The lies we tell to get by

I have a boyfriend (please leave me alone)

Yes I am totally mentally distraught about this pregnancy and would get lots worse if I had to continue (please give me an abortion)

No extra flatmates (please give me enough resources to support my whanau)

It's not you, it's me (please let me go)

I'm driving tonight (please don't spike my drink)

Maybe, I'm not sure, but perhaps we could do it this way? (please listen to my excellent idea)

No I don't mind you asking me if I'm having more kids, it's okay (please don't get angry with me)

Sure I can work late (please see my worth)

Oh yes, baby is a great sleeper (please think I'm a good parent)

Thanks, you look great too (please stop talking about my appearance)

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We live in a society where women often need to lie to get by.  Honesty is often the preserve of those who have a high level of safety and comfort.  May we live in a world where we don't need to lie to get by.  We don't live there yet.

Tipping - bad for all, worse for women

If you ever notice that I say chicken oddly, then know that it is because I worked at a fast food outlet called Chick-Inn every Friday night, Saturday day and Sunday night for some time in my teens.  It was probably about a year, but in hindsight it felt like much much longer, especially after the Gypsy Kings CD got stuck in the stereo and was thus on All The Time.  I used to twitch whenever I heard Bamboleo but I'm okay now.

But I digress.

This place did delivery as well as eat-in.  I was a "cashier" which means I was at the counter, took the orders and money, put together drinks, soft-serve ice-cream and jelly cups and other bits that were pre-prepared, gave people their food and often ended up in the kitchen helping out with putting together the burgers and boxes of chicken and cooking stuff and so on.  Dishes were for drivers, yet I ended up often taking their phone orders, preparing their bags and doing those dishes.  I never got a tip over the counter, and that was fine.

Some years later I found out that the drivers used to routinely get tips on the doorstep, sometimes several hours' pay extra a night.  Never a cent was shared.  This was their due apparently.  Despite the backroom work done by others to get those orders out the door and in to the cars asap there was no acknowledgement of that (and not just in money either but that's something else).

And guess what?  The drivers were almost all male and those of us working the cashier jobs mainly female.

I've worked in other hospo and service jobs too, never as the only money that I needed to survive, luckily.  As someone who did not fit the physical stereotypes for shall we call it extra appreciation (and sadly also harassment) I don't think I ever got a tip.  Again, that was fine.

It was fine because I was paid a (relatively) fair wage which was not undercut, or reliant upon top ups, from tips.

Hospo and service jobs already have a massive power imbalance and exploitation is rife.  The Customer Is Always Right (even when they harass you or hit you or are unreasonably unreasonable and you want to spit in their food but you don't or maybe you do but you make sure no one else sees).  Smiles Are Free (but are they really, for the smiler?).

If We Don't Take Care Of Our Customers Someone Else Will (so give them whatever they want in case they flee and tell all their friends about our awfulness nevermind how they treat you).  And many other Inspirational Customer Service Quotes that reinforce the lowliness of the person doing the serving, and the supremacy of the customer, and the role of the manager as champion of the poor downtrodden arseholes with the money.

And there's the vicious cycle - you aren't worth much because you aren't paid much, and you don't get much in tips so you are obviously not worth much, and around and around we go.

So yeah, tipping as a way of improving customer service?  Not likely.  Tipping as a way of making those working in hospo and service industries even less powerful and more discriminated against?  Very very likely indeed.

a response to robyn malcolm

yesterday i had a brief exchange on twitter with robyn malcolm regarding roger sutton, and you can see the whole exchange from this tweet:

A CERA employee with some humanity https://t.co/VgjwPhpUVz http://t.co/2Q9s8efQBx
— Robyn Malcolm (@robynmalcolm) November 19, 2014

twitter is unfortunately not a good medium for a detailed discussion of the issues, so i wanted to give a fuller response here.

i really do understand the desire to support a friend who is going through difficult times.  from the twitter exchange, it appears that she knows mr sutton well and considers him a good friend.  i know it must be difficult to watch your friend go through something like this in such a public way.  and i'm sure it's difficult to see people saying some very negative things about him.

supporting a friend who has done something wrong is not an easy business.  but i don't think you do your friend any favours by dismissing what he has done or by ignoring the complainant in this case and her suffering.  sure, make the point that your friend is generally a wonderful person who has achieved some very important things for the community, but also acknowledge that in this instance he stuffed up.

the best example of this would be owen pallett's facebook statement on hearing of the allegations against his friend jian ghomeshi (for details of that case, see my post here):

At no point here will I ever give my friend Jian’s version of the truth more creedence than the version of the truth offered up by three women. Anonymity does not mean these women do not exist....

...Jian Ghomeshi is my friend, and Jian Ghomeshi beats women. How our friendship will continue remains to be seen.

now i'm not for a minute implying that mr sutton's actions were at the level of mr ghomeshi's.  however, that doesn't mean that mr sutton's actions should be dismissed, ignored or in any way treated as not important.  of course other people do worse things, that's not the point.  the things that mr sutton constituted serious misconduct, they were not trivial matters.  i don't believe you can do a friend any favours by embedding a view that he has been unfairly treated when there is no evidence that this is the case.  in fact the whole "look over there, that thing is so much worse" is the richard dawkins "dear muslima" defence, one which he has since apologised for.

ms malcolm has known mr sutton for 20 years.  but what if she had known the complainant for 20 years?  what if she had watched the complainant go through the harrowing process of the investigation, sat by her while the complainant suffered through that press conference & the resulting aftermath?  would ms malcolm's response have been the same?  mr sutton is struggling but he is the one who has behaved wrongly in this case.  that doesn't make him a terrible person overall, he's not some kind of monster.  but he is in the wrong and that can not and should not be overlooked.  the impact of his behaviour can not and should not be overlooked.

the best way to support a friend who has done something wrong is not enabling a view that his wrongness isn't so very bad.  rather, it would be to say to the person: "what you did here is not ok.  you are still my friend and i still really do care for you and will stand by you.  but you need to change this particular behaviour because it isn't acceptable".  that's my opinion anyway, for what it's worth.

