How come we are not discussing the terrible gender gap in UK?

[Miggsie]

I thought that the doyens of Mumsnet should really look at the report about UK dropping in gender terms.

Despite girls getting good grades at school and going to university, we still have a shocking pay gap and women in their 50's fade away in terms of senior posts.

Why?

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8327895.stm

Also in the Independent.

are you saying you chose lower pay pt posts in prefence to ft better paid post.you have digressed into your personal prefence

general point is those women who receive lower wages than males for similar/same post without chosing to do so.an enforced inequality for females

But cat, on teh one hand you say the workplace isn't sexist and then you say the public sector shake up has done a lot to iron out poorer pay for similar jobs. It can't be both.

One of the reasons the discrepancy is being ironed out is because many jobs which had an element of hard physical labour to them used to be entitled to far more pay. This ensured that a lot of men's jobs wre paid more.

And then you say we can't do anything about the private sector. So are you saying there is untouchable sexism in the private sector?

I have been through job evaluation recently and in my opinion, the men fought harder to have their work recognised for its financial value. The women didn't fight as hard (generally, myself excepted!).

I don't think its sexist to say that, just what I experienced. Its what I would expect happens in the private sector - men negotiate harder when it comes to pay.

That together with the immutable 'women disappear from the workplace to have babies' means that we get paid less. It sucks, I don't know what the answer is, but it does kind of make sense. Work is a market place and if you sell yourself harder, you'll get better pay. And if you can worker longer or more reliable hours, you'll make a better impression. Me, I leave at 4pm to pick up the kids.

Cat, but that doesn't explain why, hour for hour, part-time workers are paid less than full-timers.

Or why capitalism is apparently unable to cope with women in the workplace who go off and have babies. (Gosh, who'd have thunk it, human beings having an innate drive to reproduce, wow.) All those male workers have kids too - why do we have an economic system that relies on the unpaid labour of women to keep the wheels turning?

And btw the companies would find themselves with precious few customers or workers if women stopped having babies.

Yes, but I meant at a societal level rather than you as a lone individual - it may work well for you, which is grand, but why are women largely forced onto the Mummy track with little prospect of promotion or fulfilling work? Is it beyond the wit of man and woman to devise a society where you don't have to sacrifice your children on the altar of career, or vice versa?

I have a theory.

Ireland - where I live - is number 8 on the list. My theory is that the economic and cultural boom we enjoyed over the last 20 years has improved the lot of women here unbelievably. It was a fast growth, a new society, and everyone was needed to work, men and women. Education here is good, and so there is a generation of women here who presume to be - and usually are - equal in the work place. In my industry- television - the production personnel are almost all women, causing an 'old school' male executive to gripe about the 'femminisation' of television.

The UK has had a slower burn, so to speak, and hasn't changed as radically. I think this means traditions are still in place and harder to shake off. From the outside it seems to me that British society is still concerned with hierarchy and tradition, and this makes it tougher for women to break in to established areas.

I could be totally wrong, but it's just my theory. I'm sure you'll let me know if you disagree.

Whenever this stuff is trotted out about women choosing shitwork jobs because they really prefer the Sacred Duty of unpaid service Caring, it's very rarely considered how many men are stuck in shitty low paid jobs or indeed are poor because they have chosen to do stuff other than corporate 9-5. Basically when you model success as being an executive with a company car, then not everyone will acheive it and not everyone wants to - and not everyone can, because someone has to wipe the bums and care for the sick... and empty the bins and unbung the sewers as well.
Basically, the 'Women don't want money and power' argument is witlessly sexist; it's a myth that everyone could get to run their own blue-chip company if they only devoted their lives to it. Because people have to find things other than work to give their lives meaning, because the shitwork has to be done and someone has to do it.

I think the idea that it can all be blamed on a patriarchal society is slipshod thinking to be honest.

Yes there is an element of gender discrimination, but there's also the fact that childcare costs are prohibitive and also the (unpalatable) fact that many women simply choose to opt out of the hard daily grind of actually earning a living.

I only really see this on MN but time after time you see women - intelligent educated women - being dilettantes when it comes to focussed career choices. Or imagining that working two days a week from 9-3 is making a meaningful financial contribution (fair play if it is but mostly it isn't).

