Just in case you missed it, Kay Hymowitz had a good piece in Friday’s Wall Street Journal on the latest incursion into a previously all-male bastion:
While Hillary Clinton attempts to storm the Oval Office, some of her less renowned sisters are busy liberating one of the few other remaining male strongholds: the hardware store. Strange as it sounds in a country still steeped in Tim Allen reruns, gals are becoming fix-it guys.
“It’s not hard to see what’s driving the fad: Women are increasingly home alone and emboldened. Perhaps the largest group eager to seize the pink hammer is single young women. Many of today’s young women are marrying well into their 20s; an increasing number are waiting until their 30s. But they often aren’t waiting for that gold band before they commit to a house or condo. The National Association of Realtors reports that in 2006 single women made up 22% of the U.S. real-estate market; the median age for first-time single female buyers was 32. It helps that having grown up with computers, cellphones and iPods, this you-go-girl! generation doesn’t look at small machinery the way Barbie looked at math. These women are not only gung-ho about buying a home on their own dime; they’re ready to lay the tile and patch the drywall too.”