Excerpt from the article: Women are an increasingly important labor resource for the Nation's economy. Between 1940 and 1970, 26 million women joined the labor force. During this period, the proportion of women either employed or looking for work rose from less than one-third to nearly half of those of working age. Expanding opportunities, changing family size and structure, inflation, and the pressure thereby exerted on family income and purchasing power plus more progressive attitudes toward the appropriateness of women's work outside the home are major factors.