In Malaysia, women’s participation in
the workforce, though low, has increased from 44.7 per cent in 1995 to 47.3 per
cent in 2004(Women’s participation in the workplace, 2005). The
increasing of their participation in the workforce cannot be halted because, it
actually in line with the growth of their population. It is been said that
women can do anything that men can. This issue of women involving into the workforce is
actually continues to be debated. The impacts of this occurrence have its boons
and banes. Participation of women in the workforce can affect family
institution adversely, high infertility
and difficulty in the work organization.
Participation of women in the
workforce can affect family institution adversely. In this era, people got so
worked out for working 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. When women which are
the backbone of a family are out to work six to eight hours per day, they will
be exhausted and too tired to have the quality time with their family. It is
not deniable that women involving in the labor force can improve their life
standard, and many of them have achieved that standard that they dream for.
However, take a look at their family and the majority of them have a fractured
family bond. Their spouse and children’s need got neglected and the bond
between husband and wife, a mother and the child are cracked. Children need the most of parents attention
and love through their childhood and as teenager. Lack of a mother’s love
making them to search for alternatives to get their parents attention for some
cares or to fill their emptiness.
The involvement of women as the
workforce can lead them to high infertility. Their satisfactory to find the
comfortable in life standards make them to postpone marriage and stay single
past their fertility phase. Usually women who are really committed to their
career even feel that they do not need men to support their life, thus,
forgetting to get married and build a family. This will result in the declining
of society population and will cause a country to lack of labor force in the
future. Malaysian women are experiencing a decrease of fertility level every
year and the fertility of women in the group age of fifteen and forty-nine year
declined rapidly, and this can affect the population in our country in the
future, translated from Utusan Online, Malaysia Women’s Fertility Rate Is
Expected to Decline. Women can lift their position in the society when
participating in the workforce, but by doing so they are going to sacrifice
their own self-need to have their offspring. Maybe they will be admired for their
position and wealth, but that will not guarantee a person happiness. Eventhough
money is important, but a person will feel very lonely and miserable if he or
she does not have someone to share and spend good time together.
Women participating in the workforce
can cause difficulty in the work organization. Women workers have many
difficulties to be paid attention. Usually in some occasion or in some
condition that they are going through will cause them to have a low production
and contribution to the organization which they work for. Some of the women
have serious period cramp or morning sickness and that will halt their
production for a while because they will have a leave for it. Maternity leave
will affect an organization because for about two months the company will lost
an employee that is good at that certain position and this going to slower the company’s production
when a new employee will need to be trained for that position. Women are
diligent workers, but these temporary complications lead to unstable
organization production from time to time.
In a nutshell, women participation
in the workforce is not highly supported. Participation of women in the
workforce can affect family institution adversely, high infertility and difficulty in the work organization.
Women should not interfere with the working world when men can handle it.