So yes, blame society by all means, but take a look in the mirror as well.

But how much of that is due to sexist stereotyping? The concept that being a career woman = being a bad mother (and probably a bitch to boot), where it is just considered normal for many men? Doesn't at least some of that come into play when people make choices?

I don't see why childcare is raised so often in these debates as being an issue for women. This should be an issue for families. When my children arrived childcare was part of the cost involved. Not my cost. It was expensive, but the combined salaries of me and my husband paid for it like all other household bills. It took up almost 50% of our combined post tax income, but that had nothing to do with my choice to return to work. As parents we have had to juggle things a bit at times, but again I see that as an issue for parents, not solely for women. Most women have small families now. Even if they take a full year for each child, in a career of 40+ years that shouldn't make a huge difference. Perhaps they should on average arrive at senior management a little later than their male counterparts, but the fact is that on average they never get there at all. Even if some women do drop out, there still should be far more women at the top.

Of course the Scandinavians are at the top. No surprise given that they encourage men to take active parenting roles, which if it is all about the desire to nurture would make sense, or indeed if it is about more equal society (my view).

Good post nooka.

Of course these things should be seen as a family issue rather than male/female.
When a couple have children, the decision about work and childcare is a joint responsibility. Childcare costs shuold be viewed as a joint expense - they enable the parents to work. No different from paying the mortgage or food bill.

For a period of time, our childcare costs were effectively the equivalent of one income - but I didn't view it as me spending all my income on childcare. It was a joint expense.

I also think Quattro makes an important point - many women choose to take lengthy periods of time out of the workplace, or return to work 2 or 3 days a week, which is fine, but there is no point in then comparing your career progression with someone who remains full time. It is perfectly possible to take even the maximum maternity leave of a year, and then return to full time work - you could even do this two or three times to complete your family, and it wouldn't necessarily mean loads of time out of the workplace in the greater scheme of things.

But the fact is that a lot of women choose not to return to senior positions or full time work, or they don't actively seek those positions.

Of course, this is a separate issue from where one gender is paid a lower rate for the same or equivalent work, and that's wrong, and has actually worked against men as well as women - there was a recent case in the media where men went to tribunal over being paid less than their female equivalents.

But I think we need to separate the two issues. Men and women should be paid the same rate for the same job. But it's no good women playing the sexism card if they have made an active choice to work less, or in less senior positions.

The decision about whose body is actually going to carry the baby, give birth and breastfeed isn't (yet) a joint one, however

The gender gap is partly about traditional men's roles being valued more than traditional female roles - why are bin men paid twice the salary of carer's in an old people's home? Is cleaning bins twice as valued?

Interestingly, this is one area that Leeds Council are trying to resolve - and of course, it involves reducing the salary paid to refuse collectors. They are currently striking over it.

Because being a bin man is hard physical labour. I could be a carer but I could never be a bin person - I'm not strong enough. That's why it's paid more - the resources are scarcer.

Anna that's bollocks. A wheelie bin does not weigh more than an old man needing to be lifted to the loo.

back injuries are a major problem among carer's of old people. I'm sure it's a darn sight easier to wheel a bin three feet to a hydralic lift than to turn a man over in bed to change his shitty sheets

You have to work much faster at emptying bins than at emptying old people - how many bins does a bin man empty per day? How many old people does a carer lift per day? There is no comparison.

Just butting in but working on the bins is hard, physical labour. More so than being a care worker.

Back injuries are a major cause of injury among SAHMs! I took my back to its limits and so have many of my friends and acquaintances. I cannot begin to lift a wheelie bin.

You don't HAVE to lift a wheelie bin, there is a rubby great truck handily invented for the job

Well, the council have disagreed with you (and by God, I'd rather work on the bins than in an old people's home) and have decided that the bin men are overpaid. So are reducing their salaries accordingly.

That might depend on where you live, mp. Where I live (very dense urban conditions) wheelie bins have to be lifted - there are so many obstructions in the way.

Where my parents live, it is forbidden to put more than 2 sacks (not bins) of rubbish out. Not so hard.