“I Feel Like a Lot of Times Women Are the Ones Who Are Problem-Solving for All the People That They Know”: The Gendered Impacts of the Pandemic on Women in Alaska
Abstract
1. Introduction
1.1. Goal and Research Questions
1.2. Conceptual Framework
2. Methods
2.1. Study Region
2.2. Research Approach
2.3. Authors Positionality
3. Results
3.1. Social Domain
3.1.1. Strengths for Resilience Within the Social Domain
“There were little pods formed. I think people were just looking for little pods that they would feel like you wouldn’t get infected. I thought it was a very creative move that a lot of women did create these pods to be able to meet their own needs and still fulfill their functions at work.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“One thing that has positively come from the pandemic is, despite people being so disconnected and there being less opportunities for ’community,’ I feel like people have risen to the occasion… and created micro communities… that never existed before…”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I feel like a lot of times women are the ones who are problem-solving for all the people that they know whether it’s their friends or their relatives or just trying to make sure that people are connected to the resources that they need or finding out what they are or all of that.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I’ve never taken kids to school or picked them up before. And then that kind of became just an active service that I could do for some of my friends with kids who needed to have a job interview at that time or needed to be in a meeting … So being able to help them out in those small ways has been really meaningful.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I did a lot of mentoring and most of my mentoring was towards women… I found out … that it was one of the most positive sides of my job… Before I went back to work <after the pandemic–authors>, I was frustrated because I had all of this knowledge, 30 years of being a woman and working my way up, it was like, ’I’m wasted. I want to mentor again.’ Most of the employees that we had were female, and I got a lot of very positive feedback from women, and there’s a part of me that really liked being told that I was helpful.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“I’ve realized a couple things in the pandemic… We were forced to slow down… I was enjoying the times when we didn’t run around like chickens with our heads cut off, constantly driving kids to soccer practice or to choir concerts… It is nicer and calmer now that we can slow down and appreciate…the times where we can just be without having to hustle. And prior to the pandemic, my day was like clockwork–I’d get up early in the morning, make sure kid one gets to school, wake up second kid, make coffee for the husband, make sure lunches are packed, get myself to work, take my lunch break, go to the gym, pick up kid one from school, pick up kid two, come home, make dinner, make sure homework’s done, rinse, and repeat… <During the pandemic–authors> the personal time schedule has really changed… I have taught myself how to relax a little bit more.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“We have this myth of the supermom in which women can do everything. They can get pregnant and have a child and be back in a bikini in a month. And I think sometimes women hold each other to that standard as much as men hold women to that standard. We all need to give each other a break and understand we cannot do it altogether. And that whole striving to be everything for everybody, something’s got to give there. And not doing it all... and that will open space for other people, the men in our lives…to come forward and do more. It’s not the default responsibility of women by virtue of biology.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“I am still working. My husband is not currently working and so he is more responsible for the household stuff. Yes, he does a lot of the cooking and the laundry. So, that’s just the way it is.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
3.1.2. Constraints to Resilience Within the Social Domain
“I think a man is thought to be the provider, the breadwinner, the person that’s making the most money, and he’s probably gone the most for work. He provides the stability for the home in the forms of financial stability. But women are then put into this corner of being the emotional providers, the persons keeping track of every little detail <in the household–authors>.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“The burden of childcare and schooling primarily falls on women. Their father was working a job that would not allow for any leeway during the pandemic, and so their education, health, safety fell to me.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“I know personally several women who basically stepped back from their careers for their families, tried to work at home and have families… I’ve got one friend who she started seeing a therapist, and she went on some antidepressants because it just was overwhelming for her.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“I tend to think that men get to do more of the fun things, so more of the playtime with the kids… let’s say maybe playing with kids like hockey or taking them to fish together… And women tend to take on the less fun tasks, just because we tend to be more detail oriented, but also can see the big picture of everything that’s at play and that needs to get done… I don’t want to sound too biased, I do think that men get to do more of the fun things…. And I think that that dynamic still exists in a lot of families. And that was hard <during the pandemic>. I think that really wears on women mentally, and it changes your relationship structure. And I think a lot of people underwent their relationship structure changing to an uncomfortable degree.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I know that domestic violence and murders have increased. I was really scared of what was happening to women. And murder of pregnant women has gone up so much since the start of the pandemic… Pregnancy in general is the highest risk time for women in abusive relationships and in terms of abuse. Always the time of escalation and risk.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“In Nome, there is a high rate of alcoholism, and women had to stay home <during the pandemic>. You had to stay in the same household with your abuser. You had nowhere else to go… One of the major issues we face in Nome is a housing crisis. There’s just not enough housing to go around… We do have a women’s shelter here, but there’s limited space as well. A lot of women just end up going back to their abusers… It seems like the amount of domestic violence and trauma to women and children I think went up in our region during the pandemic.”(Nome, 40s.)
