MNHQ here: 'Pregnant then Screwed' is launching a campaign (and inviting you to a march on Halloween) - tell us what you think

[RowanMumsnet]

Hello

Some of you will know of the campaign group Pregnant then Screwed, which came to prominence a few years ago by highlighting women's experiences of pregnancy and maternity discrimination in the workplace.

On Halloween, they're holding marches in locations across the UK (London, Belfast, Cardiff, Manchester, Newcastle and Glasgow) to 'demand recognition, respect and change for working mums'. In deference to the day, they're inviting people to turn up dressed as mummies - the Walking Dead kind.

Here are the changes they're calling for. We know that in the past MNers have expressed support for more and better exclusive, paid paternity leave - but we'd love to know what you think about this list:

1. Increase the time limit to raise a tribunal claim from 3 months to (at least) 6 months for pregnant and postpartum women.

2. Require companies to report on how many flexible working requests are made and how many are granted.

3. Give fathers access to 6 weeks non-transferable paternity leave paid at 90% of salary.

4. Give the self-employed access to statutory shared parental pay.

5. Subsidise childcare from 6 months old, rather than 3 years old.

Over to you - and if you'd like to join the march you can find all the details here.

Thanks
MNHQ

vj it doesn't sound like you had much of a choice regarding working. What a shame that teaching PT isn't an option available to you.

What makes you think your salary wouldn't go up working in a school support role? As you get more experience other roles open up to you which often pay more but will most probably develop other competencies. Since you are out of the workforce those opportunities won't come by your way at all. It's also harder for you to go back to work if you need to.

Want2bSupermum could you please tell me with sources how much less tax the self employed pay? It would go some way to understanding why people on here are so against the demand for self-employed people to have access to statutory shared parental pay. Thank you

It's not something I consider worthy of marching for. It only seems to offer some minor surface benefits to couples in relatively secure jobs which imo isn't a priority.

It won't improve the gender pay gap, or help increase the number of women at the top.

It offers sweet fa to lone parents. If anything it increases their disadvantage because a couple will get more maternity leave and more maternity pay for the same thing.

Sweet fa for the lowest paid workers, tribunals and flexible working really make no difference to a nmw job on zero hours or those where there aren't fixed shifts.

Childcare again it offers nothing for those who actually need the help. Low incomes get tax credit help with it. The problem of it not covering it all is not addressed, nor is the fact the cut off is too low, nor the issues faced when dc don't have standard care needs, or the parents need out of hours childcare. The fact a couple above tc cut off might not see much financial gain from two working parents at preschool age is hardly a reason to subsidise their childcare, the money is better spent on those who need it.

Here is the national insurance contributions for the self employed: www.gov.uk/self-employed-national-insurance-rates

Here are allowable expenses: www.gov.uk/expenses-if-youre-self-employed

Here are capital gains taxes: www.gov.uk/capital-gains-tax/rates

So a self employed person making say £100k a year is able to deduct expenses such as travel costs including the cost of a car, which are significant costs that employees have, and pay a max rate on national insurance of 9% and 20% capital gains tax.

Meanwhile an employee making £100k a year is paying tax on $88k and the blended income tax is about 30%. Then the employee and employer portions of national insurance are also much higher with the government collecting 13.8% with employees paying about 5%.

So I would hope this illustrates just why the self employment tax is unfair. The rates should be the same. Why should someone self employed pay 29% while an employee making the same money is paying about 45%.

I'm going to look into those figures closer, because I know that when you say they can deduct 'the cost of a car' that is not the case.

Is anybody on here an accountant that can advise?

I am an accountant. Just read through the links. It's very clear that someone self employed is going to pay less tax than someone who is a PAYE employee.

Self employed people can buy or lease a car and deduct the expense from their income. The part inland revenue has a hard time with is what is personal and what is business. Keeping a log, great, but the system is completely open to abuse and often is.

Why should someone self employed pay 29% while an employee making the same money is paying about 45%

Because the self-employed aren't just workers they are also their own shareholders. No one pays NI on dividends. The comparison employed vs self employed is misleading, it doesn't consider all the additional risks a self-employed person takes.

Actually a business owner who sets themselves up as a business and employs others is taking additional risks. Someone who is self employed normally doesn't have people working for them. If they do they normally form a company and corporation tax applies.

I'm someone who runs a business in the UK and I don't have myself set up as self employed. I hire self employed people all the time. Most people in the trades are self employed. If they have someone working for them the 'employee' is normally an apprentice or they too are working on a self employed basis.

DH is also a business owner with a large number of employees (116, which is a lot of people to be responsible for paying in full) and the company is here in America. Income from the business is taxed at the same rates as employees. On the first $127k he pays both portions of employee and the employer Medicare and social security taxes with income above the threshold only applying both sides of Medicare tax.

Think about the fact that self employed pay in less but get the same pension and are eligible for the same benefits as those who are required to pay more in. How is that fair? If a self employed person fails benefits kick in to support them. They can also become an employee. If being paid benefits there isn't a discount applied to the help they receive so really what risks are they taking on?

There are tax efficiencies by being self employed/employee of your own Limited Company but there are significant risks - no work = no pay, no holiday pay, no paid Bank Holidays, no employer to pay their share of your pension contribution .

No work, no pay, if income is low you qualify for benefits. It therefore makes no sense as to why you would pay lower rates of taxation.

I think paid paternity leave (number three) is excellent.
Women are in danger of not being employed in case they go in to have chikdren - lessens the risk for the woman that a man would be chosen over her.

So Want you have yourself set up as an employee in your own company? Not a shareholder who gets paid dividends?

