To think the future for women in the work place is looking pretty bleak at the moment?

[KittyRainbow]

Just that really. While I understand why certain measures are being taken to slow the spread of C19. I am struggling with how much more it is affecting me than my husband.

We both work full time, and have 3 DC (nursery, primary and early secondary age) We have always had a pretty equal approach to childcare, taking turns with sick days, appointments etc but he does earn 3 times what I do (despite me having more education and better qualifications than him)

My eldest (12) will not be going back to school until September and we have been told that it will likely be part time in school, part time learning at home.
Likewise my middle, who starts reception in September. Again we've been told it will likely be part time. My youngest attends 2 childcare settings. She is only allowed to return to one for now and neither can take her full time.

My husband is due back at work from furlough FT from June 1st. My work have been great, I am currently working FT at home and they've been very understanding so far (helps that he's been on furlough as he has been able to take the children away for conference calls etc) and have no concerns about me being lone carer from June.

BUT they've said that they will expect people to be back in the office from Sept. Most of my colleagues are men and are fine with that.

I will not be able to do that unless schools and nurseries go back FT. Almost every woman I know is in the same boat. Even my secondary age child will need input at home. There is 0 chance she will sit and do school work if she is left at home alone. The smaller two obviously need constant supervision. Husband's work cannot be done from home. Mine can but not with the children around.

AIBU to think that all of the PT school/childcare etc is going to affect women far more than men, and to think that moving forward we will see a trend towards far less women in the workplace?

I think SPL could and should be a game changer and we need to look at the reasons why it hasn't been

In my case, shared parental leave (for my second) wasn’t ever viable because:

1. my work found it far easier to get a 1 year fixed term secondment in to cover me. 6-9m would have been harder for them
2. getting a 3-6 month cover for my husband would have meant bringing in an interim director at high cost. Culturally that was unlikely to happen at his place of work.
3. financially, I had a great mat leave package, my husband would have got smp only
4. for the last 3 months of unpaid leave, it would have cost us too much for him to be unpaid instead of me. Financially it just didn’t make sense.

Oh @Pelleas bore off! We all know you're far more superior than the normal people on this thread you don't have to keep screeching about "lifestyle choices"

I do also agree that many women, dont want shared parental leave. They feel something is taken away from them. And thats i my experience of managing people and knowing people in real life

It's mine too. This is obviously anecdotal, but as a manager when SPL came in in 2015 and for several years afterwards, I oversaw many women in my teams transition to maternity leave. Part of my role in the process was to explain the maternity options offered by the company, including how SPL worked. Without exception no one was interested. Reactions ranged from indifference to actual hostility - I remember one woman saying 'there's no way he's having my maternity leave!'. And that's the problem - it's not even being considered by most as an option - not even being assessed for viability before being dismissed.

I totally understand how the financial side of SPL works ,but we should be looking at the structural reasons behind that
Having said that it cost us £(pre SPL) days to preserve my career but was worth it in the long run,financially and otherwise
Have seen so many women give up or scale back their career only to regret it long term
So easy to give up ,perhaps at a time of crisis,so hard to get it back

GeneGenie There's no point in engaging with you because you're not taking anything I say seriously.

I agree @KittyRainbow Without meaning to Sound smug, this is the one time I’m glad I had my son at 19 because he’s 18 now so this doesn’t affect me. Most of my colleagues my age have got kids of primary school age and even younger. No idea how they are coping as I know I wouldn’t have coped

Why is it vile and revolting to point out that most women have choices about whether they want to concentrate on their careers or their children?

My mother always told my sister and i to make sure that we never have to depend on a man for money. Neither of us ever have.

Maybe instead of arguing on the internet we, as a society - childfree amd parents - should be working to ensure that the current generation of children of both sexes have the same chances and the same choices? That girls don't think they have to marry a rich man. That boys feel able to take on caring responsibilities?

There's no point in engaging with you because you're not taking anything I say seriously

Because you don't know what you're talking about. You're lecturing mother's on what they should do and you don't even have kids.

Why is it vile and revolting to point out that most women have choices about whether they want to concentrate on their careers or their children?

Yes of course everyone has a choice. I haven't not concentrated on my career! But here I am left in a shit position where I might have to give up work and it's all my own fault.

My mother always told my sister and i to make sure that we never have to depend on a man for money. Neither of us ever have

I don't depend on a man for money either. We as a couple depend on both of us working. That was fine until schooling was abolished overnight.

Maybe instead of arguing on the internet we, as a society - childfree amd parents - should be working to ensure that the current generation of children of both sexes have the same chances and the same choices? That girls don't think they have to marry a rich man. That boys feel able to take on caring responsibilities?

Yes we should but as I've said several times lecturing women on the internet about how it's all their own fault is not the way to do that.

I don't think "depending on a man for money" is the same as working as a team with different responsibilities at different times during a marriage or partnership.

And part of that working together should be for mothers to show a little bit of respect for women who have either made a different decision to them, or had that decision forced upon them. Stop dismissing what no parents say ams think just because we don't have children. We are all part of society and are generally pretty clued up on what's going on. It makes us feel like lesser human beings ams, guess what, makes US less likely to support you.

I didn't even mention the word parents.

