"How Can We Help Men? By Helping Women"

Submitted by Mastodon on Sun, 2014-01-12 02:43

Article here. Excerpt:

'THIS week Maria Shriver brings together a star-studded cast of celebrities, from Hillary Rodham Clinton to Beyoncé, to call attention to the economic plight of American women and demand that women’s needs be put “at the center of policy making.

But is this really the time to focus on women? For nearly four decades, feminists have decried “the feminization of poverty.” However, since the 1980s there has been a defeminization of poverty, as a growing proportion of men have fallen on hard times. In recent years men have experienced especially significant losses in income and job security.

Although women are still more likely to be poor than men, on average women’s income and labor-force participation have been rising since the 1970s. By contrast, between 1970 and 2010 the median earnings of men fell by 19 percent, and those of men with just a high school diploma by a stunning 41 percent. And while women have regained all the jobs they lost during the recession, men have regained just 75 percent.

Since about 1980 the percentage of men and women in middle-skill jobs has declined. But for women, nearly all of that decline was because of increased representation in higher-skill jobs. Women’s employment in low-skill jobs increased by just 1 percent. By contrast, for men, half the decline in middle-skill jobs was a result of increases in low-skill jobs.

The most urgent issue facing working Americans today is not the glass ceiling. It is the sinking floor. So wouldn’t it make more sense to focus on gender-neutral economic policies?
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Today, however, becoming a “never-never” employee is increasingly a gender-neutral fate. Millions of men face working conditions that traditionally characterized women’s lives: low wages, minimal benefits, part-time or temporary jobs, and periods of joblessness. Poverty is becoming defeminized because the working conditions of many men are becoming more feminized.

Whether they realize it or not, men now have a direct stake in policies that advance gender equity. Most of the wage gap between women and men is no longer a result of blatant male favoritism in pay and promotion. Much of it stems from general wage inequality in society at large.
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Another source of the gender pay gap is the lack of reliable, affordable child care, which forces many mothers to stay home or work part time even when they need and want full-time work.

Prioritizing child care would not just be a boon for mothers but for millions of fathers as well. The highest proportion of stay-at-home moms is found among women married to men in the bottom 25 percent of the country’s income distribution. Most of these women cannot afford to work because of the high cost of child care, even though their partners and children would benefit from the increased income.
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Putting women’s traditional needs at the center of social planning is not reverse sexism. It’s the best way to reverse the increasing economic vulnerability of men and women alike.

Given the increasing insecurity of many American men, they have good reason to back feminist policies. And if those policies alienate some women in the upper echelons, then maybe feminism isn’t for every woman, and doesn’t need to be.'

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Comments

... if the gov't starts providing free ("free", as in "free" health care, too) daycare services, men will be better off.

I don't get that, especially when our society is trending relentlessly toward a single-parent model of child-rearing (i.e., a single-mother model of child-rearing), which is driven almost entirely by the mothers themselves. Just exactly how is having taxpayer-funded day care going to help men when either a) they have not historically been the primary caregivers of children and b) are increasingly less involved with their children on the whole than in the past due to so many children being raised in "single parent" homes for whatever reason (usually divorce, which sees mom get custody/primary residence 90% of the time).

The author says men should support feminist policies because it will benefit them. This was the same line touted in the 1970s by feminists and a lot of men bought it. Look at where that took them to: the cleaners.

I suppose it's possible that there are still some men who are clueless enough to buy this claptrap. In particular, there are men who have yet to be sent through the ringer of "family court" machinations (or have yet to see what happens to a friend when he gets clobbered by the fallout from feminist legislation and attitudes in certain critical contexts) and may think this kind of "reasoning" makes sense. But a Trojan Horse is a Trojan Horse, and it comes in many flavors: big wooden horse-flavored, computer-flavored, and of course, feminist-flavored. And they all taste BAD!

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Submitted by Matt on Sun, 2014-01-12 03:48

Hilary Clinton and company don't value childcare (as in parents taking care of their own children), nor do they have family values (dad, mom +children all under the same roof). Also, don't welfare moms already get free daycare? So this "free" daycare would go to parents who can already afford daycare or can afford a stay at home parent (please correct me if I'm wrong). This sounds more like a ploy to shut down private daycares and add government control to your children's lives.

Clinton is forever trying to get children out of their homes and into institutionalized childcare by offering free daycare and/or free preschool. These would most likely be staffed with union employees and set to federal guidelines. She doesn't like any form of child care to be outside of government control (private daycare, private schools, charter schools, homeschooling, medical care, etc). In her book "It takes a village to raise a child" she paints parents as dangerous and in need of government oversight (so I have been told, I admit I have not read the book).

Clinton is a supporter of health centers in public high schools (government run no doubt). This takes the responsibility out of the hands of parents (she backed a bill prohibiting parental notification of any medical services for kids 13 and up). I suspect the clinics would mostly provide birth control and abortion services (and maybe some ADD meds for the pesky boys /s).

Every entity involving children is starting to morph into the same system - daycare, schools, juvenile detentions, courts, medical care, etc. And you know what they say "The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world" Hilary Clinton is after full control of our children.

PS- if your in doubt google "dear Hilary letter from Marc Tucker" about a cradle to grave system of control, starting with control of young children and the school system.

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Submitted by Kris on Sun, 2014-01-12 05:50

I believe it, Kris. She seems to be a totalitarian nightmare in terms of her worldview.

Kudos to you too, Matt for seeing through the BS. To me this seems like a ploy to get the U.S. on an extremely slippery slope to socialism. I think if they want to institute government funded childcare, let ONLY those who use it be taxed for it. But then that would defeat the purpose, because they couldn't afford it, wouldn't it? Socialism is all about theft from everybody in the name of the poorer classes.

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Submitted by xtrnl on Sun, 2014-01-12 23:49