How far do you agree that women had made significant gains in their fight for equality by 1980s?

How far do you agree that women had made significant gains in their fight for equality by 1980s?
In order to address the question, it is important to define the means to judge the term ‘gains’ upon. For this instance, the judgement will be whether or not life drastically changed for women and whether they made real advancements to equality. In order to asses these advancements they must first be categorised into three subsections those being, education, the workplace and legislation and political achievements. Overall, by 1980 women had made advancements in these areas but there was still a long way to go in terms of reaching a goal of equality and those that had been predominantly white upper middle classes.
Once the Second World War broke out and men went to Europe to fight in 1941 there was still a demand for labour in the US and, like that of the First World War, the women filled their shoes. This showed society that they were capable of the work. The 1941 Lanham Act allowed for children to be in daycare whilst the mother worked and because of this married women working rose from 15% to 23%. Additionally, the demand for black women workers increased and in 1945 2,600 black women were employed in nursing compared to a little over 1,000 6 years prior. The Second World war clearly boosted the role of women in the workplace and was a significant factor in gaining women more equality. Furthermore, its impact was crucial. Where men did not return, the women maintained their job and the restrictions that had previously been introduced, such as the Muller vs the State of Oregon case where the Supreme court set women working hours to be no more than 10 hours a day, were rarely reintroduced. This lead to a consequence of more women in work and more women in a variety of jobs. This advancement made in the workplace can be attributed to the Second World War as attitudes to working women can be seen to have altered post-war and in 1978 38% of people said that married women should not work, compared to 78% in 1938 thus demonstrating a change in social attitudes towards women working proving gains had been made towards equality. Another important factor to mention in terms of advancements in the workplace was the Equal Pay Act of 1963 under the liberal administration of J.F.K. However the weaknesses of this was that it was much more difficult to enforce than to pass. Women continued to be paid less and were discriminated against in terms of training and promotion indicating that the push towards equality was restricted. This demonstrated that rather than conforming to the laws of equality, employers look for ways to loophole it. The war’s impact can also be limited as many women could physically not continue with their jobs. The demand by men for their jobs back met with the lack of funding for wartime day care centres for children gave women little choice other than to resign their jobs and return to a pre-war state of life. What work was left was clerical, women often found jobs as copywriters during the 1960s and ‘70s and faced hostility and sexism from their male colleagues who always had the more senior role demonstrating how little had been achieved in the mission for equality. Finally for women of colour faced segregation even after the Civil Rights Act and hostility in the locations they did work, much more severely than their fellow white Americans. Certainly, then there were changes in the workplace, but to me, they can not be regarded as a significant gain for equality. 
In educating the issues and education itself women also made advancements towards equality. But they were still limited by public mood. By the 1980s the wave of ‘young radicals’ involved groups of educated middle-class Americans. They coordinated groups and protests to bring about the issue and educate people in women equality. They used these groups to push forward the idea of women liberation. The magazine ‘Voice of the Women’s Liberation Movement’ run by volunteers sold over 2000 copies to teach people about the issues at hand. At a similar time ‘NOW’ was pursuing a similar agenda focused on educating people on the issues and their demands. They wanted women to be able to be free with their bodies and decide their own futures bringing light to the cause. The moment resulted in bringing into t the public eye and its membership rose from 1,000 to almost 50,000 in 1974. In education itself, advancements were made. Following the 1963 commission into the status of women, it was decided that girls were rarely encouraged to enter higher education and advise given at schools was inappropriate and it impacted the way government thought and approached these issues. The civil rights act went onto include sexual equality and women entering college and graduating began to increase. By 1980 13% of women had completed 4 years of college compared with 20% of men and 6.7% of women in 1962. In 1972 it became illegal to discriminate in public schools on the basis of sex in admissions practices and a variety of other things in education and sago’s could be at risk of losing their federal funding if caught. 2 years later support was provided to schools to assist with the recruitment of girls for maths and sciences and teacher training in gender bias was increased. This created a more welcoming environment for women in school and education as a whole but social opinion still restricted significant gains being made as a whole. Women who attempt to raise issues were met with condescension and media attention painted the campaigns as radical - giving the movement a negative image, allowing for a negative public opinion to develop towards the movement, placing the problem of equality into the public hand. The issue still remained however that legislation was passed, but poorly enforced because of the public mood. This meant that there was still little in terms of a significant move towards equality. In fact, when Reagan became president in 1980 the budget for the Women’s Educational Equality Act was cut and it wasn’t until 2014 until women overtook men in terms of the percentage of Americans completing college. 
Finally, in politics and legislation, the advancement of equality can be seen to have made the most progress to some extent. To begin there was the equal pay act of 1963 and the Civil Rights Act the fowling year under President Johnson. This demonstrates the move to equality being at the forefront of the political agenda. The counter culture and liberal climate helped with this. Johnson as president was also able to extend Affirmative Action to improve the conditions of women in federal jobs. The Supreme court also changed its attitude towards women ’s stride for equality. In 1972 it ruled that contraception should be accessible for all women and in 1973 Roe vs Wade famously declared abortion legal. This was an important milestone in the women’s liberation movement and was the main aim of groups such as NOW. By now it seriously looked like steps were being made in legislation that would bring about significant changes for women. For instance, the Equal Rights Amendment passed Congress and was awaiting ratification by the states to become an amendment to the constitution, however with a time stamp of 10 years ( making 1982 the deadline ) 15 states were refusing to ratify, meaning that the constitutional requirement of 3/4 of all states ratifying unmet. Today there is still no Equal Rights Amendment meaning that the headway and momentum that seemed to have been made in the 1970s was not continued. Arguably then in legislation and politics, there had been huge advancements up to the 1980s but beyond then the same cannot be said. The USA never signed up to the United Nations policy on non-discrimination in all aspects of life and laws still needed to be enforced. There was certainly a positive trend upwards, whether or not it was limited, there were still gains. For instance in the 87th Congress (1961-1963) around 3% of people in Congress were women, by the 97th (1981-1983) this was reaching 5%. This was certainly a step in the right direction, even though women made up around 50% of the American population. 
Overall, to come back to the meaning of significant and to address the question, women had not made outstanding gains. They were, however, noteworthy advancements that did change social perception but at the same time created more prejudices. There were still problems women faced even when law and legislation had been put in place. Additionally, in the workplace, social attitudes had not changed and women in education still faced problems despite new laws preventing it. On the surface of things, it could be said that women made significant gains in terms of moving towards equality but underneath the surface, there was still a problem with attitudes of Americans towards equality and stigma that had not yet been shifted.