Studies conducted in the area of labor and employment were aimed at exploring the status of working women and search of possible ways to improve it. Geography of research covered such cities as Izhevsk (Udmurt Republic), Ufa (Bashkortostan), Naberezhnye Chelny (Tatarstan) and Karagai village in the Perm region.

The number of women participating in our survey was 565. The age range of interviewed women was represented by relatively equal groups: 18,5% were below 25, 26,9% were 26-35, 28,5% were 36-45, 23,1% were 46-55 year old and 3,9% were over 55 (employed pensioners).

57,0% of respondents had secondary or post-secondary education, 41,3% - higher or incomplete higher education

58,4% were married at the moment of survey, 18,2 % were divorced or widowed, 23,5% had never been married. 23,3% of respondents had no children, 29,0% had a single child, 37,6% had two children, 10,1% had three or more.

Over one third (36,7%) of interviewed women were employed in the industrial sector, 21,5% - in trade and facility services, 21,1% in education and culture, 9,1% in the health care, 5,5% in construction; 4,0% in transport and communications. The biggest group was represented by women employed as the plant operators (15,6%); finance and accounting (14,7%); engineers (13,4%); teachers (12,6%); saleswomen (7,1%).

Our questionnaire comprised a few sections dedicated to the women‘s position at their jobs, violation of their labor remuneration rights, hire and fire and career promotion as well as study of their operating environment health effects.

At the time of survey the majority of our respondents (71,7%) were employed at enterprises of various ownership types in such areas as the industry (36,7%), education (18,1%), trade (16,8%), health care (9,1%).

The set of questions related to the hired labor began with the question about execution of all paperwork supporting the labor relations. As we know the investigation of any conflict arising between an employer and employee begins with the study of documents governing their labor relations so as to determine if there is a legal basis for any party‘s claims. Quality of such documents is the subject of a separate examination therefore we‘ll confine ourselves to the key potential options:

а) Documents are legally valid and do not permit any potential equivocation for the benefit of one of the parties. It is characteristic of big commercial enterprises where the job is either connected with significant financial flows or intellectual property, etc. Documents are executed by a skilled employer‘s lawyers and duly complied with.

b) Documents are formally available and provide for the execution of standard contracts. Such documents contain the non-mandatory statements of rights and responsibilities of both parties but they are practically useless in case of any debating situations. It is characteristic of medium-size private companies and public enterprises.

c) Absolute or partial absence of documents. It is characteristic of small businesses with low turnover of capital and high labor turnover. In cases when labor relations had been partially executed, for instance in a form of labor contracts or agreements only, the employer would most probably try to indemnify himself: the document would include the items, mainly providing for responsibilities of a female employee. She would be suggested to sign a sort of agreement stipulating her financial responsibilities for the employer‘s property and containing her passport data. Much more seldom the executed documents may contain the employer‘s obligations to pay some bonus for the employee‘s job and appropriate social charges.

Majority of employed women (83,9%) mentioned that their labor relations were supported by appropriate documents: with entries in their workbooks and labor contracts in place. Nevertheless there were incidents when no documents would be executed at all or they would be executed partially (for instance only a labor agreement or hire contract).

Most frequent violation in this area is the statement of undervalued salary size resulting in reduction of the corresponding social payments. Employers would use this as an opportunity to cut down their own costs connected with budget payments and explain to employees as the only chance to increase their payrolls. For example, out of total number of hired employees only 73,1% would receive the actually registered salaries, another 12,2% would receive partially registered salaries. In breakdown by sectors the worst situation appears to be in trade where 32,8 % of women indicated that their salaries had not been either supported by documents or they didn‘t know the way they were documented.

The next step after accomplishment of all hire formalities is to define a scope of all responsibilities and rights of a female employee. Of all women responding to a question "Have you been informed about your responsibilities when hired to your job?" - 70,3% of them mentioned that they had been aware of their responsibilities while the rest had not been familiarized with their duties. Such ignorance may very probably result in a situation when the scope of employee‘s responsibilities will expand or change with the time. In reality every second female respondent often has to do the job inconsistent with her direct responsibilities.

Further to the question about the scope of responsibilities we addressed another question about remuneration of the extra job. 65,8% of female respondents mentioned that they hadn‘t received any remuneration for their extra responsibilities or overtime work at all, while 11,5% who had been so paid, had problems with inadequate remuneration for the scope of extra job they may perform.

Loss of a job or even its change is a hard time for any person: he becomes more sensitive to the financial exposure, feel psychological discomfort and uncertainty. Over the last six months prior to our survey almost half of the respondents (48,2%) had gone through a situation of the lost or changed job. Among the key reasons of such change of jobs in cases of resignation the respondents mentioned either low payrolls (41,2%) or substantial delays or non-payments of the payroll (10,5%). The most significant reason for the lost job in cases when female employees had been separated against their wish was their layoff due to cut-down of jobs (18,1%), next came the company liquidation -14,7%. Whereas one third of respondents (33,6%) mentioned that in case of layoff men and women would be separated in equal proportions and two thirds emphasized that only women would be fired. The most susceptible age group among all categories includes women over 45 (47,3%), then married women (10,9%) and young mothers with babies (9,4%).