“The majority of houses here are not safe for individuals, especially kids and women, to be in. Here, it’s typical for two to three families to live in one house where you’ve got 15 people, that are crowded, sleeping on couches, sleeping on the floor, and don’t have the options to isolate if they’re feeling sick.”(Nome, 20s.)
“<In Nome>, there’s just not enough housing. We have a lot of lousy landlords. They rent dilapidated rentals that are probably not even up to code to people. I’ve heard stories of people going without heat for a year because the landlord won’t fix the furnace or the heaters. In winter, it’s worse because your pipes freeze and then you don’t have running water, or you can’t use the sink. You can’t shower, you can’t bathe, you can’t wash hands. And then illness just takes over because of that…”(Nome, 20s.)
“I just remember that horrible feeling a lot of times where I feel like I’m not doing a good job at work, I’m not doing a good job at home, I’m just trying to do everything.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“I hear a lot about the parents’ guilt, they’re working these crazy hours trying to work from home and also trying to support their kids and not being able to really carve out any time for themselves. And that definitely impacts your mental health and your physical health, and the health of your family.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I think women are more social in general, and if they’re not working then they don’t get a lot of interaction with other women so going through all that just kind of made it worse. Everybody was more separated and less likely to gather together as a tribe.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“Nome’s a very transient town… We have a lot of people from all over getting a job here, working for two years, and are gone, and then there’s a small core of people that have been here for many years… That affects a lot of the relationships.”(Nome, 20s.)
“Any in-person mom playdate groups were completely killed off by COVID… all of the new online parent groups… I really feel like isn’t ideal, because if you have a support structure already, I think you’re going to be okay, but if you’re in a place where you need to form a new support structure, then I think you’re really going to suffer, because all of those places where you can forge those really meaningful connections have moved online. There’s absolutely value in those things existing at all, in whatever form they take, but I don’t think it’s ever going to be as good as something where you can meet face to face.”(Anchorage, 20s.)
“There’s a hesitation of people in my family who believe in the pandemic, believe in health and safety, and then those that don’t and think that it’s a total hoax and think that the rest of us are crazy and we’re just being paranoid. It’s shifted a lot of relationship dynamics… It’s not like we’re not meeting as a whole united family despite different political stances, which we’ve always had. But now, the tensions are so high around it, that I feel like there is some irreparable damage that has been done where things are just really divisive… I would say relationships have not been restored after the pandemic.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“COVID pandemic certainly changed us. I’m more profoundly and sadly aware of how little the United States cares… about children and women… <Regarding–authors> the administration here in Alaska—“Well, what about childcare? You can’t open the economy back up if there’s nowhere for kids to go. What are you going to do? Leave them at home alone?” I knew that the administration didn’t care about children or women, but to see it echoed in so many places was pretty heartbreaking.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“Things have gotten worse, … all the inequities have gotten worse. Women were left in charge of holding the bag for the total societal refusal to prioritize babies and children first.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“Mental health is the biggest thing… We’re <geographically> separated, so we already have the isolation issue… we deal with darkness here, we deal with seclusion, isolation, and then on top of having to isolate yourself from your friends and family even more <during the pandemic–authors>, it added more of a stressor to the whole thing… And then the fear of people now and adding all that in on top of having to keep a job down.”(Nome, 20s.)
“Everyone is falling through the cracks… Our healthcare system, things that were already spread thin… There aren’t enough therapists to meet with us… I wanted to see a personal therapist… I eventually found one, and it was months of waiting before I could even have my first appointment. And I had basically four months in between every appointment… and then my insurance didn’t cover it … and that was so cost prohibitive! I ultimately chose to stop seeing that therapist… The financial stress of this is going to cause my anxiety to go up more than it already is… It’s very challenging to have something as basic as… mental healthcare…in Alaska.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
3.2. Economic Domain
3.2.1. Strengths for Economic Resilience During the Pandemic
“In academia, they’re just obsessed with meetings, and most of them are completely unproductive… Such a waste of time! Nowadays, we do it on Zoom and I can turn off my video and I can pipe in when needed. But meanwhile, I can do something useful at home… So, I find it very positive.”(This quote has been anonymized to protect the participant’s privacy.)