@hammeringinmyhead we cross posted. My reply was in response to ones above you. I totally agree with what you're saying - I've been in both positions at different points jn my life, as have many couples.

@TrustTheGeneGenie so you don’t accept what @Pelleas is saying cuz she isn’t a mum. Right. I’m a mum and as I’ve said before in this thread I agree completely with what she’s saying. We can’t blame always society for our own decisions. Sometimes we might take them trying to find a quick best solution to our problems but this might not be long term the best.

Mn is full of mums whose partners never lifted a finger for their babies and yet continue having kids wit. Them. And then 10 years down the line they realise they’ve given up their career they won’t be employed anywhere and if they do the their roles will be secondary comparing to their partners. It’s not society who has enabled it but couples.

There have been some shocking attitudes to non-mothers on this thread - right on the first page, someone told me that not having children was akin to wanting to 'be like a man'.

The non-parents are in many cases those who have been holding the fort and picking up extra work for colleagues who can't work or can't do their normal share due to childcare. It's in all our interests to find a solution where the burden of childcare doesn't fall on one person (where there are two parents available) so that as a consequence, the entire work burden doesn't fall on that person's colleagues in the workplace. We all need to share the load both in the workplace and at home.

I know plenty of couples who both have to concentrate on careers or they would not have enough money to have children! And, indeed, they absolutely should feel able to have a great career. Both of them.

Children do cost money. Some mums (and dads) do decide to slow down with their careers, take a break, or stay at home forever, but many do not have that choice. They both need to work and women need to have a career too. Otherwise we might as well go back to the 50s.

Circumstances, at the moment, will make it very difficult for the least well paid person to carry on working fully if the childcare is not in place. Frequently that is the mum. So yes, OP, its not choice. It is forced upon people.

I have no doubt there will be many grandparents giving up jobs to help! That also brings its own problems. They also might need to work for various reasons. Never mind the 3 million unemployed just around the corner. They might like childcare jobs but higher earning people might not like that idea. It could be about the only way out of this mess for working parents though.

People without children will rely on those children to pay taxes in the futurre for their benefits, old age pension and the NHS etc. You might feel you take the burden now, but you put the burden on these chidren later. It is how society works. Retired people pay less tax. They get all sorts of tax breaks and discounts and handouts. Younger people, the children of today, will be paying for this. That is why we support parents to provide the valuable service of bringing up young people.

Circumstances, at the moment, will make it very difficult for the least well paid person to carry on working fully if the childcare is not in place. Frequently that is the mum.

But what we need to do is look at how we can change 'frequently that is the mum' to a more 50/50 situation.

@TrustTheGeneGenie
100% behind you and your points.

When people in this thread are going on about "choice", how it's a choice to have this career, or marry this person, or live in this place etc it's what I think of a stereotypical position of a person who has no understanding of the many complexities that govern the situation of anyone - female or male.

Let's try this: let's say you're a born a child in a very poor background, surrounding by crime and abuse, and no one around you have ever gone to school etc. Is it surprising when this child grows up they end up, let's say, not in the same position as the boy who went to Eton? Yet @pelleas would argue it was his "choice" he could have gone to school, after all schooling is available to all in the uk, and taken a loan and gone to university etc etc.

This is an extreme position but like other posters have said it's not always choice how much you earn, whether both of you have to work. And also it's not a choice what sort of parent you become and how your partner rises to the occasion. And if your partner doesn't rise to the occasion and says "this doesn't make sense, I earn a £250k a year and you earn £25k, why don't you take a couple of years out till kids are in nursery?" Do you Ltb because he earned too much?

Your position is so narrow minded and frightening to me. I hope more people don't think like this to be honest (I don't mean to be rude)

That is why we support parents to provide the valuable service of bringing up young people.

No one is grudging support to parents. What I'm saying is that the burden of childcare should be split between the parents, so in turn each parent can continue to do a greater share in the workplace.

We can’t blame always society for our own decisions. Sometimes we might take them trying to find a quick best solution to our problems but this might not be long term the best

We can blame society for this problem. Like i say in a normal world my decisions have been fine. I can't blame myself for the way the government have reacted to a global pandemic.

@TrustTheGeneGenie Im Spanish so I’ve seen the way this gov has acted against the pandemic and so regarding the kids and guess what. They’ve done exactly the same. In fact in Spain many working families are already back at work. Pubs , hairdressers , beauty salons , are opened in Spain.
Most of my friends have had to asked unpaid leave as the schools are closed. At least in this country you can asked to be furloughed because of childcare. In Spain you can’t.
You can blame the English government for their decisions but every single country has done the same

There have been some shocking attitudes to non-mothers on this thread - right on the first page, someone told me that not having children was akin to wanting to 'be like a man

If we're ever going to have a proper conversation about society's attitudes to women then the absolutely disgusting views that some people (mostly women I'm sad to say) have towards women who don't have children for whatever reason needs to be dealt with. But of course it won't. We'll just be dismissed, insulted, stereotyped and insulted and then asked why we dare to be on here.

Women have choices. Sorry, but we do thanks to those amazing women who fought for us to have them. There is still work to be done, but at the end of the day - we have choices. Own your choice.

Every single country hasn't done the same but ok.

But it's okay to have disgusting views against women who dare to have children.