Motherhood 'devastates' women's earnings - well, obviously!

[neenztwinz]

www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2009/jul/10/mothers-wages-fawcett-society

I know it's not fair and it's not equal opportunities that men can have babies and not be affected in the workplace whereas women are affected enormously, but isn't this just obvious and something we should accept when we decide to have children?

If you don't want your earnings affected by having kids, don't have them, or get your partner to stop working to look after your kids while you go back to work. Then your wages won't be affected. But you have to accept, surely, that when you have kids you will not be able to earn as much as before?

The article doesn't acknowledge that lots of women don't want to earn as much or work as much after they have kids. It says something should be done to redress the balance so that women can earn as much as men after having kids. But the govt should be making it more attractive for women to stay at home and look after their own kids, if that is what they want, rather than thinking of ways to push us all back to work and become as 'successful' as men.

most important point of that whole report is her conclusion tbh

'Poor access to childcare is the main reason for this disparity, the report concludes' (says we have little access to affordable childcare)

think we can all agree with that

A woman has the right to return to her job at the same level of pay after statutory maternity leave. If she doesn't want her job back, then it's hardly reasonable to complain about not retaining the same salary and conditions is it!

stillstanding - the figures you quote are based on the fact that many women do have long periods of time out of the workplace, or working reduced hours, and are therefore not going to move up salary scales as fast as someone who doesn't!

I have no personal axe to grind here. I worked part time for a few years when my children were very small. I returned to full time pretty quickly, but my salary is still slightly behind that of colleagues who have been full time workers right the way through. Perfectly reasonable! Likewise, my pension pot is slightly less full than my DHs.

A woman who is paid less than a male counterpart for the same or equivalent job can take legal action - that's sexual discrimination. And vice versa. (There was quite a high profile case recently where male workers were awarded compensation because they'd been paid less than women in an equivalent job). But don't confuse that with women who choose to work fewer hours, or take long periods of time off.

Sorry but that's rubbish, violethill.

I have no problem with a woman's pay being "suspended", if you will, while she is on mat leave (despite that being illegal and all but hey ho) or that a woman who works 3/5ths of full time earns 3/5th of full time salary and moves up the salary scale 3/5ths as fast. All proportionate.

The point is that isn't what happens. The person is, in the vast majority of cases, instead penalised. Very, very heavily.

It seems that your experience is different as you have not been disadvantaged by your taking time off apart from - as you say fairly - being held back a bit by the actual time you took off. You should count yourself very lucky for that. But you should certainly not stick your head in the sand, ignore the facts and believe that your situation is the norm. Because it blatantly isn't.

The reality is that there is a very large pay gap between women and men and while I couldn't agree more that where a woman is paid less than a male counterpart for the same job it is sexual discriminiation, I do disagree that it is not happening all the time in most industries.

Cases like you mention are starting to address that. Is the report cited in The Guardian. But seriously is quite confusing, if not downright alarming, that you think that sexual discrimination is not actually prevalent in the workplace. And with devasting effects.

You seem to be spouting a lot of rhetoric stillstanding, but not actually going behind the statistics to look at why they are as they are.

Yes, there is a pay gap between genders - precisely because of the reasons I've outlined. Because loads more women than men choose to work part time, or have career breaks.

It's very easy to say that discrimination is 'the norm' in industry all over the place - well, back that up with sound evidence and you might have a point. But the fact that a pay gap exists because a much larger proportion of women than men have chosen to work less, is not evidence of discrimination - it's simply evidence of choice! What exactly are all these 'heavy penalties' you describe?

"most important point of that whole report is her conclusion tbh

'Poor access to childcare is the main reason for this disparity, the report concludes' (says we have little access to affordable childcare)

think we can all agree with that"

I dunno if I would actually.Need to think some more about it

I'm not totally convinced by that either MT. I think a lot of women choose to work part time, or not at all, because it's what they personally want, not necessarily because of a lack of childcare. Certainly many of my colleagues who have older children, and don't need childcare anyway, still work part time. A lot of them returned on 3 or 4 days after having kids, and have stayed on that even though the children are now teenagers! So you can't really put that down to childcare.

Violethill, I started to google this to provide you with loads of articles etc but it really was quite overwhelming and I got bored.

And I then I just thought that if you can't just see it - all the discrimination around you in the pay gap, in the hugely disproportionate number of men to women in high-earning jobs, in the daily articles on the subject, in the fact that organisations/govt/think tanks etc are setting up investigations etc to address this very issue which most regard as endemic - then I am certainly not going to be able to show it to you with all the links in the world because you simply have to have been exposed to it and yet somehow dismiss it all.

I wish I lived in the utopian world that you apparently do. Must be glorious.

Incidentally (because I just can't go to bed without pointing this out although so bloomin' obvious, I know!) the research does control for this, you know.

I mean - in the figures quoted in the article the OP posted for example - they are not just comparing some newly-qualifed girl fresh out of school with an 50 year male CEO. They compare like-for-like, experience with experience and women - continually - come up short.

you should be paid for the job you do no matter which sex.....
but yes, mothers often do chose to reduce their career...

oh I meant we could agree that there was poor access to childcare not necessarily that it caused the disparity (though reading my post, I can see why you thought I was agreeing with her conclusion!)

