Women have found employment opportunities (maybe not great, well-paying opportunities, but something) in retail and service industries in huge numbers, and now they are being made redundant in huge numbers, from the counter workers in Woolworths to the domestic cleaners of Canary Wharf workers. In fact double the rate.
What’s more, it may be that they are even in the same jobs being differentially laid off more often than men – clearly this is something that needs to be monitored, and if necessary prevented (unions and government need to keep a very close count).
And one of the things we know can be a trigger, if not a cause, of divorce is financial stress – and there is now definitive evidence showing how the divorce law still leaves women worse off, and men better off. Maybe now the Fathers For Justice types will stop bleating?
Jenkins found that the positive effect on men’s finances is so significant that divorce can even lift them out of poverty, while women are far more likely to be plunged into destitution. Separated women have a poverty rate of 27% – almost three times that of their former husbands.
Maintenance paid by former partners also has little impact, said Jenkins, as just 31% of separated mothers receive payment from the father of their children.
BUt there is a positive message for women in there: don’t give up your job! “The percentage change in income is less if they have worked beforehand and continue working afterwards.”
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She may have been accused of political manoeuvring, or of feminist hysteria, but Harriet Harman’s hypothesising on the ‘Lehman Sisters’ has brought the question of gender in the recession to the headlines – raising the issue of a seemingly shatter-proof glass ceiling in the worlds of finance and politics. From the reams of coverage over the past months, you’d be forgiven for thinking that this is a very ‘male’ recession, started by boy bankers taking big risks for bigger bonuses. This has been felt across the land by a predominantly male industrial workforce and seen in the male faces of the wildcat strikers and Lindsey oil riggers. Where are all the women in this recession? Nowhere, it would seem, apart from inconveniently asking for equal pay at a time when businesses, according to Lord Mandelson, can’t afford it.
Perhaps women are recession proof. Employment figures do indeed show that men are losing their jobs in proportionately higher numbers than women. Perhaps women have nothing to worry about and John Prescott is right to tell Harriet to, ‘Stop complaining’.
But numbers never tell the whole story. Numbers won’t explain what sorts of jobs women are doing. They don’t explain that part-timers are still mostly low-paid women parked in low status jobs. They don’t explain that too many girls are headed for the five Cs: cleaning, catering, clerical, caring and customer service – none of which generally leads to a sixth C – career.
The employment numbers also don’t explain the persistent pay discrepancies that exist between men and women. They won’t tell us why it is that for every £1 earned by our sons, our daughters can only expect 85p.
And employment numbers don’t explain the restricted choices faced by women. Because although many more women have entered the workforce in recent years, they continue to take on the lion’s share of caring responsibilities. As the ‘male’ recession hits male workers, more and more women are finding themselves juggling employment demands and caring commitments, perhaps cutting short maternity leave or returning to full-time work faster than they would have liked.
Harriet Harman is right to talk about these issues, to highlight the gross discrepancies and the systemic discrimination women face in employment . And I for one am behind equal pay for equal work. I’m behind blasting through the stereotype that will forever divide men and women’s roles. I’m behind flexible working initiatives. None of these are luxuries to be jettisoned in recession but are ways of responding to a crisis to ensure that employers preserve their skills base and maintain their workforces. With a little creativity, this recession could become an opportunity. Crises can sweep away outdated structures and enable new thinking and new approaches to emerge. In just two years’ time just 20 % of the workforce will be made up of white, non-disabled men. Maybe it’s about time working practices began to change.
But in the meantime let’s not focus all our attention on the Boardroom and the front bench. In fighting for equality at the top we should not forget those women in the recession who are fighting their own battles everyday. They need our support too.