Japan's Princess Sayako, 36, will marry a commoner on Tuesday and lose her status as a member of the imperial family. She has worked as an ornithologist, but will become a stay-at-home wife after the wedding.According to an article in today's Los Angeles Times, it is popular to refer to unmarried women in their 30s are "loser dogs" in Japan.
"One of four Japanese women in their early 30s are unmarried, and [popular author Junko] Sakai says they waver emotionally between relief at their independence and lament for what they might be missing," writes the Times' Bruce Wallace.
"Instead of regarding single, 30-something working women as trailblazers, many women in their 20s pity the so-called loser dogs. Those who have snared husbands are now labeled 'winner dogs,' many content to coast through life on their husbands' paychecks."
In a related story, back in September, the New York Times published an article about how an increasing number of female undergraduates at elite Ivy League colleges plan to stop working or reduce their work to part-time once they are married and start having children.
From the article by Louise Story: "The likelihood that so many young women plan to opt out of high-powered careers presents a conundrum.
" 'It really does raise this question for all of us and for the country: when we work so hard to open academics and other opportunities for women, what kind of return do we expect to get for that?' said Marlyn McGrath Lewis, director of undergraduate admissions at Harvard, who served as dean for coeducation in the late 1970's and early 1980's.
"It is a complicated issue and one that most schools have not addressed. The women they are counting on to lead society are likely to marry men who will make enough money to give them a real choice about whether to be full-time mothers, unlike those women who must work out of economic necessity."
As I understand, this is also the case with the overwhelming majority of Japanese women, though increasing numbers are continuing to work and develop their careers while raising children.