Every fifth woman (20,5%) in our survey called herself unemployed and 12,7% had been registered in the Unemployment Centers, but only few of them would try and find the job through such centers. Women would mainly view such unemployment center as a source of income, however small it might be, which the government must pay her for the unemployment. Concurrently they would be seeking for job opportunities through their friends and acquaintances or advertisements and apply directly to the companies and only small percentage would expect a real help from the unemployment center. Results seem to be justifying such behavior because unemployment centers may help to find a job only to every fifth woman in cities and every tenth unemployed woman in the rural areas.

Among the main reasons why women cannot find the job is a low payroll level and that‘s the point where the offered vacancies may be rejected. Second factor is the lack of experience and required education, then comes the age reason for those over 40. Interests of employers looking for the potential employees are mainly focused on these factors: 34,7% of employers inquired about the prior job experience, 30,6% - about appropriate education. The discriminating question about women‘s age has been still relevant among employers and had been addressed to every third job seeker. Then followed the questions which had been brought together under the headline of "family questions": about availability of children, their age, plans for future babies, marital status (single or married), if single then about marriage plans.

28,3% of respondents who had been looking for a job had to answer some or other questions related to their family responsibilities. Interviewed women expressed the opinion that the employer‘s questions about their marital status could rather have negative implications for them because they implied the available potential threat to the steady performance of occupational duties by such woman: …she has a baby and will often take sick leaves with him, if there‘s no baby then he may appear soon and we‘ll have to look for a new employee and train her" etc.). When same question are addressed to men then availability of their own families and children will rather have positive implications and add to their social reliability. Based on the family breadwinner‘s traditional stereotype he would be required a higher payroll.

At the time of our survey the majority of interviewed people (84,5%) were representing families with the income up to 10 000 rubles including payrolls of all employed family members as well as benefits, pensions, alimony, educational scholarships and other. In rural regions this indicator doesn‘t exceed 6 000 rubles, moreover seven respondents‘ families out of nine would specify their income up to 2 000 rubles (with the subsistence minimum during I quarter 2004 totaling 2293 rubles). Analysis of questions dedicated to the interrelation between the total family income and women‘s monthly payroll demonstrated that in families with the total income up to 10 000 rubles the payroll contributed by women accounted for about 60%. This means that the men‘s stereotype of family breadwinners has no real grounds whatsoever.

Evaluating their family‘s income every tenth female respondent would mention that they didn‘t have enough money to pay even for the most primitive food and their housing (such answers are very specific for rural women as they were given by every fourth country female respondent as well as families with two (36,8%) or three children (40,4% of replies)). Another one third of respondents indicated that they had just enough money to pay for the most primitive food and their housing. Only 4,6% of respondents mentioned that they had sufficient family income to cover all their current expenses.

Women would describe their psychological conditions in direct accord with their financial positions. About half of the respondents would say that "…it all goes not so good as it could be, but we can manage to make both ends meet", another one third would admit that "…it‘s very hard to live but quite bearable". Every tenth respondent would choose to answer that "…she is unable to abide such distressful situation", where country women would choose such response twice as often compared to the city women.

The next set of question was dedicated to careers and promotions over the job ladder. Every fifth female respondent would mention that the femininity "counts against her" in her career promotion (specific answer for women employed in the heavy industry and construction), 45,5% said that their femininity did not have any impact at all (specific answer for those employed in education, trade and facility services, i.e. in such sectors where women are dominating and therefore not competing with men).

Response to the question "Who in your staff may count on preferences in terms of the payroll increase or upgrading?" showed that in 62,4% of cases " they would be men of any seniority period" or simply "young men". As for the women our respondents selected from all listed categories of "young and single" or "young and married with babies" or "single with children" or "experienced and over 50" only the last category of women, who could have the preferences (16,9%).

With regard to the labor cost about 26,8% of respondents believe that men are paid much more for the same job that women. Such replies were especially typical for traditionally male sectors, such as heavy industry, communications, construction and transport. In "female" sectors, such as education, health care, culture, municipal and housing cervices the typical answer in majority of cases (72,9%) was that "men receive the same payroll". Quite a lot of respondents selected an option "I don‘t know" because in most companies the information about employees‘ payroll is kept confidential.

A separate section in our questionnaire was dedicated to the protection of women‘s labor rights. 36,9% of female respondents said that they had been unaware of their labor rights and therefore unable to protect them. 63,1% answered that they had been well aware of their labor rights and one third of them believed that would be able to protect them in case of any violation. 36,8% of respondents had the experience in protection of their labor rights.

