Labor productivity is run by industries and other people. The companies control the pay, the number of workers, how long they work and do what’s best in the interest of the company rather than the workers. In some cases this can lead to worker exploitation, where women and men alike are unable to support their families in ratio to how much they work. Men and women need a balance where they are being paid enough to support their family but at the same time they need to work certain hours because of their families. I believe that finding that balance is very difficult because it would change from person to person depending on experience and other life skills qualified for a certain job.
For example, I watched a TED talk where the author Jessica Shortall talked about maternity leave. She discussed how women are fired or pressured to get back, because the company doesn’t want to give them paid leave, to work sooner despite the dire consequences that could follow, emotionally and physically. Women original jobs were to take care of children at home, but when they were needed in the workforce during WWI and as followed they were expected to do both and even as the men came back women were seen as having to jobs. One outside the home and one where they took care of their family. Women are criticized either way whether they are working or not either being seen as lazy for not working but when they work and have a baby they are an inconvenience. As said in the video, we need babies and we are discouraging women to do so because they cannot afford it. I think that our economy would thrive more if women can support their family and make a family without worrying about leaving their babies right after birth. This is draining emotionally and physically for women making it harder to do a better quality job.
The concept of maternity leave relates to cheap care. Where in my opinion society is taking advantage of working moms. As men are more dominant in working industries they don’t understand the pain and pressure that comes from childbirth. It also leads to the companies hiring primarily males so that they don’t have to worry about the consequences that follow from hiring women. They push their women employees to come back to work without paid leave and in turn pressures them to not have families instead which causes all sorts of problems. As Shortall stated in her video the problem is not the women, it is America. Workers fought to get certain rights so they are not being abused and exploited. Acts like OSHA were passed to support this, so I think that both women and men should fight for paid maternity leave because they are also in ways being exploited.
https://www.ted.com/talks/jessica_shortall_how_america_fails_new_parents_and_their_babies?language=en
https://www.ted.com/talks/jessica_shortall_how_america_fails_new_parents_and_their_babies?language=en
I think this a very important subject to discuss and it fits in well with our discussion of the labor market. I remember reading that California had some pretty good parental leave laws. I looked it up and I found that, since the beginning of 2018, the Parental League act guarantees most parents 6 weeks partially paid leave (https://www.workingmother.com/california-maternity-leave-everything-expectant-parents-need-to-know#page-3). However, it doesn't apply to employees of small business with under 50 employees. The good news is, historically, policies like these have had little effect on the economy (http://www.nationalpartnership.org/research-library/work-family/paid-leave/paid-leave-works-in-california-new-jersey-and-rhode-island.pdf) with small businesses even implementing it voluntarily.
ReplyDeleteThank you Padmini for bringing this to light as I think it is commonly overlooked or conveniently not talked about as much! The historical background you provided about World War II really helped me understand how these policies/social scripts came to be. I remember talking with teachers at Los Altos and they told me that they have to plan their pregnancy in the summer in order to still be paid. The double standard in how working moms are asked about their work-life balance and are seen as “bad moms” for hiring nannies is also upsetting, especially in how it sometimes pressures women to choose between motherhood and a career where some don’t want to risk losing a stable job and income. The point you brought up about how “companies hiring primarily males so that they don’t have to worry about the consequences that follow from hiring women” rings truth and made me think about other communities that are affected. From a employer perspective, it is more costly to address their issues when in reality it could help the whole economy by contributing to alleviating the whole community’s issues. Besides gender inequality, I see this with minority economic inequality where both communities are concentrated in lower income occupations because a very specific demographic dominates the industries. This makes me wonder if opportunity gaps should be filled by the government, with federal paid leave for example, or if it should be the company’s responsibility to pay—especially when they have been known in the past for cutting costs by reducing the salaries of women…
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