[EDIT: i did want to say that i am a fan of robyn malcolm's, not so much of her acting as i haven't watched any of her shows, but of her political activism.  i love how she stood up and made her voice heard on the union dispute with peter jackson, & i have also admired her stance on other issues.  the fact that i deeply disagree with her on this issue doesn't change that.]

on roger sutton not being the victim

today the news breaks that roger sutton is resigning from CERA as a result of allegations of sexual harrasement.  he announces and holds a press conference, apologising for the hurt he has caused.  and yet, there is still a certain dismissiveness of his own behaviour: "hugs, jokes, i do do those things...", "i am who i am", "i never meant to cause any harm" (yeah, intent isn't magical) and "i've worked my guts out for the last three and a half years" (sorry, that doesn't give you a free pass to harass anyone).  on the other hand, there were statements taking responsibility for inappropriate jokes and a strong statement that he is not the victim here.

sadly, but somewhat predictably, there has been a lot of minimising of the behaviour in various media reports.  the focus has been on the language - "really, calling someone honey or sweetie is sexual harassment now?", but there has also been minimisation of the unwanted hugs (oh but women hug men, hugging is common etc etc).  despite his own statement that he isn't the victim, there are a lot people who are trying making him one.

it was pretty infuriating listening to gary mccormick on radio nz, worried about what a terrible impact this was going to have on nz.  very little concern at all for the woman who made the complaint, no acknowledgement that mr sutton mentioning that he may have hurt other women by his behaviour as well.  in fact, no recognition that the sum of his behaviour over a period of time may have created a difficult work environment for the women who had to work with him.

we have heard from his tearful wife, and i can completely understand that she is upset by what has happened and feels protective of her husband.  when she says "She says she is baffled that his "hugs and jokes" have been misinterpreted and that Mr Sutton is simply a "touchy-feely" person.", one has to wonder whether or not she has spoken to the woman who laid the complaint or to the other women who may have been hurt, and whether she has been part of the investigation or read the full report.  maybe she has done all of the above & still supports her husband.  but in doing so in the manner that she has, she is further harming the women in the workplace.

i've also seen, on social media, the "nice guy" defence.  the one where people refuse to believe that a person could have committed particular acts because they are so nice, they do such good work, they have benefited society in xyz ways.  except we have so many, many examples of people who behave extremely well in many spheres but who have also been abusers or harassers.  just because someone is nice in their behaviour towards the majority of people they come across, or just because someone donates to charity or does other "good works" doesn't mean they haven't behaved badly.

in this particular case, the state services has investigated the complaint against mr sutton, and while the conclusion is that the behaviour didn't justify dismissal, it was considered inappropriate.


the problem with the current media narrative, with the minimising of the behaviours complained of, is that it creates an environment where it's almost impossible for the complainant and other women to come forward and tell their side of the story.  after all, we live in a culture where women who come forward are subject to all kinds of abuse, death and rape threats, character assassinations and more.  it's hard enough as it is.  but given the climate created by the current media narratives, it is going to be even harder for these women to speak out.

and of course, there is the ripple effect.  minimising mr sutton's behaviour makes it harder for other women in other workplaces to lay a complaint.  in fact, in choosing to resign, mr sutton has placed the complainant in an even more difficult position.  she will now be blamed for costing him his job, even though that may not have been the outcome she wanted.  it has created a higher level of hostility.  i can understand that he no longer feels comfortable in that workplace, but there is no doubt of the impact on the complainant.  even state services commissioner iain rennie said "There are no winners. This is a sad day for the complainant in terms of the impact on them."

one has to wonder, with some of the people being dismissive of the significance of mr sutton's behaviour, whether they are feeling just a little threatened or defensive because they know that their own behaviour might have been upsetting to another person.  a hug isn't always welcome.  just because you are a "touchy-feely" person doesn't mean that the person you are touching is the same.  and yes, the touchy-feely person needs to check that their way of being isn't making other people uncomfortable, because each person has the right to determine how, when and where they are touched.

i've heard that there are more details to be revealed on thursday.  by that time, it may be too late to upset the impression that has been caused by today's reporting.  

Ian Fletcher, John Key and dodgy partisan appointments

This is what happens when you have a culture of corporate governance in a democratic institution.

Joyce and Key are both corporate governance masters.  And they set a great deal of the culture of the Cabinet, and thus of the behaviour of the senior civil servants who support the Cabinet in their day to day work.  And they don't recognise the difference, the very important difference, between corporate governance and actual democratic governance.

In a corporate environment the Right Thing To Do is often what you can get away with for maximum gain.  It's about not getting caught, rather than acting with integrity in the first place.  If you do get caught then the focus is not that you did something wrong, or even that you got caught, it's how you manage being caught out; shifting blame, constructing plausible deniability, brain fade*, whatever.  Not everyone plays it this way, but the collapse of many finance institutions in the last few years has surely taught us that a great many do, in particular those in the areas of currency speculation, hedge fund managers, etc, who are seeking to make marginal gains very quickly by shifting around huge amounts of money for no other reason.  It's ok for Key to manueoruve a high level post for an old friend, it's ok for Ministers not to front to major news institutions for months on end on topic issues, it's ok for us to never know why a Minister was sacked.  Because in corporate governance those are all within the rules and acceptable.  Move on, nothing to see here.

I'm not saying the corporate governance model is better or acceptable or even slightly ok.  Again, the events of recent years have shown us exactly why it isn't; because it gives incentives for the wrong types of behaviour and appears to reward those who act in ethically dodgy ways when they don't even wear most of the risk themselves.  That Kiwisaver campaign that suggests you join Kiwisaver or you work until you die - there are plenty of people who thought they had saved responsibly for their retirement who have had to go back out to work, at a time of high unemployment and a lot of discrimination on the basis of age because people who got bailed out to the tunes of billions of dollars were reckless with money that wasn't theirs to play with.

In democratic governance the standards are different.  For a start there are a whole lot of rules.  And those rules are there for Good Reasons.  They recognise the extreme level of power that politicians, especially senior politicians, possess, which they may use to advantage themselves and their friends when what they are supposed to be doing is serving the broader electorate. 

Appointments are a particularly crucial area.  In recent times we have had Judith Collins appoint a close friend of her husband to an important role, Tony Ryall's neighbour end up Race Relations Commissioner, lots of ex National MPs (or wannabes) on the Human Rights Commission, and now an old school friend of John Key's is the only person interviewed for a role where it seems he had limited previous relevant experience. 

Government are obliged by law to be an equal opportunity employer.  While usually this is taken to mean jobs are won on the basis of skill and best fit rather than gender, ethnicity, sexuality, or other irrelevant attributes, it also means that anyone with the relevant skills etc should have the same chance of getting the job as anyone else.  Even when anyone else happens to know someone who is a very senior politician. 