The interviews showed that every second woman is aware of her job benefits. Among those who are entitled to such benefits 45,8% can use them (specific for government companies or big enterprises). 20,4% of respondents cannot use their benefits although they are aware of them (mainly in the small business).

The last set of questions was related to the health and factors which might effect it. Two thirds of female respondents (69,1%) find their health state satisfactory or poor. The lowest assessment of the health state was given by women of age 41-45, second came the young women of age 25-30 which appears to be a very alarming factor because they belong to the most active childbearing group.

About 80% of female respondents can fall ill once a year or more often while only 6,4% can afford an efficient medical treatment.

About half of respondents, believed that their job place complied with the health requirements although every second woman would mention suffering from either chronic or work-related diseases. Such discrepancy in answers to these two interrelated questions is explained by the fact that the health can be effected not only by the occupational environment, but also by such non-occupational factors as marital status, number of children and family income.

The health state was assessed as excellent and good by 44,9% single and 26,9% married women. The women‘s heath is also directly related to the availability of children (availability of children irrespective of their number has a negative impact on health).

With regard to the negative occupational impact on health our respondents referred here a very high job strain (47,9%), stresses in connection with the management discontent (46,6%), frequent inspections and reporting (34,7%). Majority of interviewed female participants believed that their workdays were overloaded. Even those who work less than 8 hours mentioned a high labor intensity being a cause of rather tangible discomfort for female employees.

The main fears and stresses of interviewed women relating to their professional experience are the fears not to cope with their occupational duties and therefore lose the job (among city women) or fears to lose and fail to find another job as the only source of living among country women). A question "Have you ever experienced any pressures in your job?" was positively responded by every second woman (49,2 %). They mentioned such pressures as psychological (75,2%), moral insults (20,9%), sexual harassment (2,2%), and threats (1,8%).

Among positive trends we can mention the facts that 88,7% of respondents aim at improving their professional knowledge and 44% are willing to upgrade their skills or train to another job as a chance to strengthen their existing occupational position or find a new job.

Therefore we may say that our research confirmed the key negative trends which had been highlighted in numerous works by our domestic scholars dedicated to the status of women in the area of labor and employment. This fact foregrounds the necessity to develop programs aimed at improving the employed women‘s position.

The work team of "Labor rights and employment of the population" within the project "Integration of a gender approach into the regional social policy" set the target not only to explore the situation with labor and employment in the Volga region and identify the common and specific problems of labor relations in various regions, but also review the positive experience of solving the problems and develop certain proposals to be included into the Gender Development Program of the Volga region.

Among the key imperatives the following activities appear to be most reasonable:

- Workout a gender-based comprehensive development program of professional education and occupational guidance based on the identified needs in certain specialties for all Volga areas and the region as a whole;
- Incorporate into the programs of post-secondary and higher educational institutions a special training course dedicated to the job search techniques for the graduates;
- Develop an Equal Gender Rights Training system for the government employees of all levels (including the expertise and techniques of the employment solving problems);
- Continue work on the promotion over the Volga regions of the law "Jobs Quota Assignment for Women" through:

а) establishment of an economic leverage system for the employers to comply with this law;
b) development of a penalty system for incompliance with the "Jobs Quota Assignment" law;
c) establishment of new jobs through self-employment of women;

- Reinstate the formerly closed and open new centers for social and psychological adaptation and rehabilitation of unemployed women. Resolve problems of financial support.
- Establish an inter-regional data bank of vacancies;
- Educate the common public, employers and women on their employment rights through mass media and electronic editions;
- Provide for the companies with majority of the employed female personnel the preferred rights to participate in the government tenders on the accomplishment of innovation projects;
- Encourage investments through the cut-down of credit interest rates, partial budget co-financing of the socially significant business projects of high potential women‘s employment;
- Expand the system of small credits, training and support for women employed in the informal sector of economy;
- Take into account the gender factor in execution of all collective bargaining agreements and contracts at any level;
- Create and promote a sub-program to the Program of "Small Business Support and Development" in the Volga regions aimed at supporting the female businesses with focus on such priorities as an access to investments, access to the information and creation of the employee rights protection tools;
- Continue collaboration with the legislative and executive authorities regarding the tax benefits for businessmen who employ the female labor, companies employing the labor of handicapped women and those women who raise the disabled children.
- Develop and introduce into practice of Psychological Service Centers the support programs for business women who may undergo the crisis situations in their businesses;
- Develop jointly with mass media the partnership programs on creation of a positive image of an entrepreneur woman;
- Continue research of the men‘s and women‘s positions in the labor market;
- Continue development and introduction into the national statistics of the gender-sensitive indicators relating to labor, employment and measurements of poverty.