More mothers sought jobs outside the home. Those that did stay home no longer wore dowdy housedresses, but found the casual pants and tops they were used to wearing for sports to be comfortable and convenient not only for working in the home, but also for transporting the children of the baby boom or for picking up commuting husbands. Boys were more conservative, strenuosly resisting short pants for dress wear. Europe Dress styles were decidedly more formal and conservative in every large city in Europe, than in our casual and easygoing United States. Girls are dressed to look like girls and boys to look like boys.
Children stay children in Europe until they are well along in their teens.
Boys dressed up in short pants suits and knee socks until they are at least 13 or 14, some even longer. Short pants suits were worn even in the Winter. On the Continent at the beginning of the decade quite old boys still wore short pants suit, but by the later part of the decade it became rarer to see boys over 13 so dressed. French and Italian elementary boys still wore smocks to school, usually over short pants. Many fashion writers seem to think this a sensible and attractive mode of dress.