Why is this so important?  Partly because the civil service is supposed to be politically neutral, and it's hard to maintain that if some staff are there due to the patronage of particular politicians.  But also because it is actually good appointment practice.  How many times in your paid work experience can you think of someone who got a role because of who they knew rather than what they could do?  And how did that work out? 

What bothers me the most about all of this is that the politicians involved do seem to genuinely think that they haven't done anything wrong; that their corporate approach is fine and dandy.  It's not.






*  And as someone who has suffered from a medical condition that at times caused actual brain fade in the past, it was so debilitating that I couldn't hold down a job at the time, or study.  So if we could stop blaming brain fade as if it isn't something that happens to real people that'd be nice. 

nope, not all of this is a backlash

i was directed to this article at slate by someone on twitter, who was lauding it as a good defence of successful women.  i was pretty hopeful, but having read the thing, it pretty much leaves me seething.  there's this:

Mayer was attacked recently for her decision not to allow employees to work at home. She is a woman, this line of thinking goes, how could she think women should have to work away outside of their houses, away from their children? But why should Marissa Mayer have some special responsibility to nurture her employees with a cozy, consummately flexible work environment just because she is a woman? Isn’t her responsibility to run a company according to her individual vision? If we want powerful female entrepreneurs shouldn’t we allow them to pursue entrepreneurial power?

and then there's this:

Think of Lena Dunham and the outsized rage she has attracted for her large book advance, for attracting huge amounts of attention with her show. These could be greeted as welcome signs of success for a woman in the largely male world of comedy, but instead she too is attacked for “not being like us.” She too is expected to create a mini utopia on the set of her show. She is attacked for not hiring minorities, or not representing people without college educations. In one cranky piece in Slate, Amanda Hess complains: “so far Dunham hasn’t appeared to use her position to give a leg up to less-privileged voices.” To which one can only wonder, “Is  she supposed to run a home for starving comedy writers of other races?”

and that last line pretty much had me ready to scream: "way to completely miss the point!!!"

reading the piece as a whole, i get what the writer is trying to say: that we should be supporting successful women, and that successful women get judged in a way that successful men don't.  particularly women in the business world, and particularly when they challenge notions of how women are supposed to be ie always in angst between their roles as caregivers and as ambitious working women; always supposed to feel guilty for not doing enough and/or not suffering enough for their families.  men, on the other hand, don't need to have any angst and are allowed to have it all - successful job and family with kids - without any questions about whether or not they should be trying to have it all.


but this piece in slate?  reads less like a defence of successful women and more like a defence of privilege.  the privileges of class and colour in the 2 paragraphs i've quoted above. and all it makes a case for is that those who don't have those privileges should shut up and stop complaining, should be unquestioning cheerleaders of these women who have finally MADE IT, cos weren't you all complaining that there weren't enough  women CEO's anyway?  b*tches are never happy, are you?

it's somewhat like the republican defence of sarah palin: here you go, we've given you a woman in a position of power, shut up and support her.  if her policy positions are anti-women, well so what?  any criticism of her means you women don't really want women in positions of power do you?

which is pretty stupid, because yes, we want more women in positions of power.  but just because they get there doesn't mean they suddenly become immune to criticism.  it doesn't mean they get some special status that prevents then from being called out, and especially when they do things againsts the interests of the majority of other women.  having them there serves a great purpose - it breaks down barriers when we become accustomed to seeing women in such positions.

but we are allowed to expect more.  we allowed to expect that once women get into these positions, that they actually do what they can, in that position, to improve the lives of others.  and we expect this because very often the women who have MADE it, they have direct experience of discrimination and the difficulties involved in trying to succeed in a system that has been designed for people who are not like them.

is it wrong to expect empathy?  i don't think so.  is it wrong to at least expect an absence of hostility towards the issues of importance of other women?  not at all.  so i don't see it in any way wrong to criticise marissa mayer's policy which prevents employees from working at home, particularly in a society where the larger part of the burden of caregiving work is still borne by women.  and i think it's perfectly valid to criticise lena dunham for being extremely dismissive of any concerns raised about the lack of women of colour in her shows.

but more than that, these are things that men would and have been criticised for - often and for a long time by feminists, by activitists, by people of colour.  i don't understand the position that men can be criticised for these things but women in the same position doing exactly the same thing can't.

where i draw the line is misogynist attacks against successful women, and i know that this blog and most other feminist blogs defended sarah palin against misogynistic attacks while continuing to denounce her destructive policy positions.  because it's absolutely very easy to do the latter without doing the former, and because doing the former is never acceptable.

so have people been unfairly hating on successful women? absolutely, and i would love to see a piece which details that.  but this slate piece wasn't it, not by a long shot. by conflating valid criticism with sexist putdowns, the article harms rather than helps these women.

I'm too sexy for my job

My parents conceived me in the USA, but my mother travelled half a continent, alone, to give birth in Canada.  The US were invading Vietnam at the time, and my parents, no radicals, did not want a possible son to be drafted to another imperialist war.

Just today, I'm thankful for that choice, difficult as it must have been for my mother.  Because in the USA, you can fire someone if you think they are sexy.  That's what happened to Melissa Nelson, backed up by the all male Iowa Supreme Court.  Her employer's lawyer said:

"While there was really no fault on the part of Mrs. Nelson, it was just as clear the decision to terminate her was not related to the fact that she was a woman," he said. "The motives behind Dr. Knight terminating Mrs. Nelson were quite clear: He did so to preserve his marriage."

Poor boss Dr Knight.  Apparently he found Mrs Nelson "irresistable" and wasn't sure he could restrain himself, describing her as a Lamborghini - which some might call sexual harassment, since it was in reference to it being a waste she wasn't having much sex - and he thought eventually they would have an affair.  Not based on anything Mrs Nelson had suggested, mind.

Not only do women have to make sure we're not tempting men with our bodies, our clothing choices, our habits, our movements - now we have to not earn a living, in case our male employers feel they might suddenly feel driven to be sexual with us.

Well, I don't know about you, but I find other people attractive and don't sleep with them all the time.  Some might say I make a habit of it.  Walking down the street - oh, there's someone else, I think I won't sleep with them.  Sometimes at work I see someone attractive and, well, chat to them about work.  Out with friends?  Just more opportunities not to sleep with people I'm attracted to.

