pathology, and the Institute of Higher Nervous Activity and Neurophysiology found that women require less brain power compared to men working the same task (Chalabi, 2017). This implies that women can easily multitask compared to men and thus they make better pilots. In addition to that, the research conducted by Kuptsova indicates that women find it easier to switch attention compared to men and the brain of women do not require the mobilization of extra resource in doing that, unlike in male brains. Despite women having the advantage over men, and the ratio of women to men that are pilot being small, it is funny that few women are interested in becoming pilots. The article, “women in aviation, where are they today” confirms that there is a very small number of female aviators in the world compared to male aviators. The author of the article states that in most cases, women feel isolated during pilot training but in the real sense, very few women are interested in training for the pilot position. The reason Kelleway provides as to why women are reluctant in pursuing a career as pilots is because of the stereotypical notion that men are more competent than women in the aviation industry (Kelleway, 2018). He adds that the notion is indeed not true since men and women have the same capability of being pilots but the view is likely to drive women away from the aviation industry.
Conclusion
In conclusion, it is clear that there is both gender inequality and equality in the aviation industry. Gender inequality occurs in the airline pilot position as there are more male pilots than women. In addition to that, more male pilots are being trained in aviation schools than women and this will ensure continued gender inequality at the pilot position. Equality occurs in the flight attendant position as more men are joining the industry and thus, almost balancing up with the number of female air attendants. The higher number of male aviation attendants entering the industry will bring about equality. It is clear from the research findings that gender imbalance in the industry can be offset by more women entering the industry. It is factual that aviation companies have focused their worries at diversifying their stewards and stewardesses and totally forgotten that they are running out of pilots due to the high rate of retirement and few women entering the industry for the pilot position.
Works Cited
Chalabi, Mona. “Dear Mona, How Many Flight Attendants Are Men?” FiveThirtyEight, FiveThirtyEight, 21 Apr. 2017, fivethirtyeight.com/features/dear-mona-how-many-flight-attendants-are-men/.
Gall, Peter. “The US Is Facing a Serious Shortage of Airline Pilots.” The Conversation, 19 Sept. 2018, theconversation.com/the-us-is-facing-a-serious-shortage-of-airline-pilots-95699.
Goyer, Mireille. “5 Decades of U.S. Female Pilots Statistics.” Women Of Aviation Worldwide Week | Powered by IWOAW, www.womenofaviationweek.org/five-decades-of-women-pilots-in-the-united-states-how-did-we-do/. Accessed 4 November 2018.
Kelleway, Sarah. “Women in Aviation: Where Are We Today?” CTI Professional Flight Training, 8 Mar. 2018, ctipft.com/women-aviation-today/.
Payne, Paul. “Study: Gender Differences in Plane Crashes.” ABC News, ABC News Network, 19 May 2009, abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=93264"page=1.
“The Changing Demography of U.S. Flight Attendants.” Population Reference Bureau, , 3 June 2009, www.prb.org/usflightattendants/.
