Did World War II liberate American women? World War II liberated American women. After Pearl Harbor, in fact, employers openly encouraged women to join the industrial labor pool. In 1947, 37% of all adults in the United States were in the labor force. Married women accounted for more than 70% of the increase in female employees, a significant shift from traditional patterns in which the vast majority of working women were young and single. It has also been criticized that they lost their jobs soon after the war ended. But not everyone lost their jobs. Many of them who wished to continue working kept their positions safe. Since they had already paved the way to employment, it was not difficult for them to work in different places where they had never woken up before. The Most Significant Change Wrought by World War II American women represent the end of sex segregation in the workforce. Before, they could do some so-called women's jobs and live life as housewives. But during World War II they were employed in indifferent manufacturing jobs, and the work they performed challenged the prevailing definition of femininity. Black women were able to benefit more from World War II. Before the war, most black women were relegated to white women's kitchens. In 1940, two-thirds of employed black women worked as domestic servants in Los Angeles. By 1950, this percentage dropped to 40 percent and was accompanied by an increase in black women in the durable goods manufacturing industry. Several criticisms were leveled at the fact that women had to leave their jobs to make space available for men returning from war. But the war had changed the perspective of the nature of the work women did before the war. The war gave women more freedom than they had ever had before.