That is life, isn't it?  Unless, of course, you're a male employer living in Iowa, unable to control those manly urges.   Having the power to fire someone because you think they are sexy is rape culture in the extreme.  Having that power bolstered by a Supreme Court shows how entrenched rape supportive attitudes are in the institutions supposed to protect citizens from crime.

Rape culture, Iowa is soaking in it.

Thanks again, Ma.

Royal Society of New Zealand 2012 Research Honours Dinner

Cross Posted from my usual home-base.

The annual awards evening celebrating top NewZealand researchers was held at Auckland Museum on Wednesday.

Huge congratulations to Distinguished Professor Margaret Brimble, CNZM FRSNZ, School of Chemical Sciences, The University of Auckland, who last night became the second woman to win the Royal Society of New Zealand's Rutherford Medal.

She was quoted by Fairfax at stuff.co.nz

“I am personally very pleased that New Zealand has now recognised me, not for being a woman in science, but for my science.”

The Rutherford Medal was awarded to chemist Professor Brimble, for her world-leading contributions to the synthesis of bioactive natural products. Part of her work in chemical sciences has been research benefitting those who have experienced brain injury by modifying a naturally occurring peptide found in the brain after an injury, which helps to prevent secondary cell death.

If you are interested in reading more about her research, please go to the university website for more information.

Other women who won during the presentation of thirteen awards on Wednesday night were:

The Dame Joan Metge Medal for excellence and building relationships in the social science research community.

Professor Linda Tuhiwai Smith, Pro Vice Chancellor and Dean of the School of Māori and Pacific Development, University of Waikato, for inspiring, mentoring and developing Māori researchers.

Professor Janet Holmes FRSNZ, Chair in Linguistics, Victoria University of Wellington, for her outstanding contribution to linguistics.

Congratulations to all the winners on Wednesday night, you are inspirations.

I am going to try and focus more on the amazing work of New Zealand women, who, unless they are in film and television tend to slip through the cracks of NZ media, making small headlines no matter how outstanding their work is. Those who are already in their field appreciate them for the work they do, lives they change, and ideas they bring forward.

I will be recognising them here with the original drive due to the fact this is a feminist space, but in the hope that the circle of people who appreciate the work being done will widen. Please don’t hesitate to link to further information on the work these women are doing, or information about their achievements.

The stubborn gender gap - the Market is not providing

Bad news on the gender pay gap today, as reported in the NZ Herald:

The gender pay gap is the biggest it has been in 10 years, according to new data from Statistic New Zealand.

The quarterly employment survey shows the gender gap has increased in the year to September by 1.3 per cent, from 12.85 per cent to 14.18 per cent.

Pay Equity Challenge Coalition said it was the biggest gap it had seen in a decade.

Contrary to the delightful picture the Herald have chosen to illustrate their story (a white man and a white woman, both in suits, arm-wrestling) the gender pay gap is not a zero sum game, where men will lose out if women gain, and it is also not predominantly the concern of those in the higher paid roles where suit-wearing is expected.  In March 2009 I wrote a longish post about what I see are the reasons for the gender pay gap.  I'm not going to rehash that again here, because I agree with our guest poster from March 2010, Rebecca Matthews, who wrote then:

It seems to me that there are too many people, and particularly in this government, who use further research and analysis as a shield to hide behind, because they actually don’t view the gender pay gap as a problem and don’t want to commit to doing anything about it..

The only people who have ever made real progress towards pay equity for women, or indeed for other group disadvantaged by not being older middle-class or above white men who appear straight, have been workers' groups and movements led by those who deserve the improvements.  Employers do not magnanimously pass on fair pay, they only do it when they are forced to.  This is why we have a minimum wage; because otherwise employers would pay some people below it and as a society we have decided that is not fair. Some employers are fair, that's true, but they don't appear to be the majority, and the Market doesn't encourage that behaviour.

In other areas we have significant gender gaps too - particularly in political representation of women and appointments to boards.  Talk about quotas has been slowly building for some years, in response to the inability of political parties and organisations to deal with it voluntarily and effectively.  I used to be pretty anti-quota; I thought that it would undermine those women appointed or elected.  But, having heard from Judy McGregor on the topic, I've changed my mind. 

It is not as if there is a shortage of women who would be good in senior roles, on boards, as political decision-makers.  Indeed there is some contention that more women on the boards of major financial institutions may have meant we didn't end up with all that global financial meltdown stuff.  Without a TARDIS, I don't feel I can say for sure.

The shortage is instead in the area of those willing to appoint women.  And if they won't start doing it, despite all the evidence of the value of diversity at the decision-making level, and decades of working to change attitudes, then maybe it is time to regulate.

Snippets from the "Diary of a Caregiver" - Wellington August 9th

This event sounds totally amaze, many thanks to Rebecca for telling me about it.

Snippets from the “Diary of a Caregiver”

EEO Commissioner, Judy McGregor, will talk on her experiences as a caregiver and compiling the report Caring Counts

This event is hosted by the NZCTU Women’s Council and is a fundraiser for the Federation of Trade Unions of Burma Women’s Committee

August 9^th, 5.30- 7.00pm, 13^th Floor Education House, 178 Willis Street. Wellington

Serving soup, rolls and snacks at 6pm – a cash bar will be open

Cost $20 & $10.00 for low waged

Rsvp (required) to Karin Currie Karinc@nzctu.org.nz by  August the 7^th. 

Facebook event.

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I'm keen to assist with organising something similar in Auckland if others are interested...

international workers' memorial day

today is international workers' memorial day.  it's a day to remember those people who have died at work, particularly as a result of poor workplace safety practices.  it's a day to remember those that died at the pike river mine, the security guard charanpreet dhaliwal killed at his first day at work, the bus driver herman curry killed during an attempted burglary, derek lovell killed at the cool store explosion in tamahere, philomen gullard killed in the explosion in a water mains tunnel in onehunga, and so many more.  too many more.

it's also a day to remember those injured at work or general having to work in unsafe situations.   a quick look through the department of labour website shows that pacific workers have a particularly high injury rate:

“Manufacturing is a key area of focus for our work with Pacific Peoples as it accounts for one fifth of the Pacific workforce nationally,” says Vasantha Krishnan, General Manager of the Department’s Labour and Immigration Research Centre.

