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Women and Work: Pleasure, Pain, Prospects ‘Our work, Our lives’ National Conference on Women and Industrial Relations 12

Women and Work: Pleasure, Pain, Prospects ‘Our work, Our lives’ National Conference on Women and Industrial Relations 12-14 July 2006 Barbara Pocock Centre for Work and Life, University of South Australia. Pleasure, pain, prospects. The pleasures of work…. The pain Time Money

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Women and Work: Pleasure, Pain, Prospects ‘Our work, Our lives’ National Conference on Women and Industrial Relations 12

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  1. Women and Work: Pleasure, Pain, Prospects ‘Our work, Our lives’ National Conference on Women and Industrial Relations 12-14 July 2006 Barbara Pocock Centre for Work and Life, University of South Australia

  2. Pleasure, pain, prospects • The pleasures of work…. • The pain • Time • Money • Inequality • Security • Future prospects

  3. Work: the pleasures • 60 per cent of Australians would work even if they didn’t need the money • Not just professionals • Over half of cleaners and labourers • Some women ‘love’ their work • Even when they didn’t expect to • Children see the positive spillover • They might love work, but they don’t always love its terms: safety, security, hours

  4. The pleasures • Increasing appetite for work? • Women want to work • Young women expect to work • Few signs of the ‘new wife’ that US researchers speak of • With a decade at work before having children, social supports and friendships increasingly work-based • The suburban social desert?

  5. Participation

  6. But overload and guilt not uncommon • In 1997 Australian women did twice as much housework as men (33 hours, compared to 17) • And very little change between 1992 and 1997 except that women did a bit less and bought more help. • Working women prioritise care, especially developmental care (Lynn Craig’s research) • Women buy help…Which requires more work… • Domestic work - standards, time, inequity • ‘Pseudo-mutuality’ or ‘lagged adaption’? • Easy redistribution in the pipeline…?

  7. How to draw men into housework?

  8. The Pain? • Increasing hours for full-timers. • Average hours of full-timers increasing - by 3.1 hours 1982-2001 • A quarter of Australians now work more than 45 hours a week. • Traveling time is increasing. • The intensity of work is increasing. • Common family time is being squeezed or lost. • Most new jobs have been part-time: the work/family mechanism of choice in Australia. • But it has unique characteristics: • two-thirds is casual with restricted rights, tenure, respect, predictability of earnings and hours, retirement savings, and limited job security.

  9. Time: A critical issue for women

  10. Long hours of work • Hours of full-timers have increased significantly in Australia in recent decades - mostly before 1996: by around 3 hours a week • International research about health & long hours (Spurgeon, 2003) • Increases risk of mental health problems • Increases risk of cardiovascular disease • Adverse effects on family relationships

  11. Unsocial time and families • 64% of Australian employees already work either sometimes or regularly outside standard times • ‘Consistent body of international evidence’ finds that unsocial work time affects social and family time (Strazdins et al, 2004) • Evening and night work is especially stressful for parents, increasing depression, affecting sleep and reducing parental responsiveness to children • Positive associations between shift work and marital discord and divorce

  12. Night work and family • Night work combined with parenting is most harmful for marital stability (Presser 2000; US study) • Night working parents have two to six times the risk of divorce compared to those working standard daytime hours • Transmission effects to children

  13. Unsocial hours and care • All kinds of unsocial routines (weekend, afternoon, evening and night) can disrupt families and reduce parent-child time • Such parents spend less time reading, playing and helping children and are less satisfied with the time available with children • Many parents compensate by taking less time for themselves

  14. New research: effects on children • Analysis of Canadian data by Strazdins et al (2004) shows that children of parents who work non-standard hours are more likely to have emotional or behavioural difficulties • Independent of socio-economic status and childcare use • Other kinds of disadvantage can compound this effect

  15. Money • Widening dispersion in earnings • Average full-time gender pay gap steady • But much movement underneath the average • By type of instrument • By industry and occupation • The legacy of undervaluation of feminised jobs… • The political economy of care and service sector work • The pay price for maternity - overshadows the hourly gender pay gap?

  16. Inequality • Widening inequality between the top and the bottom of the labour market • UK: in 1979 executives earned 10 times the pay of typical British workers. By 2002, 54 times • US: in 1980 executives earned 50 times and by 2002, 281 times • Australia, 1989-90 executives earned 18 times of average workers, and by 2005, 63 times. • The social costs of inequality are not visited only on the bottom… • A rising plane of prosperity built upon a growing body of low paid feminised services sector work…?

