A key contributing factor to this reduction is the large-scale downsizing in the Stateowned and collectively-owned enterprises since the mid-1990s where women had been disproportionately selected for redundancy (Cooke, 2005). Similar waves of downsizing also took place in recent years in the public sector and Government organizations (Cooke, 2005), although the scale has been much smaller and with less damaging effect to women employees. For a number of reasons including age, education, skill portfolio and job preference, retrenched women workers tend to encounter more difficulties, and often discrimination, than men in regaining employment (Cooke, 2005; Lu and Zhao, 2002).