“These workers are disproportionately represented in injury statistics, accounting for over one-third of the manufacturing sector’s injury claims made to ACC in the 2009-2010 year,” Ms Krishnan says.


there are the appalling conditions faced by workers on foreign charter vessels, first reported by bloomberg and which led to our government putting out this report.

workers deserve to be safe at work.  they should be able to leave work at the end of the day, no worse off physically or emotionally than when they started it.  their policies, procedures and processes required to ensure their safety shouldn't be described as unnecessary bureaucracy or PC gone mad.  we still have a long way to go in keeping workers safe.  let's keep the names above, and others, in our thoughts so that we don't forget how important this is.


on another note, this is the photograph i loved best from the asset sales protest today & i wish i could have been there holding that sign as well:

it was great to see such a large turnout at the protest.  let's hope it makes a difference.

some essential reading

a must-read piece, via blue milk, on the value of work:

When performed by married women in their own homes, domestic labor is work—difficult, sacred, noble work. Ann says Mitt called it more important work than his own, which does make you wonder why he didn’t stay home with the boys himself. When performed for pay, however, this supremely important, difficult job becomes low-wage labor that almost anyone can do—teenagers, elderly women, even despised illegal immigrants. But here’s the real magic: when performed by low-income single mothers in their own homes, those same exact tasks—changing diapers, going to the playground and the store, making dinner, washing the dishes, giving a bath—are not only not work; they are idleness itself.

[...]

So there it is: the difference between a stay-home mother and a welfare mother is money and a wedding ring. Unlike any other kind of labor I can think of, domestic labor is productive or not, depending on who performs it. For a college-educated married woman, it is the most valuable thing she could possibly do, totally off the scale of human endeavor. What is curing malaria compared with raising a couple of Ivy Leaguers? For these women, being supported by a man is good—the one exception to our American creed of self-reliance. Taking paid work, after all, poses all sorts of risks to the kids. (Watch out, though, ladies: if you expect the father of your children to underwrite your homemaking after divorce, you go straight from saint to gold-digger.) But for a low-income single woman, forgoing a job to raise children is an evasion of responsibility, which is to marry and/or support herself. For her children, staying home sets a bad example, breeding the next generation of criminals and layabouts.

brilliant.  please go across and read the whole thing.

also, i linked to this report on women's leadership in asia (pdf) on my own blog yesterday.  it's also worth a read.  a few key findings from the executive summary:

• The gender gap is closing on health and survival, educational attainment, economic opportunity, and political empowerment.  This implies that the women of Asia can leverage rising personal endowments as well as increasing structural opportunities for
  future leadership. Family and dynastic factors have also catapulted some women in Asia to the highest levels of political leadership.  Indeed, Asia has seen more women heads of state than any other region in the world. Asian women have also joined the ranks of the world’s most rich and powerful.
• the countries of South Asia, which perform worst in overall gender equality and women’s attainment, actually lead among the top five countries in political empowerment (Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, India); number of women in parliament (Nepal, Pakistan); number of women ministers (Bangladesh); and women leaders in subnational government (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh). This contradictory picture is partly due to the region having the most number of women who have become heads of state because of family and dynastic connections (and not because of greater gender equality). Moreover, affirmative action has significantly increased women’s representation at different levels of government.
• the relationship between human development and women’s leadership is not directly proportional. Some economies in Asia with the highest human development rankings (e.g., Japan and South Korea) also perform most poorly in some measures of women’s leadership (e.g., women in senior management, women on boards, wage equality, remuneration and political empowerment). Others, such as Singapore and Hong Kong SAR, China, continue to have significant gender leadership gaps despite their high human development.
• To address cultural and social norms that impede women’s leadership, a broad campaign is needed to educate people and push for change in the valuation and perception of girls and women. Three shifts need to happen: 1) societies must perceive girls to be as valuable as boys; 2) societies must view women as having roughly similar abilities and potential to lead as men; and 3) societies must be more open to gender roles that involve women leading outside the home and men doing more in the home.

that last is something we're still struggling with here, and we definitely need improvements in the areas listed in the second bullet point.  comparative to other countries, nz scores well.  but comparative to men in our own country, there's a lot of work to be done.

Aggressive Promotion

So Murray McCully is overseeing a halving of women employed by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade in frontline diplomatic roles. It’s down from 30% under the last Labour-led government, to just 16% under this National-led government.

This isn’t surprising, given this government’s laissez-faire approach to women in paid work – scrapping the gender equity unit, paying female public sector workers 15% less than male public sector workers, and reportedly putting blocks within their own party to women representatives.

What is new is the reason Mr McCully has struggled to appoint women, according to Matthew Hooton. He says Mr McCully is manfully fighting “the most conservative of departments,” MFaT, by “aggressively promoting” Gen X talent:

Vangelis Vitalis, 43, has been appointed ambassador to the EU and Nato; Taha Macpherson, 40, to Turkey, Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian Authority; Reuben Levermore, 36, to the Philippines; and Justin Fepuleai, 38, to Afghanistan. Ben King, 39, is John Key’s new chief foreign policy advisor in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet.

So this isn’t about “aggressively promoting” Gen XY after all. Mr McCully isn’t a discriminatory employer. It must just be there are no women in their thirties and forties available for employment. Otherwise, I’m sure, with his fight against entrenched and conservative existing power structures, he’d be “aggressively promoting” Gen XX. Right?

For debate: Why don't more feminists support libertarianism?

WARNING:  This post and the ensuing thread include a lot of libertarian ranting.  You may prefer to find another time-wasting/procrastinating technique.

Prompted by a discussion in comments in another post, here's a question for debate, and I'll recreate the comments on the matter so far so you can see how it's all come to this:

Mark Hubbard:

To state my ideology, I'm an Objectivist Libertarian. From that point of view, a query.

Guestie: The War on Women

Many thanks to Amanda from Pickled Think for submitting this guest post.

Perhaps these fictional examples look like women you know about to be effected by the latest rounds of the War on Women...err...Social Welfare cuts.

• Erin, early 30s, mother of two. Children aged ten and twelve. Has just left an abusive husband of 15 years. No formal education beyond sixth form. Has not worked for almost all of the marriage because husband insisted on controlling finances and did not like Erin "fraternizing" outside of the home. Last job she held was as a "checkout chick" at a local supermarket at age 17. Currently undergoing counselling for domestic violence she suffered. Moving through the court system in a messy divorce and to gain sole custody of children. Children suffering from behavioural problems at home and school because of family violence and divorce, require careful monitoring and CYFs are watching her, making things more stressful. Is often tracked down at a safe place by partner, and driven to further hiding. Cut off from both sets of parents, her siblings and friends because of controlling ex, so cannot count on them for childcare. Cannot afford a car. Cannot get interim education because of Adult Continuing Education cuts. No one wants to hire someone with an empty CV, unreliable transport and unsteady timetable as she moves from one safe house to the next, and struggles to find and afford childcare.
  
