PEI women in poverty: Obstacles to obtaining and maintaining employment

In 2011, the PEI provincial government asked PEI Islanders what they thought should be done to reduce poverty in PEI, which resulted in a follow-up plan. The goal of this plan, called the Social Action Plan to Reduce Poverty (SAPRP), is to support those in poverty enough so that they may become self-sufficient and stay out of poverty. One essential aspect of an individual's ability to become self-sufficient is employment; thus helping Islanders to obtain and maintain employment is key to reducing poverty in PEI. The issue of employability is not simple, as is acknowledged by the SAPRP's discussion of vulnerable groups in PEI, such as women, people with disabilities, and recent immigrants. Although SAPRP acknowledges that some groups are more vulnerable than others when it comes to poverty, it fails to take into account the ways in which such vulnerable groups experience poverty and employment barriers differently than other populations. This paper explores six Island women's experiences of employment barriers in their own words, taken from interviews that were part of a series of liberation psychology workshops for an ongoing participatory action research project with Women's Network PEI. These interviews were analyzed using interpretative phenomenological analysis methods, from the standpoint of feminist psychology, which emphasizes that women's experience has long been underrepresented in research. Major themes generated from the participants' interviews include: society's unrealistic standards for employment, various forms of oppression experienced by vulnerable women, the role strain of motherhood, and personal struggles. These themes as well as the literature on vulnerable populations and employability are used to make some recommendations for the provincial government's poverty eradication strategy and shed some light on the unique experiences and life circumstances of PEI women living in poverty.