Though I do think it is a contributory factor.

I was thinking about this last night. Almost all CEOs I know or have worked with have stay at home wives (they are all male the CEOs). Because of this they have total flexibility to travel where and when they need to and can work ridiculous hours. I also think it can mean (not always) that they have less understanding of what it is like to have to come back at a certain hour, look after children when they are ill etc.

As violethill pointed out, lots of women choose to downgrade their careers (some choose not to work at all) but there are also lots who cannot return at all because they cannot access the childcare they need at a price that makes it worthwhile them returning to work.

This results in less women working which I think can result in devaluing women in the workplace (in the eyes of employers). It is certainly discrimination and several high profile people (like Alan Sugar) have now said faced with a woman of childbearing age and a man, they know what choice they'd make!

Interestingly, I read the other day that there are now more female medical students than male. Which should mean in the future that there are more female doctors than male. I think it will be interesting to watch and see what happens with that. I know our GP surgery has full on flexible working already (as does the other GP surgery here) where most of the GPs only work 3 days a week and I wonder whether some of these flexible working practices mean being a GP is more attractive to a trainee doctor.

But in general, I think a lot of men (and it is mainly men) get away with working silly hours because they have a partner at home who absorbs that. Because they seem to have this 'committment' to work, men are often favoured over women. We need a complete change in thought processes about work and family life before any of this discrimination will change.

I also think, re childcare in this country, that the most flexible forms of childcare are only accessible to those who earn the most.

So the people who can have au pairs/live in nannies (the cheapest, most flexible childcare) are those who can afford large houses for them to live in.

Then there are live out nannies only accessible by those with above average salaries.

Most people I know who work on lower incomes can only do so because they have family help or they shift work (so one parent at home while the other works) which can put a lot of pressure on the family unit.

Kingsley Browne is one of the foremost contep. thinkers on this subject

You can read online for free

books.google.co.uk/books?id=vq_0BUkcZ5MC&dq=Kingsley+Browne&printsec=frontcover&source=an&hl=en&ei=P HdhSrbSIoKsjAft6r3-Dw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4

Page 36 on the 'glass ceiling'

My third baby and maternity leave cost me at least 5 grand in salary because my career took a dive. I found too my surprise (naive) that it was very much out of sight, out of mind. I'm getting back now to where I was - but I've been back at work a year and in salary terms will always be at least two years worth of increases behind the man who replaced me...

who was it that said there will never be equality at work until the school's response when a child is ill is not to automatically call the mother?

And how many mohters do you think would not go ballistic if they wren't.

I hate the way feminism has made children the centre of this in such a negative way.

And that's only in salary terms, Northernlurker.

I hope it's not true for you but in a lot of cases the damage done to a women's career and promotion prospects is often even more far-reaching ... So over time you might be even further behind the man that replaced you even though you took x amount of mat leave and work the same hours/do the same job etc.

I read an article recently which was talking about this issue and it was saying that its often not even enough not to have to children. You will still be discriminated against on the basis that you might or that you are some cold-hearted freak of nature.

The writer argued that only once a woman is post-menopausal can they actually enjoy the freedom from discrimination that men enjoy throughout their working lives.

Not pretty stuff but I do believe that we have come a long way and it is obviously so much better than it used to be and there is at least a heightened awareness of the issue.

What does make me really mad though is that half the time you end up arguing the issue against women which I find incredibly frustrating. Where is the awareness?

I think the point, Monkeytrousers, is that the school could call the father too ....

And I agree, Bellsa, until there is equality in the childcare front it is hard to imagine equality in the workplace.

In out school they ask you who they should call first.

If people could read page 36 of that book I linked to it might widen the debate.

Lol I read this as 'earrings' too! How odd.

I had visions of women, their life in ruins, earrings in bits, lives blighted forever...

I think there are two sides to this debate - a woman doing the same job as a man should be paid the same no matter how many kids she's had or how much time she has taken off on maternity.

But over the course of her career, a woman who takes time off on maternity or returns to work part-time after having kids is going to earn less than a man who has never had a career break. That is what I am saying is obvious.

When I said after you have kids you won't be able to earn as much as before, I meant over the course of your career - because you really have another job to do too, raising your kids.

Of course people should be paid proportinately the same for the same hours, but even when this happens women's pay will still be 'devastated' by the choice to work part-time or take a few years off. I earn the same per hour as I did before I had kids, but I only work two days a week, so my earnings have been 'devastated', but I accept that and think it is unrealistic not to.

I am also not sure about the childcare argument - making it more financially attractive for women to stay at home and look after their own kids would be better imo.

MT, I could only get up to p24 on the online book?

Oh for heaven's sake this thread is ridiculous!

Neenztwins, you say 'you really have another job to do too, raising your kids'

Why is this the woman's job?!

Motherhood will continue to devaste women's earnings until fathers - and their employers - take the responsibilities of fatherhood seriously.

I also can't understand it when people shrug at the negative impact of motherhood on women's earning capacity. What happens to women who have chosen to SAHM or cut their hours when a marriage breaks down? They are screwed financially.

Women and men should be prepared to cut their hours - if that is what is right for their family. To ask women to carry this financial risk alone is absolutely sexist.