  And this woman is to be forced to find a job why?

• Maggie, 55, no children. Husband recently died suddenly, leaving a business, mortgage and health care bills to settle. Has university entrance and a few correspondence papers under her belt, but most of her skills have been gained working for her husband's business and unquantifiable.  Husband's health insurance and superannuation payouts and sale of business (after debtors settled) is enough to pay off outstanding bills and mortgage with a little left over which she wishes to reinvest for her retirement (as she is in good health) rather than use it as living expenses now and suffer a cut back retirement. She could go back to tertiary education, but feels it would cut into the time and money she has left before formal retirement age. Employers are wary of hiring someone of her age and empty CV.
  
  Why would you penalize or completely remove her benefit  simply because she struggles to find a job under the auspices of institutionalized ageism and sexism?

• Moana, 27, married, 3 children under 10. Left school at 15, no formal education, cannot afford any ongoing education. Lives in an historically high unemployment rural area. Husband works a variety of seasonal jobs that takes him away from the home for weeks at a time, which means their income is not always static and they rely on benefits in between times. She has worked a variety of temp jobs deemed as unskilled labour, often just earning minimum wage. Both sets of parents and a variety of friends are available for child care outside of school hours, though her youngest is not yet school age, and these family and friends also work and sometimes are unavailable to help. She cannot afford child care, and CYFs have unusually targeted her, causing undue stress,  though both are good parents and doing their utmost to earn a living. She has unreliable transport, as the car keeps breaking down. In a particularly low time in job availability, she is offered a job in the next town 45 minutes away, but it is only minimum wage, not flexible in the hours she needs to look after her kids, and not worth it for the amount she must spend on petrol and car maintenance.
  
  Should she be penalized and/or lose her benefit because she accurately weighs up the economic and time costs of this job, refuses it, and suffers from entrenched racism?

• Raine, 25, pre-operative transgender woman, single, no dependents. Not in touch with, and can't rely on, any family. Highly educated. Suffers from bad depression. Has lived on the streets before, but currently in a stable, sympathetic living arrangement - would not like to leave if money runs out, but may have no choice. Has worked a variety of well paid jobs, but has been forced to leave many times after being outed against her will and shunned by employees. Would like surgery, but cannot maintain a steady job to afford it as well as her health regimen.  Recently left a sympathetic workplace because of depression issues. Used up all savings towards surgery as living expenses so as not to deal with social welfare system, but now running out of money. Finds sickness benefits excessively difficult and unsympathetic to deal with. Has high medical bills. Can get a benefit, but demands to get another job are stressful as she deals with health care, decision to stay closeted, and living arrangements.
  
  Should she be penalized because of medical issues and systemic transphobia in the workplace and social welfare system?

• Tina, 42, 2 children aged 12 and 14, recently divorced. Lives in Christchurch.  University education. Parents deceased, siblings live overseas. Amicable divorce finalized just before Feb22 earthquake, with agreed joint custody. Children suffering some stress and behavioural issues from earthquake and divorce. Lost her house and job from earthquake. Currently renting while waiting for EQC and insurance payouts on house. Unable to find permanent work post-earthquake because of shrinking local job market, though has taken on some temp jobs. Finds a job in Auckland, but it is far less money than desirable, will take all her savings to move, finances will be in flux while awaiting insurance payouts, after school care for stressed children and living expense will be more expensive, and will take children away from the childcare base of their father who is secure in Christchurch.
  
  And this is an ideal way to "get back into work" how?

• Sharyne, 17, single, no dependents. Living on her own between a variety of friends houses. Sexually abused from a young age by stepfather. Ran away from home at age 14 after failed CYFs placements. Often needs to leave a flatting arrangement quickly if stepfather and associates tracks her down. Left school at age 15 with behavioural issues. Has worked a variety of temporary jobs but left or been fired each time because of altercations with staff or customers. Family and friends who are trying to keep her separated from her abuser, and helping her contemplate laying charges, helping her towards counselling and various work placement courses that may suit her interests, but when she has a relapse or drinking session ends up on the street and/or picked up by the police. Community services keeping an eye on her, but recommends she needs careful attention before she can return to education or work.
  
  Does the government not realize that by taking control of paying a person's rent and living expenses they tie them up in impractical paperwork that slows down their retreat from an abuser? That by forcing a young person towards work or education when they are not mentally or socially capable will cause more problems?

• Robin, 47, single, 1 grown up child who lives overseas. Never married. University education, computer specialist. Suffered a serious back and neck injury twenty years ago, which now creates recurring pain issues and periods of depression. High medical bills. Unable to sit at a computer for long periods of time, though tries a variety of positions/ergonomic furniture to varying success. Some days are better than others with pain management. Reduced mobility with walking stick and scooter, though can look after herself given plenty of time for daily routine. Has tried to work in the past, but met with frustration from employers at her slow movements and high needs. Some success with self employment, but cannot maintain high enough mobility, mental health and energy to self advertise and manage projects.
  
  Should she be tossed out again into an unsympathetic workplace when she knows how this will end, in more stress, pain, and possible loss of already precarious funds?

These examples just scratch the surface of the depth and breadth of women's needs within New Zealand's welfare system. They're not eating bon-bons and watching soaps, waiting for the next sperm donor to turn up so they can rort the system. But thanks Paula and John-John, you two self-declared products of our welfare system, for that nice little mythology you've chucked out there. Nothing like keeping the rich white voters of the country happy with a few little elitist exaggerations.

Bootstraps, eh? Now available in Kiwi Flavour.

We need to talk about jobs

Red pen about to start circling the Job Opportunities in the paper

Today's announcement about welfare reform brings us back to the problem that has been plaguing us for quite some time now; the absolute and urgent need for a proper strategy on job creation.

Last year I attended the Bruce Jesson Memorial Lecture and this time it was all about full employment, and delivered by Professor (of Economics) Paul Dalziel who has been doing a whole heap of research on the matter at Lincoln.

