Pay Equity Rally
On the 30th of June over 300 unionists and supporters braved cold conditions to rally outside parliament in Wellington,in support of pay equity for women. Their banners and placards showed representation at the protest by Nurses, Railworkers, teaching support staff, fast food workers, public sector employees and others.
Despite being the first country to give women the vote and decades of subsequent legislation, women here as elsewhere around the world, continue to find themselves behind men in their socio-economic conditions. One sign of this, is official statistics showing that on average women in Aotearoa earn 12% less than men. Many women work in sectors characterised by precarious employment conditions, move in and out of the workorce to a greater degree than men and perform a lot of valuable unpaid work such as raising children. The raw figures therefore understate the extent to which their labour is undervalued both in real terms and pure capitalistic economic measurements.
The government has shown itself at a loss in dealing with the current economic recession. It has done little beyond a 'jobs summit' stunt to share ideas amongst employers and has recently expressed the intention of forcing beneficiaries into training with Mc Donalds fast foods stores. It has also announced the abolition of the pay equity unit of the Ministry of Labour and the loss of jobs in the Ministry for Social Development. These combined measures strongly indicate that women can expect no improvement in conditions any time soon either in terms of economic change or the nature of governmental frameworks. While attendees at the rally listened to parliamentarians from the Green Party and Labour Party, there is scant reason to put their hopes in these parties as saviours. During 9 years in office during the 1990s-2000's Labour did nothing beyond modifying the worst excesses of previous neo-liberal governments (including Labour administrations in the 1980's which put into place vicious privatisation measures that established the present elite economic consensus) while continuing to push similar overall policies itself.
The path out of inequality for women, (not just on the issue of pay equity), doesn't lie in investing their hopes in tired schemes of voting for one government or another. A better option in the longer term is to be found in empowering themselves by working with each other and other sections of the working class in their communities and workplaces, to change the entire system that creates structural, systemic economic inequality in the first place. This will not solve all their problems, but it has to be a key component in any struggle for women to be truly free.
Comments
Studies have shown that, when
Studies have shown that, when controlling for education and experience, woman earn the same as men. </discussion>
Pay equity hard data
You don't say what study you refer to Frank, but here are the results of a recent and real one.
A big gender pay gap has been revealed in one of the first pay and employment equity reviews to be conducted in local government in New Zealand.
Gisborne District Council, with 265 permanent staff, has a 46 per cent female to 54 per cent male workforce split.
The median full time equivalent (FTE) salary of female staff within the Council is 78.4% of the median FTE salary of male staff.
The median actual salary (taking account of part time work) of female staff is 79.3% of the median actual salary of male staff.
A little over half the women earn less than $40,000 compared to 26 per cent of men, while 27% of men earn more than $60,000 compared to only 7% of women.
The gender pay gap is partly due to occupational segregation.
The workforce data showed women concentrated as librarians, call centre operators, clerical workers, secretaries (100%) and planners while men dominated engineering (100%), specialist managers(100%0 and managers (84%) and technicians and trade workers(1005). Lifeguards were predominately male (70%) compared to 30% women.
These findings from Gisborne are consistent with the general claims being made at the moment in opposition to gender inequality.
Sadly I didn't bookmark the
Sadly I didn't bookmark the study but refering to your study, as you state the pay gap is due to occupational segregation.
Besides the lifeguards, arguably the occupation that are male dominated are those that require education and experience. More experience and education = more money.
If a female enigineer was to be appointed, she should expect to be paid a salary on par with that of a male with the same education and experience. Thus no inequality.
Frank, read the passage more
Frank, read the passage more carefully. The pay gap in that Gisborne study is only PARTLY due to occupational segregation.
Gender injustice is wider and deeper than you seem to believe.
As EEO Commissioner Dr Judy McGregor noted when speaking on International Women’s Day earlier this year:
"Pay and employment equity reviews conducted recently in 39 Government departments and 21 District Health Boards showed there was still significant gender-based pay inequality with women earning on average between 3% and 35% less than men. Women’s starting salaries were also lower than men’s for similar jobs."
“The pay investigation of education support workers who work with special needs children in schools shows they are paid $7.57 less per hour than Corrections Officers, a job that’s been evaluated as a similar size, at the lower end of their pay scale. At the upper end of their pay scale the difference is $4.07."
“Female special education support workers were also paid a $1 less average hourly rate than their male counterparts, even though the women had on average longer service"
I think too, that the value of work ought not to be only judged only on the basis of experience and education. Take, for example, patient care in rest homes. This work, which does not demand high academic qualifications is traditionally done by very poorly paid women. It is also extremely mentally and physically draining work that demands much patience and a big heart and it is absolutely socially necessary. Capitalist values have showed they are totally inadequate to address that sort of injustice.
Frank, given that engineering
Frank, given that engineering and senior management occupations in the survey were 100% male, you'd need to explain how lack of "education and experience" would be sufficient explanation given the fact that it's about a century since women started graduating from universities in New Zealand and there are thousands of women in New Zealand with engineering and management degrees.
Cheers,
John
This thread could be titled
This thread could be titled "Watch out for the sexists: Pay Equity back in the news". Look out for Frank's next study "How to pick up women: hit them over the head with your mammoth thighbone and drag them by the hair into your cave". But seriously, Frank your alleged studies fail to control for too many things, especially ethnicity and social class. In the 1970s and 1980s affluent, Pakeha women organised marches for Pay Equity -> now most women who have close to that are affluent, Pakeha women. Pay Equity has never existed for lower class, Maori and Pasifika women. The concept of Pay Equity, in so much as it concentrates on paid employment, ignores the thousands of women in Aotearoa / New Zealand who do unpaid labour, such as work in the community and raising children.