User:Richard Lee Chen/sandbox

An office lady, often abbreviated OL, is a female office worker in Japan who performs generally pink-collar tasks such as serving tea and secretarial or clerical work. Office ladies are usually full-time permanent staff. Although many of them received high level of education, the jobs they perform usually have little opportunity for promotion, and there is usually the tacit expectation that they leave their jobs once they get married.

Sex Discrimination
Especially in the late 20th century, OLs were often depicted as passive and submissive because they didn't seem to care about strong sex discrimination against them in the workplace. As a matter of fact, many OLs were well-educated, yet they were still treated as low-skilled clerical workers, and the fact that OLs were usually responsible for serving tea to office leaders and male employees in the workplace indicates the existence of sexual discrimination against OLs in major Japanese corporations.

OLs were expected to leave the company after they get married. The employers, therefore, are reluctant to spend extra money to train OLs.

Surprisingly, many OLs are actually content with their position and wages in the company because a great number of them live with their parents and do not have to worry about their daily expenses. Thus, they can spend all their salaries on travelling or luxury goods.

Employment
Japanese female labor force participation rate has been increasing since 1960. In 1995, almost 40 percent of people in the labor force are women. The age patterns of employed males and females differ vastly. 75 percent of females in their early twenties are employed, and the percentage dropped significantly after they reach the age of late twenties and early thirties when most of them get married and start raising a family. (The percentage dropped to 55 percent for females in their early thirties.) There is also an inclination for women older than 34 to return to the labor force by finding a part-time Job, which makes the labor force participation rate increase for females after their mid thirties. Males, one the other hand, are attached continuously to the labor market after they get a job in their early twenties. Therefore, the labor force participation rate for males remain high (95%) in their thirties, forties and early fifties.

It is noteworthy that almost one third of all female employees have clerical jobs in 1995. (Most of them are OLs) This fraction, however, is much smaller for males - only 15 percent of all employed males holding clerical jobs. Despite a large number of women working in the office, they still have much fewer opportunities for promotion than males. Only one percent of female employees are managers or officials, on the contrary this figure is almost one seventh for males.

Hierarchy structure and tension
In Japanese company, tenure that determines not only employees' wages but their positions in the company is crucial. Employees with shorter tenure have to show reverence to those who have longer tenure.

"Doki" is used to describe the relationship between those who enter the company in the same year or have the same length of tenure. If two employees are Doki, they are assumed to have the equal position. Similarly, senpai (one's senior) and kohai (one's junior) are also commonly used to manifest the hierarchy in Japanese companies.

A junior female employee has to use polite terms such as desu and masu when she speaks to her "senpai". Senpai, on the other hand, can speak casually with her kohai.

If the tenure is the only standard that determines one's position in the group as well as in the company, everything will be straightforward. However, the difference in education that OLs receive causes the tension between them. OLs who are college graduates may have higher official ranks than those who are high school graduates even if the latter has longer tenure.

As described previously, kohai have to pay deference to their senpai. However, the difference in their education makes kohai's official rank as well as wage higher than their Senpai's. Therefore, kohai is unwilling to be compliant to their senpai, and senpai also feel unfair to receive lower pay. The fact that OLs don't get along with each other in the workplace explains why they cannot unite together to fight against the gender discrimination.