One of the key ideas he talked about, from Jesson's writings, was that when the welfare state was established in Aotearoa New Zealand, all those decades ago, it was set up to work in complementary fashion with full employment.  This muddled along ok, with direct state job creation in lean times and state support for private job creation in the good, until the two concepts were separated under Rogernomics and thoroughly divorced during Ruthanasia.

Nowadays apparently some people think that not only is it Not Cool for us to collectively support each other in the hard times through a welfare system, it's also totally naff to even consider any Government planning to ensure we have career pathways and actual jobs; so that we can get the things made that we need, access the services we require, and also be employed in ways that work for modern life.

Sadly many of the people who hold this view, that Government's role is severely limited and The Market Will Provide, are currently in positions of power in our society.  In particular they seem to populate Cabinet, and those who don't have Ministerial chairs to sit in appear to be given taskforce and directorship and whatnot roles by their mates who do.

It's awfully convenient, to blame people for being reliant on a state benefit AND blame them for the inability to get a job that suits the way their lives have to be lived.  It let's the Government totally off the hook.  What a coincidence.

Let's not forget that the type of work you need when you are the sole parent of a child, whatever the reason for that, or struggling with your own ill health or that of another in your household, is not 9-5 (plus travel) Monday to Friday away from home and with only 5 days of sick leave a year.  We have a huge shortage of affordable quality childcare - and not just for pre-schoolers but crucially for before and after school too (and during the school holidays).  Sure a child may be at school from 9am to 3pm, once they turn 5, but how many jobs do you know of that go from 9.30am to 2.30pm in four convenient ten week blocks a year?  Teacher aide jobs would sound ideal, except that there is a lot of competition for these and the pay is ridiculously low for the level of skill and responsibility often required.

We don't have enough jobs that meet these needs already.  Creating a whole new phalanx of people who need these jobs, in a time when casualisation is increasing and job cuts just keep coming, will suit employers just fine, as it will make prospective employees desperate.  Desperate to get a job, desperate to keep a job, and that is an incredibly vulnerable place to be in, as a worker and as a human being.

Do we actually want to make people more vulnerable than they already are?  Why?

Observations

Observation the First - If kids are going without breakfast their mums probably are too
I get really fed up with the narrative that seems to go with child poverty, as exhibited by the number of kids going to school without breakfast, that seeks to blame the parents.  When food is short in a household often mum is the first to cut her rations.  This is not a situation where there are gluttonous parents hoovering up all the food and not caring that their kids are hungry.  It is a situation where there are families in our society who cannot afford to buy food.  By framing it as the former we can Otherize it - it's Their fault, they are not like me/us, and it's therefore Someone Else's Problem.  To accept it's actually the latter I guess we may need to step up and recognise that our society is something that we can have some say over - we make choices, particularly political choices, that have consequences for others.  To change society is daunting, but shouldn't the systems we live in serve rather than hinder?

Observation the Second - There are not enough jobs
There's been multi-purpose whining about how the youth unemployment rate is a direct result of the abolition of youth rates.  Employers are supposedly giving jobs to older people instead of youf because they can't get away with paying less than the adult minimum wage for young workers.  Older people are competing for places that traditionally went to the young uns because they are losing their own jobs, or their financial situations have changed resulting in the need for second and third incomes.  I really noticed over the weekend the high number of shops shutting, empty commercial spaces for lease, and a large number of retail sales that looked like the immediate precursor to closing down (shelves emptying out, no new stock coming in, quite big discounts on everything).  I also spotted a lot of older workers in the kind of retail jobs that used to be predominantly filled by those in their teens or early twenties.  The layoffs, public and private, don't seem to be getting much media but they are real, and it's definitely a buyer's labour market at the moment.

Observation the Third - A lot of people are moving to Australia for better prospects
In the 90s most of my friends were people I met through university, where we were studying together, and so hardly anyone I knew shifted to Australia.  Then in the 00s a lot of my peers did the OE thing, and some have not come back, but very very few actively moved across the Tasman as a result of a failure to find work here.  Lately week after week I feel I'm hearing of a new acquaintance, relative or friend who is making the shift.  Then there was the woman on Nat Rad from Christchurch last week who sounded very bitter about the lack of support for her family to stay.

What is this Government actually doing about job creation?  Whatever happened to whatever mysterious wondrousness came out of the Jobs Summit?  The Market is not providing; for kids, for their parents, for young, for old, for inbetween.  When do we start asking questions about the system we live in, not the individuals caught in it?

and he's gone

i know i'm a bit late for this post, but never mind. i have to say i'm very glad to see that alisdair thompson is no longer in a position to make public statements for the EMA. of course he can still make public statements, but they won't mean as much.

i am actually an employer in a voluntary capacity, being on the board of a couple of NGOs. one of these is a women's organisation, and i know that we need support as employers. the EMA should be an option for us, but until now, i really haven't felt that they are - given that their public positions and lobbying haven't been consistent with good employment policy. an employer's organisation that advocates the youth wage or that won't take more concrete actions for equality in the work place is not one that i can justify giving money to. especially from an NGO that is working to improve the lives of people in this community. to belong to that organisation in its current state is to betray the very people our organisation serves. i'm pretty sure that the rest of the board agrees with me on this.

the sacking of mr thompson is a big step but still not good enough. if this organisation really wants to represent employers, it needs to make itself accessible to all types of organisations. i don't believe it's accessable to NGOs in the way it currently operates, but NGOs employ a considerable number of staff. chambers of commerce actually do tend to be a lot better, and have managed to do some progressive things. perhaps EMA could look to them for some ideas on how to actually serve the needs of their community.

on another note, there has been some great writing on the whole alisdair thompson thing from various bloggers, but also in the MSM. there was a good piece by denise irvine in the waikato times yesterday, but i can't find it online. this there's also this one from mai chen, which is very good. and not just because it happens to mention my sister!! who is absolutely as awesome as mai chen thinks she is:

My concern is that stereotyping may stop you from hiring the best staff. New Zealand is a small country.

I had a call some years back from a law professor who asked if I would hire her top student. Despite a stellar academic record, and a formidable work ethic, no one would hire this lawyer because she was Muslim, wore a hijab and prayed five times a day facing Mecca. The woman interviewed well, so I hired her and found she was the best law clerk I had ever had.

please ignore my bias and read the whole thing - it's worth it!

then there is this article about the low number of women on nz boards:

Korn/Ferry surveyed the top 100 boards by market capitalisation in Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia China, and New Zealand, finding 65% of New Zealand boards had no women directors compared to 29% in Asia-Pacific leader Australia. In Singapore, 59% of boards had no women members, 57% in India, 56% in Malaysia, 43% in Hong Kong and 39% in China.

