A Study on Women Employment and its Effect on Power Pyramid in Families

In the past two decades, the concept of women's status has been expanded from education and socio-economic status to include women's access to control over resources and decision making within the household. It is true that if both spouses parti-cipate in a decision, a better outcome may result. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effectiveness of employment of women in the decision making power within the household.The statistical sample size is 300 married women (100 employed and 200 housewives). They were selected through random sampling method in the city of Dareh Shahr in the province of Ilam. The research is of a survey type, using descriptive and analytical methods. Data are collected via questionnaires, and a Likert type scale is applied. The statistical analysis of data is based on T-test and analysis of variance.Results indicate that the decision making power within household is vividly notable among employed women. Also, they show a significant relationship between women empl-oyment and an increase in the power of economically related decisions, the way of training children, determining the number of inborn children, the way of spending leisure time activity, and an increase in the socio-political participation. As the results indicate, there is no significant relationship between women employment and visiting family relatives. In addition, there is a significant, relationship between the dependent variables and independent variables.