Seems quite inefficient from a tax perspective.

batteries For tax purposes I am resident in America and there is no difference for me being an employee of a corporation or self employed. The taxes are the same. The only difference is what I pay myself as a dividend. I've not paid myself a salary or a dividend in a very long time because my business is my second job. I've spent the last 15 years reinvesting the money I make from it.

DH pays himself from his business and he is set up as an employee. It's not inefficient at all, you pay the same tax on self employment income. The IRS requires that he takes a reasonable salary before his dividend distribution. The IRS is quite strict about how much you can declare as a dividend. If they see you paying yourself $1million a year with $950k in dividends they get upset. They would expect at least $250k to be taken in salary. If the following year your net profit is $50k the expectation is that pay would be 100% salary.

Another person who will be at work on the day.

3) Give fathers access to 6 weeks non-transferable paternity leave paid at 90% of salary. I would have loved this but I some how feel that maternity pay being better is more important. I can’t articulate why.

Or even maternity pay being same across public sector. A teacher gets 2 weeks full pay in maternity leave compared to 6 months if you work in the NHS in a none clinical role.

I would love to have been there. I’ve been though the whole sorry mess myself and #1 is especially important.

I’d also suggest marching to reinstate Legal Aid for women on lower salaries. I could afford to take my employer to court but most can’t.

Unfortunately I’m working though. Wouldn’t this have been better planned for a saturday?

I’ve only skim-read this thread but I think that there is another very important thing we should be marching for which doesn’t involve money or flexible working or whatever. Something that was the crux of my experience.

Many many employers still seem to believe that once you have a baby, you are somehow incapable of doing your job.

We need to change that attitude.

Have a march on a Saturday. Let’s show these dinosaurs the huge numbers of women that can and do work in exactly the same way that they did before having kids.

flingingmelon I have not experienced that so much as employers not wanting to deal with the unpredictable nature of families. If DH has to run out that's ok. If I run out it's a no.

"In deference to the day, they're inviting people to turn up dressed as mummies - the Walking Dead kind."

The Walking Dead isn't about mummies.

I think midday on a working weekday is a foolish time for a march, let alone on a "family" celebration day when most women will want to be having fun with their children.

To all the doubters I would like to cite Scandinavia. They gave higher taxesto support cchildcare and working mums, paternity leave etc. Their economies are STRONG and they have a greatvqualitgnof life.
It's not rocket science to realise that more working mums= more money for the economy.

I can't believe some of the comments here about condoms??!! Are you Donald Trump or an Irish nun????

Quality of life

Actually it's not as one would think in Scandinavia. DH is Danish so I've been exposed enough to know what is really going on. Standards of living are dropping rapidly. Employment is not what it seems too. The largest employer is the state and DH has said it's a job program. I see that it's true when I have dealt with government officials.

In the workplace there are very few women in private enterprise who are in managerial positions with scarcely any in managerial positions in departments with influence (sales, production and finance). The reason for this is because of extended maternity leave of 12+ months and the societal expectation that mothers care for the children while fathers bring in the money.

The low cost childcare is a step in the right direction for the UK but we have to look at changing the culture. If a mother wants to go back to work that should be properly supported. Childcare can be subsidized via making it a pretax item for both nannies, childminders and nursery. Women need to be supported so that they can opt for a short leave if that's what they want.

Hi

I think we need to change the view that childcare costs come from the females wages only. E.g comments like 'after childcare is paid for I would only be £5 better off at the end of the week'.

I pay half of the childcare from my wage and my husband pays the other half. The whole morgage isn't viewed as coming from my wages otherwise it could be said 'after paying morgage I am only £5 better off at the end of the week'.

Attitudes need to change first and we should start with ourselves and the choice of language we use. If someone wants to be a stay at home parent then fine but don't trot out the old line about wages only just covering childcare.

:)

chosen The fact is that it's often the woman who is earning less than her OH which is why the decision is taken for the lower income earner to stay home.

I consider myself lucky. I was making $45k after taxes and this just covered the cost of me working. DH made $500k a year during those years. He was able to support me working. Not many people have a DH who makes that level of income who could afford to support a career their spouse wants.

Today that investment has paid off. Through gaining experience, earning promotions and changing employer, 6 years into parenthood and I make about $100k after taxes and my childcare bill is $36-40k a year. All in it costs my family about $42k a year to work.

Had I not been so aggressive with pushing up my income it really would have made no sense for me to return to work. I have a DH who earns enough, he travels a lot and we have one DC with an ASD diagnosis. Yet with all of this going on I chose to continue working and today I earn enough to support my family should DH not be around either due to death or divorce.

The value of giving mothers the choice to work is very real.

Ok, If I instead of more than my entire wage is eaten up by childcare, I said that I paid half of all household bills (including childcare), that would still total to more than my entire salary.

If I had more than 1 child, then the childcare bill will more likely cost more than my entire salary and more than the amount left from both both of our wages after paying the rest of the bills, which still makes it unaffordable for both adults to work.

At this point it makes sense for one person to give up work. Realistically the person who brings in the least income gives up work as their income won't cover all the non childcare bills on their own.

It doesn't matter how you phrase it, the results are the same until the government does a proper shake up and does actual subsidised childcare from at least 1 year old (or ideally less).

Hi

Why should the government (I.e taxpayers) pay for all childcare?! It is already subsidised from age 3?!

People need to do what Want2b has done above and maximise their income. If you are in a low paid career and cannot afford the childcare then try to increase your income through training and or looking for another job! Take responsibility for your own destiny rather than expecting someone else to do so.

I actually think that staff who provide childcare (and care for the elderly) should be paid considerably more which would probably increase the cost of this care as its driven by usual business drivers.

If someone chooses to be a stay at home parent then that to me is a fair choice. I would personally not step out of my profession for the sake of childcare costs for 2 years - I pay them equally with my husband.

:)