The news gets even worse, with the Asia-Pacific region lagging Europe and America, an imbalance report author Alicia Yi describes as "stark".

the difference in figures for asia can be explained by the low wages there, making it much more affordable to hire domestic staff for housework & child-rearing. also the cheaper & greater variety of food, making takeaways and eating out a much more affordable option. these are not things that we want to be emulating.

however, there is no reason we should be lagging behind australia, europe & america. many of these countries have government policies that help to improve equality, particularly in europe. as usual, our government is not prepared to look at these. although i will be impressed if they do something about removing secrecy re wages as was mentioned not too long ago. or even ask companies to report on gender payrates within their organisations.

finally, i'm currently awaiting brian edwards' defense of john ansell. based on past form, i'm sure it will be forthcoming.

alisdair thompson must go

i don't know if it's possible to embed tv3 clips (can't find any codes) so you'll have to go over to their place to watch the abomination fo an interview with alaisdair thompson. it's almost 28 minutes long, so you may not want to waste so much of your life on such a thing. the last 5 minutes is hugely illuminating, but the full things give more insights (as if his press release and tweets hadn't already) into how truly misguided this man really is.

a brief rundown of the interview: mr thompson starts by dictating the terms of the interview and how it is to be conducted. you see, he has been gracious enough to grant the interview in the first place, so it should be entirely on his terms. it's not like he has any responsibility to explain himself or anything like that. it's not like he made some atrocious public comments, or holds a role that requires him to make media statements which he should then be accountable for. oh no, he has "granted" an interview out of the goodness of his heart. he does state that he doesn't mind being asked "the most difficult questions you like" and assures the interviewer he will answer them. bear that in mind when you see his meltdown in the last 5 minutes.

once he has done that, he proceeds to tell us about his extremely busy life, with extremely important people. about his late nights and early mornings, because mr thompson is a hugely productive man who has no time to be taking sick days for weak womanly purposes. he's the man, the very important and busy man, who was pretty worn out by the time he go to the interview where he made his insightful remarks. not that he's making excuses of course. he just wants to impress on us how very busy and well-connected he is.

oh, and i missed the bit where he fusses about his appearance. because for some reason, people will be more interested in the tie and the hair than in what he's going to say.

mr thompson is prepared to apologise and does apologise. even though he's "not that unhappy" with what he's said. he gives us the apology, directly looking at the camera . hint 1: if you follow your apology with the word "but" and then go on to say a whole lot of other stuff, it shows you aren't actually sorry. so it really isn't an apology. hint 2: if you keep reiterating and reinforcing the thing you said which was offensive, then what exactly is it you're apologising for?

he reminds us that "fortunately" women are different to men and men are different to women. great insight there. women take more leave, as records show - although there aren't actually any stats on it (i've deliberately avoided writing the word out in full, in consideration of the fact that mr thompson so struggles with it). but he's the full expert now on what women do, how women manage (mostly with tablets, didn't you know).

and to show us how super non-sexist he is, he assures us that most women are more productive than most men, because of all the housework and childcare they do as well as work. he has been listening to the criticism he's been receiving all day, you see. he's showing us that he's taken it on board, that he's totally not sexist at all, because women are so different and so wonderful. it still doesn't occur to him to state that it's wrong for women to have to be the ones to take time off when their children are sick. he concedes later on that it's wrong for women to be doing more of the unpaid work in the home but can't think whose fault it might be. hint 3: if you want to convince us about how non-sexist you are, it pays not to use a hugely sexist term like nanny-state.

he thinks we need to take the emotion out of this. all this talk of menstruation and baby-making makes women so very emotional, obviously. it isn't helpful. let's all be non-emotional and just talk about productivity.

the bit that really gets me is the discussion of the personal lives of his two top women lawyers. the interviewer asks if they have children - relevant because he's so busy praising their productivity - and he answers in the negative. but then he goes on to discuss their marital status. how is that even relevant? and are those employees happy to have their personal lives thrown out into the public arena, just so he can make some tragically useless point about productivity? if i was them (& particularly since they are lawyers), i'd be filing some kind of complaint with the privacy commisioner pretty promptly.

as should all the other female employees who get to be used as examples of his "records" that are supposed to prove his point about the reasons for leave. we see the meltdown begin when he's asked for the research to support his assertions. he then decides that he should tell the interviewer what the question should be. she's apparently only there to do as she's told, not to hold him accountable. he knows he can't answer the question about research, because there isn't any. so he expects her to ask a differently worded question.

and when she does ask a pretty reasonable question about women giving heavy periods as the reason for taking sick leave, he has a complete meltdown. it's not even a difficult question, it's certainly not an offensive one, and it's asked in a completely polite and calm manner. his behaviour is shocking, and clearly bullying (but we're supposed to take the emotion out of the situation and be all rational-like). he knows it's being filmed - he specifically gave permission by saying "you can roll the camera now" a few minutes earlier.

his comments of earlier in the day were enough of a reason for him to step down from his position. but this? i really can't see how he can continue.

unequal pay is ok with employers & manufacturers association

great. alisdair thomson's response to catherine delahunty's equal pay bill:

... EMA chief executive Alasdair Thompson today admitted there was a gender pay gap -- 12 per cent according to figures -- but said women took the most sick days.

"Why? Because once a month they have sick problems. Not all women, but some do, they have children they have to take time off to go home and take leave," he told NewstalkZB.
Therefore their productivity was lower.

"I don't like saying these things because it sounds like I'm sexist, but it's a fact of life."

once again, i'm refraining from swearing because of internet filters, but really? all you ladies are taking sick days once a month? how come no-one told me? i'll have to start doing that immediately.

aside from the stupidity of the comments, he doesn't want to consider (and actually advocate for) the possibility that men who have children be taking time off around the birth to be active fathers. he's not interested in promoting policies that would make workplaces more family-friendly. he doesn't consider that many women are being more productive on a daily basis than their male counterparts.

nope, he's happy with the gender pay gap & wants it to stay. because heavens forbid that employers be faced with the costs of paying people equally for the same level of work.

i'm with helen kelly - the man has to go.