Women’s Battle for Time in Sweden
In Sweden, there is an ongoing struggle over working conditions and hours, with women-dominated trade unions at the forefront. History shows that change is possible when the labour and women’s movements unite, but despite strikes and demands for shorter working hours, progress has been modest. With increasing economic inequality and a welfare sector on the brink of collapse, Sweden now faces a critical choice: further cuts or a fairer redistribution of time and resources. Will working-class men stand alongside women, or continue to uphold a system where their work is valued more highly?
Fight to reduce working hours
In its latest negotiations, the Swedish Union of Nurses and Midwives (Vårdförbundet), which represents nurses, midwives, and hospital staff in both the public and private sectors, demanded a 15-minute daily reduction in working hours for its members. In 2024, 2,000 Vårdförbundet members were called to strike for 24 days in support of this demand, aiming to improve working conditions for those unable to work full-time under current conditions. Ultimately, just under 10 percent of members—those working nights and shifts—received a reduction of 6 minutes a day, or 30 minutes a week. However, the union has promised its members that the demand for shorter working hours will be raised again, and the fight for better time and conditions continues.
The Municipal Workers’ Union (Kommunal), which represents workers in elderly care, childcare, and some civil service sectors in Sweden, is also advocating for reduced working hours. Both the Swedish Left Party (Vänsterpartiet) and the Green Party (Miljöpartiet) have long supported reducing the standard workweek from 40 to 30 hours. While these parties remain relatively small, meaningful reforms, such as legislative changes, typically require broader political alliances or widespread public support. However, the issue has gained new momentum within the Social Democratic Party (Socialdemokraterna) in 2024, after an internal working group proposed working hour reductions as part of a broader effort to create a more sustainable working life. It is no coincidence that the call for reduced working hours is gaining traction in Sweden at this moment.
Wealth distribution
For many years, Sweden was regarded as the most gender-equal country in the world, with its historical conditions playing a key role in this distinction. Sweden has not been at war for 200 years, and a combination of peace and natural resources allowed for the accumulation of great national wealth. However, achieving an equal distribution of these resources required further organisation.
The industrialisation of the early 1900s led to urbanisation and the rise of a growing working class that demanded better working conditions and political influence. This period also saw the emergence of popular movements, such as the temperance and women’s movements. The fear that revolutionary movements, sparked by World War I, might spread to Sweden prompted the government to agree to these demands in order to maintain social peace.
From potato riots to welfare state
One such event is the so-called “potato uprising.” In 1917, Sweden faced food shortages and famine, while traders and the rich hoarded and speculated in food. Protests and hunger riots erupted as people demanded peace, democracy—and potatoes. At the forefront were working-class women, who took direct action by forcefully entering warehouses and grocery stores, demanding full inventories and reasonable prices. These potato riots not only led to price regulation and improved food supplies, but also sparked significant political changes. They helped topple the conservative right-wing government and accelerated the introduction of equal and universal suffrage just a few years later. This joint struggle between the labour and women’s movements, with working-class women leading the charge, made history.
From the end of World War II until the 1980s, Swedish politics remained shaped by a strong labour movement and the development of a robust welfare state. Several gender equality reforms were introduced, including childcare, elderly care, laws against wage discrimination, and generous parental insurance. Rapid industrialisation and welfare expansion created conditions for women’s paid work. Today, workforce participation for both women and men in Sweden is nearly equal, with an employment rate just over 80 percent for both genders.
Ongoing gender segregation
Despite high employment rates, gender segregation in the workforce has persisted. Feminist economist Heidi Hartman’s research explains how men actively organised to maintain this segregation, even amid growing demand for an expanded workforce. She describes this as patriarchy and capitalism working in tandem. According to Hartman, preserving gender segregation in the workplace was key for men to maintain control over women’s labour, even as women moved from domestic labour to the formal labour market. Capitalism benefited from patriarchy by securing cheaper labour and a divided working class. Women were excluded from certain professions: they were not allowed to hold government jobs until 1925 and were barred from serving in combat roles until 1989. Married women needed a permit to work until 1939, and joint taxation, which made it less financially beneficial for women to work if their husbands had an income, persisted until 1971.
The norm of the man as the family breadwinner has been—and remains—strong in Sweden, leading to a highly gender-segregated labour market that persists today. Hartman argues that working-class men chose to preserve their patriarchal advantages and maintain gender segregation in the workforce, rather than uniting with working women to challenge capital. This decision, she claims, went against their own class interests. As a result, Sweden paradoxically has one of the most gender-segregated labour markets in the world. Of the 30 largest occupations in Sweden, only four exhibit an even gender distribution. Stereotypes about women as caregivers persist, with women predominantly working in people-oriented roles, such as care services, while men are more likely to work with things, like machinery or technology.
Undervalued labour
Not only is work divided by gender, but it is also valued differently. In 2023, the Swedish organisation Lönelotsarna conducted a job evaluation comparing male- and female-dominated occupations. The study found that, despite these occupations being equivalent in terms of education, responsibilities, and stress levels, the pay gap between male- and female-dominated jobs was 20 percent. This disparity is also reflected in how young people choose their vocational training. A survey of 2,600 young people about their educational choices revealed that boys tend to avoid care professions because they are perceived as too low-status.
Since the 1980s, the organisation and financing of the public sector, particularly the social sector, has undergone significant changes. Efforts to make the sector “more efficient” and “more productive” have coincided with an increased opening to private investors. This process has transformed parts of the healthcare sector into a lucrative industry, with returns on investment that other sectors can only envy. In 2021, the return on equity for healthcare companies averaged 29 percent (25 percent for care companies), compared to 14.5 percent for the service sector as a whole. As large amounts of public money continue to flow into the privatised welfare sector, it appears much of this is being converted into private profits rather than being reinvested in health and social care. The privatisation of care also has severe consequences for working conditions in the sector.