“Work from home policies were helpful, because if you don’t have childcare, it’s better to at least be home with your kid than leave them home alone.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“I would say, positively … working from home and less commuting… I get more done if I work from home. I can work more focused, I don’t have distractions… I live quite a ways out of town… and this place can be kind of hairy in the winter with snowstorms and whatnot…. I’ve done more during the pandemic, and I find it very much less stressful.”(Nome, 50s.)
“One of the things that was good that did come out of the pandemic was… more access to different conferences that I wish I would’ve gone to in person before the pandemic and wasn’t able to. I was able to attend these conferences online and take language classes for free or a limited low amount of payment for the classes… And I really enjoyed the conferences that I had attended. One of them was… <on> small women businesses and how they’re boosting the local economy… And then in the midst of the pandemic, I was taking some classes to learn about starting my own business and… how to make business more successful.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“… I think the thing that was most helpful was we got COVID funding for our Northwest Campus <University of Alaska Fairbanks–authors>, and you could take classes for a very reasonable price. That opened up a lot of doors for women to be more providers at home. For being able to learn how to make … parkas or learn how to knit so that they could make things to sell… The Campus really tries to reach the local needs …”(Nome, 20s.)
“I teach a distance class, and I know a lot of my students live with other people in crowded conditions… Most of them are mothers and wives… And I feel bad for them because it’s clear they don’t have a quiet space to get away from it all. And apparently whoever else is in the house with them takes absolutely no regard to the fact that they’re trying to take a class…I totally admire them for that, because I could not focus in an environment like that. That might have been worse during the pandemic, when everybody was more cooped together.“(This quote has been fully anonymized to protect the participant’s privacy.)
“My colleagues, my team members, we are family… So, I started noticing how much extra…, like emotional labor or just colleague stuff, you put more of yourself into work that you’re really invested in. And when I started seeing more and more cracks <related to the gender pay gap–authors>, my perspective on work has definitely changed.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“Since I am looking for jobs and because I’ve had some traumatic work experience this year, I’m very much seeking an employer who respects me… I want to learn how they’ll support me as an employee rather than only focusing on what I can do for them. It’s about reciprocity really, and not just in terms of employment, but in all aspects of life.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“Perspective shifts… Almost all my team had to take a pay cut <during the pandemic–authors>, so we just worked one day less a week…. But I didn’t realize until the next summer that leadership didn’t take a pay cut even though they were working less… One of my <male–authors> colleagues, he was hired on at a higher pay than me. Not only is it appalling because I have 10 more years of work experience… It’s a gender pay gap situation… Then you start thinking about how you’re valued and how we’re placed in the workplace and in your work, your role… It makes you start feeling like you’re not very valuable…”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I’ve realized… in the pandemic <that–authors> following the corporate dollar doesn’t really seem to have any interest to me anymore,– my relationships with others are more important than anything else…”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“I was in the <one of the top managerial positions> in the company, where I worked for <many> years… And when the pandemic hit… the company made cuts, and my job was eliminated. I was retired for almost a year and a half and realized I was going absolutely crazy because…. I wanted to be in an office… There was an opening for a position…, which is basically fundraising… which I’d never done before, but I have a brain in my head. I applied for it and got it… My life has definitely changed in the last couple of years. Going from working full-time and being the most knowledgeable person in the room to being retired, and then back to working full-time but being the least knowledgeable person in the room was quite an adjustment.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“I do miss the little kids… <but–authors> I ended up quitting my job because I couldn’t take it anymore. This past year was awful. We had very violent kids and just a lack of resources and support and everyone was really burned out. They <schools–authors> lost a lot of principals, a lot of teachers quit or retired early…, coming to the realization like, ‘My job isn’t worth … risking my life for.’ Now, I’m going to think about doing something different… I would think that technology, doing something with IT or tech would be cool…”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“In this place,… you can find a lot of guys with toolkits, but it’s hard to find someone who truly knows what they’re doing… I have found out that if I just do the work myself, I can do it just as well. So, I’ve spent a lot of my time learning how to replace windows, how to fix floorboards that have rotten, paint the walls, put in new floors, and how to do everything, really. I do it myself now. And what’s amazing is I feel very empowered!”(Nome, 50s.)
