Rotundus.com

HB Aerospace is a pioneering company ... owned by women, somewhat of a rarity in the aerospace business ... The firm, which opened five weeks ago, sells and distributes fasteners, gaskets, cables and other hardware used in the aviation industry.

It is owned by Sue Hammer and Carrie Boyer, who are backed by their husbands, Joe Hammer and Chris Boyer, who are managing partners.

Joe, a former executive for a major aerospace supplier, has worked 30 years in the manufacturing and distribution of aerospace fasteners. Chris has worked in the industry for 19 years.

A year ago, the two friends met with their wives and discussed starting a business with the women as owners, which could provide a competitive advantage with government and defense contracts, which often include preferences for minority- or women-owned companies.

Source: The Arizona Republic

Of course, neither of the wives seems to have experience working in aerospace (although one mentioned that her father worked in that industry).

And now India seems to be debating a requirement that 30% of its legislatures are female

A recent post suggested that taking notes might be a bad idea. Now here's another story suggesting that taking notes - or more particularly doodling in those notes - might help:

Good news, doodlers: What your colleagues consider a distracting, time-wasting habit may actually give you a leg up on them by helping you pay attention.

Asked to remember names they’d heard on a recording, people who doodled while listening had better recall than those who didn’t. This suggests that a slightly distracting secondary task may actually improve concentration during the performance of dull tasks that would otherwise cause a mind to wander.

- Source: A Sketchy Brain Booster: Doodling

According to a Globe and Mail article, Amazon's fight to build in Canada is sparking up again:

The rising tension between Canadian booksellers and Amazon underlines the paradox in federal policy that allows Amazon to run a virtual business – Amazon.ca – as long as it does not have a physical presence in the country.

... For consumers, Amazon's proposed new business could be a benefit if the e-tailer were to pass on operational savings to customers. The “fulfilment centre” it wants to launch is believed to be part of Amazon's move to cut costs by moving shipping in-house. Currently, Amazon has a distribution deal with a Canada Post subsidiary.

Of course, the usual "let's protect Canadian culture" claptrap is involved.

While "not work" isn't a great description of tasks of a stay-at-home mom, one of the interesting things that this article noted is that younger people are more likely to hold "traditional" views on gender roles than the rest of society.

The survey of over 24,000 adults in 23 countries, conducted by Reuters/Ipsos and released on the eve of International Women's Day, showed that people from India (54 percent), Turkey (52 percent), Japan (48 percent), China, Russia, Hungary (34 percent each) and South Korea (33 percent) were most likely to agree that women should not work.

And, perhaps surprisingly, people aged between 18 and 34 years are most likely to hold that view, not those from the older, and more traditional, generation.

Source: Calgary Herald

It's typically worth mentioning when discussing these sorts of issues that the types of households found after the industrial revolution are dramatically different from those beforehand. The kids of the '50s and '60s seems to be reacting against the stereotypes of 1950s America, but the current generation hasn't had that same experience to rebel against. Perhaps this statement from Michael Horton is worth thinking about in this context:

[M]any of the Boomers' children cannot even remember enough Norman Rockwell moments to be able to re-create a nostalgic collage. They don't necessarily want to be endless drifters, transgressing every boundary. They just don't know quite where the boundaries are - or if such a thing exists. While their parents couldn't wait to leave home, many of them long to have one. Every generation has its quirks, but from the economy to the church it is evident that our narcissism has really made a mess in this party that we've been throwing for ourselves. And we've left it for our children and grandchildren to clean up.

Source: The Gospel-Driven Life: Being Good News People in a Bad News World, p. 220

And, of course, you also see this stuff pop up in the church, as evidenced by Horton's writing about it.