Welfare cuts and workload problems
During the financial crisis of the 1990s, major cuts were made to the welfare sector, resulting in a loss of 200,000 jobs in 1993 and 1994 alone. Between 1990 and 2021, the number of nurses increased by just 9 percent, while the population grew by 23 percent. At the same time, 13,000 trained nurses were not working in their profession due to unsatisfactory working conditions.
A 2023 survey compared working conditions in the most female-dominated and male-dominated occupations across 244 of Sweden’s municipalities and regions, revealing significant differences at both local and national levels. Less than half of employees in the most female-dominated professions work full-time, with part-time work being a major factor in the gender income gap in Sweden. The primary reasons for part-time work are a lack of full-time job offers, followed by “personal reasons” (including the psychological strain of the job and caregiving responsibilities).
The survey also revealed significant differences in the number of employees per manager. Male-dominated occupations typically had fewer than 20 employees per manager, while female-dominated occupations often had more than 30 employees per manager. The number of employees per manager clearly impacts the manager’s ability to effectively perform their duties. According to the Swedish National Board of Health and Welfare, a manager overseeing 15 employees requires about 1,200 hours per year for personnel management tasks. However, with 30 employees, this increases to 1,800 hours, while the available working time is only 1,750 hours (assuming five weeks of vacation and no illness or other absences).
Rising stress levels
As the governance of welfare has become more “streamlined,” with middle managers distanced from employees, micromanagement and control have increased, while trust has diminished. The lack of professional support at work, coupled with rising micromanagement, heightens the emotional stress of caregiving, potentially leading to ill health. This situation is exacerbated by the nature of the work itself: care recipients require specific help, regardless of how many minutes are allocated. The stress of being unable to provide quality care is particularly high in professions that involve working with and caring for people.
Unsurprisingly, then, sick leave is higher in female-dominated occupations (regardless, it must be added, of the gender of the worker). Poor working conditions are contributing to ill health, and the situation has worsened since the welfare cuts of the 1990s, when fatigue syndrome was first recognised in Sweden. Welfare workers—primarily women—have continued to pay with their health ever since. In 2024, sick leave due to stress-related illnesses reached an all-time high in Sweden. The Swedish agency Försäkringskassan, which pays sickness benefits, states bluntly:
“The shift in sickness absence towards psychiatric diagnoses has been ongoing for a long time. Already in the 1990s, the number of sickness cases increased… An important explanation was increased demands and reduced resources in health, education, and care (welfare services) due to austerity measures in connection with the deep economic crisis. Three decades later, this structural problem still persists in the welfare sector, with the highest sickness absence in the Swedish labour market.”
Clearly, while this problem is not new, it is escalating.
Demanding time to live
What does it mean when a women-dominated trade union movement is pushing for better working conditions and shorter working hours? To grasp the radical nature of these demands, it is essential to consider Sweden’s current economic situation. Economic inequality is on the rise, and the country has fallen from the top position to 26th place on the global equality index. Sweden is experiencing its worst income inequality in 50 years, and the gender pay gap has widened alongside it.
In the 1980s, a CEO in the 50 largest Swedish companies earned nine times the salary of an industrial worker; today, that figure has skyrocketed to 71 times. Sweden’s right-wing government is in power with the support of a far-right party with Nazi roots, and the left and labour movement have been pushed back. In this context, women-dominated trade unions are not only demanding a bigger share of the wage space but also calling for a fundamental change in how the workforce is organised and how working conditions are structured. They are demanding the time to live.
A radical turning point
These issues also hold radical potential because we are at a turning point. In the coming years, over 400,000 people will be needed to work in Sweden’s welfare sector, leading to a looming labour shortage in female-dominated professions. Many workers in these fields are already choosing to leave due to poor working conditions, while those who remain are increasingly falling ill. Change is not just necessary—it is inevitable, or the system will collapse.
What that change should look like is the crux of the battle. Employers and Sweden’s right-wing prime minister are proposing measures like raising the retirement age and installing cameras to monitor the elderly in the absence of staff. In contrast, the women-dominated trade unions are demanding shorter working hours, sustainable working conditions, and more influence over their work. These demands have the potential to reshape how time and finances are allocated, prioritizing needs, care, and quality of life over cuts and profit maximisation.
Labour movement unity
The question now is how the more male-dominated sectors of the labour movement will position themselves in practice. At the 2024 Swedish Trade Union Confederation congress, several unions called for a more active stance in support of a statutory reduction in working hours, from 40 to 30 hours a week. However, the large, male-dominated union was reluctant to prioritise this issue. Instead, a compromise was reached to address it within the agreements each union negotiates with employers, which removed the pressure for political change that could have been exerted if the Confederation had pushed for legislative action.
So, here we stand in 2025 on the issue of class and gender in Sweden. Will working women, like those in the potato riots, once again lead the charge and rally men to support reforms that challenge the very rules of work and the power of capital? Or will the men of the labour movement opt for a division of labour where their work is valued more highly, both in prestige and pay, simply because of their gender? If they choose this path, it will continue to be at the expense of women. Together, we must demand time to live.
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Sköterskestrejken avslutad – vad kan vi lära oss? » Veckans Nyheter
Sveriges BNP per capita | 1960-2023 Data | 2024-2025 Prognos
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Martina Skrak is a former municipal commissioner for gender equality in Malmö. She currently works as a government expert on gender equality, with a particular focus on economic equality in Sweden.