“My boss is a phenomenal woman… who is very good at making decisions and very good at supporting her staff. And her goal was to make sure that everybody was taken care of while still making sure the organization could move forward and sustain itself <during the pandemic–authors>… I don’t mind working hard for her when I need to because she supports me on the flip side when I need to be there for my family. She supports that. Her leadership makes a huge difference.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
3.2.2. Constraints to Resilience Within the Economic Domain
“<During the pandemic–authors>, women are then put into this corner of being the emotional providers, the persons keeping track of every little detail regarding kids and house payments and bills and shots and all of the things. I think it’s really spreading women so thin. We were already spread thin <before the pandemic–authors>—the amount that we have to keep track of. Every woman I know with kids has a new to-go file organizer, and has all of the family’s vaccination cards… and keeping track of all these little details”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I feel that women took the burden and the brunt of childcare. Some of us had to leave our jobs… we took the brunt of that, and it wasn’t just making sure that they were in childcare, but we also became teachers, we also became counselors, we became all the different things that our children couldn’t access because they were <at home–authors> with us.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“It was really difficult for my friends with kids trying to deal with their own work at home and also having to supervise their kids with their online classes and even just having to be with their kids 24/7 was really challenging for them. I had a friend who said she had no idea that her kids were so difficult: ’I’d do anything, I’d pay teachers anything to just take my kids back. I don’t want them here all day long’.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“At the beginning of the pandemic, a lot of people were like, ’Oh, this is great <to work from home–authors>.’ But then we look at the reality of it, and people are even busier than they were when they were in the office because now that everything is Zoom, people schedule back-to-back meetings. There’s not even time for bathroom breaks… I think it’s made a lot of jobs feel more constant because there’s this new expectation that you will just work your bones off and never really stop.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I was pushed into developing new technological skills that I hadn’t always practiced. I mean, everybody now knows how to Zoom or do Microsoft Teams. Those were not tools I used routinely…It seemed like a stressful time at work. I didn’t feel as much efficacy, I didn’t feel like I was doing as good a job.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“Not everybody can afford internet here, because it can range anywhere from $200 to $500 a month… And that adds an extra stress…”(Nome, 20s.)
“Women had to stay home to take care of their kids. Ninety percent of the time that’s the way it falls, because 90% of the time, men are making more than the women so it’s the women who have to take the step back and say, “Okay, I’ll stay home and take care of the kids.” Because there was zero childcare… to save your life.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“I think more acutely and really noticeably, women are the primary caregivers in families typically. And we saw women drop out of the workforce at a much higher level than men. And it’s all tied into the childcare challenges, or even choice of life-work balance. And you always look to, ’Okay, if one of us is going to stay home or not work or work part time, who’s that going to be?’ And it tends to be the person who’s making less. And in our culture, we value women less everywhere, but especially professionally. And so, women dropped out. I think that’s a big problem following the pandemic, but it’s all connected.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“<During the pandemic–authors>, the existing disparities heightened. Women were not getting promoted in the same way as men… This exposed all the ways in which gender inequities then lead to women having to drop out of the workforce, pick up the load. A lot of these things are cultural.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“Ultimately, we just need to change our cultural framework because… It’s like, you’re a woman. You’re worth less… We’re probably going to pay you less. We know you’re not going to ask for more. It all builds and builds, and then suddenly you have a 40-year-old woman who’s making less than the 40-year-old guy doing the same thing. And so, it’s hard to change that, but I think real reflection on how we change it long term is needed.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“A lot of women choose not to work and just to have their husband work because all of their income would be going towards childcare, so they might just stay home because it’s not worth it. I think that’s a really big thing that people spend $2000 to $3000 a month on childcare easily. To have that burden lifted so that they could have the potential for a career to work.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“Single moms probably had it the worst because they had no one to fall back on. They had nowhere else to go, especially with those with multiple kids, because you can’t afford childcare for them. That’s why I never went back to work full time.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“<After having a baby–authors>, eventually that was what stopped me from going back to work, was, if I’m going to be sinking all of my money into childcare, it’s more cost effective for me to just not work. The financial aspect was definitely a huge part of it, and especially as then people started returning to work and the cost of childcare kept increasing. Then, people were not able to afford it as much.”(Anchorage, 20s.)
