Women, work and Howard's agenda
Melanie Sjoberg
Each time we turn on the TV we are confronted with images reminding us that life as a woman is extremely complex. But dominant amongst these images is that of the tireless mother and homemaker — tireless even if she also has a paid job.
During the federal election campaign, the mainstream politicians have been striving to persuade us that their policies will be most beneficial to families — especially those in which a full-time carer tends the children, prepares most of the food and looks after others when they are ill.
Why are the media and politicians trying so hard to convince us that families with a stay-at-home mum are the ideal, rather than merely one (valid) choice for women, when this ideal is so far from most women's reality?
Flexible labour
Capitalism has consistently used women as a reserve army of labour, to be brought into or pushed out of the workforce depending on the needs of business and capital expansion.
During the developmental phase of industrialisation, women in their thousands left rural communities where they shared the cottage industry and farming tasks to seek work in the rapidly growing cities. Still today, the factories in the "special economic zones" of many countries are surrounded by vast dormitories housing young women who've left rural areas for waged work.
In the early years of Australian settlement, women's domestic labour supported the colonial implantation. But as the craft industry took on a more industrialised character and unions sought a fair wage, women were not recognized as workers.
In 1907, when Justice Higgins handed down a decision on a "fair and just" basic wage, he assigned women two-thirds the value of men. The man was the breadwinner, with a wife and family to support, while the woman, if she had paid work at all, was perceived to be earning pin money, or as having only herself to support.
This was far from the reality. Many women were often the sole income earner for children, extended families, etc. Even those women "not working" actively supported their families through producing vegetables and eggs, baking and sewing, often compensating for the irregularity of men's income.
During the first and second world wars, women were actively encouraged to enter the workforce to replace the able-bodied men conscripted into the war effort.
During WWII, the media promoted an image of women as capable, competent workers. Highly skilled technical jobs were likened to operating a washer or sewing machine and fashion trends adjusted to glamorise women in overalls and hairstyles that were more suitable for working with machinery. Unions also stepped in and endorsed "male" rates of pay for women.
A dramatic turnaround occurred at the end of the war when men were returning and expecting their jobs back. The conservatism of the late 1940s and '50s was based on the need for capital to expand consumption following the decline of the weapons industry, and to ensure that jobs went to men to alleviate any disaffection after the war time experiences.
The white goods sector burgeoned, accompanied by a massive advertising campaign suggesting that all houses should contain a gleaming white fridge and washing machine, and a specialist homemaker — women. This is the era that the Coalition harks back to in their family policies.
Out of the kitchen
Women achieved significant gains through the organised, mass campaigns during the second wave of feminism in the late 1960s and '70s.
Industry was expanding, creating greater job opportunities and the political issues of the war in Vietnam and civil rights slipped through the white picket fences to motivate women as activists. Women's rights to work, have access to child-care and to have equal pay were placed firmly on the agenda.
In Australia, the right to equal pay was legislated in 1969, followed by the concept of equal pay for work of equal value in 1972. The number of women entering the paid workforce grew exponentially.
Subsidized public child-care from the mid-70s created the grounds for questioning other pre-ordained truths. Pathways for access to non-traditional jobs were laid, and affirmative action and anti-sex discrimination legislation was passed.
These gains provided the basis for a massive increase in the expectations of young women. The concept of equal rights has become widely accepted.
The Coalition presents its 1950s-style policies as merely an acknowledgement of and support for women who "choose" to stay at home. In reality, they remove choices that had been opened up by the erosion of many structural barriers which had kept women at home in the past.
Choices
According the Australian Bureau of Statistics figures, in May 43% of the female population over 15 years was in the workforce. The greatest proportion of these were in part-time jobs, which have grown from 10% of all jobs in 1966 to 23% this year.
Howard asserts that women work part time rather than full time to fulfill their family commitments, yet a recent ABS time-use study showed that 41% of part-time workers wanted more hours (around 80% of part-time workers are women). It seems that the lack of suitable employment options is a more limiting factor.
Access to child-care is also a key factor. A survey conducted by the SA Child Care Coalition in February discovered that most respondents were deciding to reduce their hours of work because of increases in the cost of care or restrictions on the hours available.
The Howard government has systematically reduced access to child-care by cutting the maximum number of hours parents' can use to 50 and limiting the reasons for which care is available. Cuts to operational funding for community based centres, and the tightening of the means test for subsidized care have also restricted women's choices (see article on page 13).
The introduction of the federal Workplace Relations Act has also had a disproportionate effect on women workers. Individual contracts are more easily introduced in small to medium workplaces which are less unionised. This is more often where women workers will be found.
Similarly, the act's re-definition of any number of hours beyond three as part-time rather than casual employment reduces the absolute rate of pay by eliminating the higher casual penalty rate.
The reduction in the number of allowable matters in awards has resulted in equal opportunity and sexual harassment no longer being clearly defined. While women still take major responsibility for child-care, the removal of equal opportunity provisions potentially erodes women's right to have family responsibilities taken into account in their employment conditions.
The male/female wage gap is also set to grow. Currently, women's average weekly earnings of $641 compare to $768 for men. Wage increases are more likely to be won in large, strongly unionised workplaces, which mainly employ men.
For example, the recent SA Holden's pay increase of $80 per week was won by a unionised workforce of more than 2000, which is majority male. Small manufacturing areas, such as food processing, which employ up to 20, often casual and part-time workers, are largely female. The Australian Manufacturing Workers Union covers both, but food sector organiser Sally Biddle told a recent women's meeting in Adelaide that the food processing area is focused on defending existing jobs, rather than campaigning for pay rises. Job (in)security is the number one issue for most women workers.
The Coalition's restrictions on young people's access to social security, its cuts to public health funding and its fee increases for nursing homes are predicated upon caring, unpaid individuals being available to fill the gaps.
The Coalition's aim is to economically coerce women into staying at home to fulfill this role. Allowing single-income families to reduce their tax through income splitting, for example, is much cheaper than increasing government funding of health, education, welfare and child-care services.
Campaigns to defend and extend women's rights in any particular area must also challenge this broader agenda.