A shift from property-based to human-capital economy could diminish gender stratification.

Evidence

Some have argued that gender stratification is reduced by neoliberalism, insofar as it involves a shift from an economy based on private property economy to an economy based on human capital. Elizabeth Mayes, for example, thinks the decreasing importance of private property is positive for women, for Engels-like reasons: if women’s subordination has been linked historically to their status as private property, women are now freed to be individuals rather than property. — Wendy Brown, Undoing the Demos, 558

Categorization

• QUESTION: A genuinely contested counterpoint worth interrogating: could human-capital economization actually free women from property-based subordination, or does it merely relocate the subordination?
• SEED: Article angle: the ‘optimistic’ reading of neoliberalism for women — does the shift from property to human capital emancipate or re-subordinate?
• XREF: connects to: Marriage and career are structurally harder to combine for women than for men — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1932; Capitalist economic change, not feminism, drove women into the workforce — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 303; Economic emancipation alone does not place women in a situation identical to men’s — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1920

Broader Connections

• Marriage and career are structurally harder to combine for women than for men #corroborates (0.75) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1932
• Economic emancipation alone does not place women in a situation identical to men’s #expands (0.72) — Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, 1920
• Capitalist economic change, not feminism, drove women into the workforce #corroborates (0.70) — bell hooks, Ain’t I a Woman_ Black Women and…, 303