"The gender bender agenda"

Submitted by Matt on Tue, 2010-03-02 16:45

Article here. Also by Melanie Phillips. She is vindicated somewhat in my eyes with this one. :) Excerpt:

'So what do you expect if you have something called an ‘Equality Minister’? She will impose gross injustice wherever she can in the interests of a coercive and preposterous ideology. Harriet Harman’s proposal that companies should positively discriminate in favour of women job candidates (ie discriminate against men) is yet another example of the way in which feminism got hijacked and turned from a campaign for fairness for women into an onslaught against men. Her proposal is not only totally unfair -- job candidates should be appointed on grounds of merit, not chromosomes – but is based on the false premise that the gender pay gap proves that women are the victims of systematic discrimination in the workplace.

But this is simply untrue. Granted that there are indeed specific instances of discrimination against women, the generalised claim is false because it ignores the differences in behaviour between women and men at work. As academics such as Professor Catherine Hakim of the London School of Economics have long argued, such iconic feminist causes as the ‘glass ceiling’ and the ‘gender pay gap’ are in very large measure the outcome of the choices made by women themselves.'

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Comments

I don't believe in any government intervention when it comes to wages and many employment issues. It should be private matter between the employer and the employee. I even hate the "minimum wage" laws.

It is all a matter of supply and demand. An employee is trying to get the highest pay for his/her work and an employer is trying to buy labor at an efficient cost. When the law of supply and demand kicks in it will naturally fall at a fair price.

Everyone is paid their worth and are free to negotiate with their boss or look for employment elsewhere. A business owner has no incentive to let good employees quit unless he is confident that he can replace them for the same or lesser amount.

There is no need for a "Equality Minister" it would just be more misguided government interference, and unfair to business owners and male employees. It is a system in which everyone loses including business owners, employees and consumers.

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Submitted by Kris on Wed, 2010-03-03 03:33

manonthestreet

Much of what is said about women's pay just does not make sense. Here in the UK a woman is entitled to a whole years maternity leave which is with pay. So the woman get paid for not working at all. If you add in these substantial benefits that women have then they must be getting far higher pay than men. No man has a years paid leave as part of his contract.

Also women are much more likely to be able to get the employer to employ them on hours that they choose. This happened with some female police officers. Again a man would be lucky to be able to pick and choose his hours.

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Submitted by trotter on Wed, 2010-03-03 14:31