  17. Consider Rosa and Mr Moss • Mr Moss, head of Macquarie Bank is being paid $21.2 million for this years work • Rosa is a room attendant in a luxury Sydney hotel and a sole parent with 5 children, renting • She works 2 days a week for $14 an hour as a room attendant and another 16 hours a week in a shop for $10/hour. Her annual wage is $20,000 and she gets another $10,000 from government. A 90 minute daily commute. • Taxpayer subsidy of low paying employers

  18. The essential work of care and cleaning

  19. Security • Over a quarter of employees now formally casual • Disproportionately women • Variable levels of actual insecurity • The price of being part-time • But loss of key conditions like paid holidays and sick leave • Implications for retirement incomes and economic security over the life cycle

  20. Flexibility? • Casual work is flexible • But less so for workers than employers in the minds of many casuals • Many find it hard to take time off, to refuse shifts, to control working time. • They talk of being ‘on call’ not ‘in control’

  21. Flexibility has many dimensions • Predictability of job tomorrow, next week, • Predictability of hours • Knowing hours in advance • Knowing finish time • Having minimum call in time • Controlling long hours and unpaid overtime • Some have say, many do not… • …even before ‘WorkChoices’

  22. Strong preference for permanence • Because workers want: • A predictable life • A reliable income and hours • Better chances at promotion and training • Paid holidays and sick leave • Chance to do the better tasks • Respect at work

  23. Prospects?WorkChoices: a weaker safety net minimum pay rate 4 weeks annual leave - with option to sell half 10 days personal/carer’s leave 12 months unpaid parental leave 38 ordinary hours, annual average Australian Workplace Agreements override agreements and awards - without a ‘no disadvantage’ test

  24. The measures: Tilts bargaining • ‘Fair pay Commission’ • weak unfair dismissal protections • More anti-collective than US law • Australian Industrial Relations Commission neutered

  25. A changing regulatory environment in Australia • Implications for women? • AIRC President Giudice: ‘people with low skills, low bargaining power are headed for the five minimum conditions..which will have an effect on their incomes..This will be accompanied by a slowdown in the rate of growth of minimum wages - that’s what the Fair Pay Commission is for…I can assure you it’s going to affect our society’

  26. AIRC and work/family • Maternity leave (1979) • Adoption leave (1984) • Parental leave (1990) • Carers’ leave (1994/95) • Right to refuse unreasonable overtime (2001) • Right to request part-time employment (2005) All opposed by coalition and employers How will any new advances be made?

  27. Improvements for women? • Loss of key conditions like ‘right to request’ • Pay inequity in an environment of greater decentralisation • Pay/time trades difficult to trace and analyse

  28. Overall Impact… • Low paid workers will be lower paid • $44 lower if government had had its way since 1996 AWAs on ‘take it or leave it’ basis for new employees or on promotion etc • Collective agreements and awards irrelevant over time • Union access to workers more limited and difficult • (eg 24 hours written notice and reason, only once every 6 months for recruitment, no entry if covered by AWAs, individual worker who seeks help from union will be identified to boss, no chance to check non-members paid correctly, complex ballots for industrial action)

  29. Impact… • Widening wages dispersion • Same workers, different rates • Tougher for the weaker • young people • people returning to work • casuals • working carers • Immigrants • women • Even good bosses are forced to compete on cut price wages and conditions

  30. Impact on workers and families? • Shift to AWAs, and stripped back awards will increase: • hours of work • unsocial working time • wage inequality • the working poor

  31. The evidence: AWAs and pay pre-Workchoices • Pay levels and pay rises are lower for private sector workers on AWAs (Peetz 2005) • Even though workers on AWAs, work longer hours • And have less access to penalty rates for unsocial hours and overtime • AWAs much more likely to reduce or abolish pay for working overtime, nights or weekends

  32. AWAs and pay • women on AWAs paid 11% less than women on collective agreements in May 2004 • Casuals on AWAs lower by 15%, • Permanent part-timers by 25%. • These are all groups with disproportionate responsibilities for families

  33. AWAs: less family friendly • In 2001 only 12% of all AWAs had any work/family measures • 2004 DEWR report: • only 8% of AWAs had paid maternity leave (10% collective agreements) • 5% had paid paternity leave (7%) • 4% unpaid purchased leave • Those who need it most, get it least: • 14% more men than women on AWAs had any family leave in their AWA

  34. ‘WorkChoices’ • Whatever else it might do… • Is already lowering standards • 16% of survey of 250/6263 individual contracts since March 2006 removed penalty rates, overtime rates, holiday loading, shift loadings • Two-thirds lost leave loadings, penalty rates and over half shift loadings • Important implications for low paid workers who depend on these payments to make a living wage

  35. A family unfriendly, unfair agenda • With very negative consequences for women, the low paid, young and disadvantaged • Will create more pressures in many families • for children and other dependents • for relationships • Long lived social consequences for inequality and unfairness

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