“I think women always pre-pandemic have been dealing with a ‘glass ceiling,’ but I think that ceiling lowered in a negative way during the pandemic.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I think that in a lot of settings, women… are not listened to as much, it’s like their perspective isn’t as valuable… A lot of women are isolated from the decision-making and policy in the community because they have all the home duties <and this exacerbated during the pandemic–authors>.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“Men in our society, they get paid more on the dollar. They rise in their careers faster than women. They’re the ones that are in more management positions. Women are the ones that take more parental leave and are assumed to be the primary caregivers and the ones getting their kids to their healthcare appointments and to school and picked up to soccer lessons… It’s an infuriating thing about our society… that women are not taken as seriously as men.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“Women always face more challenges in the realm of being respected and listened to in coming up with community solutions. And I think there’s always this vein of like, do these women really know? I think there’s a lot of misogyny built into our culture and also our political structures that expect these men, tough men, to solve problems.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“I love Alaska, but there is sometimes some toxic masculinity here that needs to be talked about. It can be a difficult community to break a ‘glass ceiling’ in. I work for nonprofits where the leadership team is primarily men. I’ve been told that I wouldn’t understand certain things because I’m a woman, and ’It’s like snowmachining.’ But I’ve been riding the snow machine since I was 10 years old. I can out-ride most guys. But being a woman, I would not understand that. I know we can’t change everyone’s attitudes, but we need to be talking about what this is and why it’s so dangerous… Women are not going to be able to succeed when we’re constantly being held back in this way.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“The Federal CARES Act came into the state and then the state distributed it… The decisions <on childcare and other social services–authors> were being made by people who did not have children and women in mind.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“We need more women in positions of leadership, and we need the means in place to allow them to do that while still feeling good about their choices to have a family. Women won’t take on extra leadership roles if they don’t have that support in their community and in their household to extend themselves. Because if we get more women in those positions of leadership, they’re going to be at the table when policymakers are having these conversations about what to do.”(Anchorage, 60s.)
“There’s always the chance and childcare they keep closing… So, if you don’t have a job that is sympathetic… you can’t work from home with a one-year-old running around. It’s ridiculous… Productivity and just you’re online talking to some male colleagues, and they don’t understand that you have no choice but to have this child in the background… Especially when you look at these patriarchal companies that are a typical ’old boys club.’ … Energy, shipping, airline,… the tourism industry, cruises, trains, restaurants …—I feel like there are very male dominated for the upper levels.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“In Anchorage, we started this school year with students back in, but no buses…We’re all back at the office, and we have no way to get our children back and forth to school… all the way across town. Let’s say you have two children who are in high school and in elementary. Well, the first one has to be at school at 7:30, then the second one has to be at school at 9… Then they need to pick up at 2 o’clock and 3:30. How many jobs are willing to give you that much time? I actually had an opportunity to interview for a job and asked, before I even did the interview, very clearly that I have children, I need a little assistance, and they told me, ’Why don’t you apply again when things are a little bit more normal?’ No accommodation willing. I understand that as a business, that’s their prerogative, but I feel like that automatically puts women into that position. I’m automatically told, ’Okay. Well, <you’re> probably going to hire a man or somebody who doesn’t have kids. Thanks.’(Anchorage, 40s.)
“Nine times out of 10, it was going to be a woman who was going to have to sacrifice her job, sacrifice her time to make sure that things kept running. And then by doing that, because you’ve taken time off… Maybe you had a really great job that would let you work from home. But if you didn’t, guess what? Now, you have a gap in your resume. Now, things don’t look so great. Why were you off for two years? It’s just another thing that makes us just a little bit less desirable to be hired.”(Anchorage, 40s.)
“The women that I worked with <in childcare–authors>, I would say <handled the pandemic times> poorly. Some of the women were suffering all the same stuff that I was suffering–overworked, underpaid, underappreciated by the system.”(Anchorage, 20s.)
“There was a great deal of time and energy and effort that went into going back teaching in person. There was a lot of intense just fear as providers. We didn’t want to mess up, ’Oh my God, I don’t want to get them <children–authors> sick.’ You had to wipe everything down… We had department meetings, or individual school meetings… We had committees and contingency plans. It was quite the system… That was a nightmare after a while. Really disruptive to this being in school, in person learning and staff members getting sick.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“We were supposed to go back to in-person school in February. I remember people just being livid: ’Do you want to open schools and there’s no vaccines and everyone’s going to be sick?…’ I think that caused a lot of distrust in the community, especially for teachers. Our district here is huge. It’s one of the largest employers in the city and a lot of people no longer trusted or thought that the government or the school district cared about teachers’ safety and felt like we were just peons that were easily replaced…”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“Teachers were suddenly doing the role of not only a teacher, but also a kind of parent, mental health clinician, cook, providing all of these different things… And not just inundated with, you’re going to do five people’s jobs for the same amount of pay in all of these hours every week.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“I would have arguments from families saying, ’I don’t want to bring my kid here because you require masks,’ and the parent of one of the kids in my class who’s a real COVID denier tried to tell us that requiring masks is child abuse… and then other families saying, ’You’re not doing enough to be COVID safe.’(Anchorage, 20s.)
“The most highly paid employee <in our childcare–authors> makes, I think, just under $20 an hour, and that is somebody who has been there for nearly 10 years… No benefits, no healthcare. Some holiday pay, depending on if you were regularly scheduled during a holiday… <Regarding the new hires–authors>, I have seen people with bachelor’s degrees, asking for 18 bucks an hour and being told, ’No, we can do 15.’ It’s pretty insulting… to see somebody with a bachelor’s degree, somebody who’s really capable, somebody who’s really passionate, and say, ’Yeah, this is what you’re worth to the higher-ups’.”(Anchorage, 20s.)
“I worked in childcare; I just left earlier this year.. I wasn’t too concerned about getting COVID … but just in that childcare environment, dealing with the emotional toll, dealing with everything there, the really toxic work environment that COVID had exacerbated,…–the underpayment, the long hours… I ended up working 10-hour days pretty regularly because of staffing shortage… You don’t go into childcare to get rich, you do it because you love it, and there’s a lot of turnover because the people who love it enough to pursue a degree in it, once they get that degree, are not going to be paid enough to stay in that..”(Anchorage, 20s.)
“Teachers are those first responders that see things. They get previews and hints of things that aren’t going well in a child’s life and in their home life, and they act as first responders… So many people quit that profession… because they became too much.”(Anchorage, 30s.)
“There are less, and less people inclined to fill those <female-dominated–authors> positions, so how do we make those career pathways desirable and meaningful again? I think it goes back to fair pay… It goes back to making supportive services like counseling and trauma-informed training more readily available…, and more just inspiration for them…”(Anchorage, 30s.)
4. Discussion
Limitations and Future Research
5. Conclusions
Author Contributions
Funding
Institutional Review Board Statement
Informed Consent Statement
Data Availability Statement
Acknowledgments
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Social | Economic | |
---|---|---|
Strengths | Capacity to redesign women’s social support networks Commitment to serving as community caregivers and addressing community needs Willingness to serve in mentorship roles Capacity for critical reflection on personal and social values and the ability to foster change Ability to reconfigure household gender roles Capacity to critically examine the supermom syndrome | Ability to productively use flexible and remote work schedules Ability to use education opportunities as a means of economic empowerment and professional growth Capacity to critically reflect on workplace inequalities and challenge conventional norms Capacity to transition into new and male-dominated professions Competence in versatile leadership during crisis |
Constraints | Re-emergence of traditional gender roles in the household Intensified gendered division of parenting Housing crisis and increase in domestic violence Increased burden of (parents’) guilt Disrupted social support networks, political polarization, and family divides over pandemic measures Women’s legitimate interests receive lower priority | Heightened levels of unpaid domestic labor Challenges of remote work, the gendered digital divide, and digital inequalities Widened gender wage and unemployment gaps Lowered “glass ceilings” Intensified motherhood penalty Challenges in re-entering the workforce and pursuing careers Unfolded crisis in female-dominated occupations |
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Rozanova-Smith, M.; Petrov, A.N. “I Feel Like a Lot of Times Women Are the Ones Who Are Problem-Solving for All the People That They Know”: The Gendered Impacts of the Pandemic on Women in Alaska. Soc. Sci. 2025, 14, 498. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14080498
Rozanova-Smith M, Petrov AN. “I Feel Like a Lot of Times Women Are the Ones Who Are Problem-Solving for All the People That They Know”: The Gendered Impacts of the Pandemic on Women in Alaska. Social Sciences. 2025; 14(8):498. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14080498
Chicago/Turabian StyleRozanova-Smith, Marya, and Andrey N. Petrov. 2025. "“I Feel Like a Lot of Times Women Are the Ones Who Are Problem-Solving for All the People That They Know”: The Gendered Impacts of the Pandemic on Women in Alaska" Social Sciences 14, no. 8: 498. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14080498
APA StyleRozanova-Smith, M., & Petrov, A. N. (2025). “I Feel Like a Lot of Times Women Are the Ones Who Are Problem-Solving for All the People That They Know”: The Gendered Impacts of the Pandemic on Women in Alaska. Social Sciences, 14(8), 498. https://doi.org/10.3390/socsci14080498