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Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

bbc.com

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Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#31

Post by mlang23 »

nickik wrote: post #21

> childcare remains not only expensive, but in short supply. Childcare is expsneive period and it will still be if you force other people to pay it. I have never understood why people demand that society pays for their children. Having children is a 100% voluntary activity in todays day and age. I don't demand that my hobbies get payed by society. The taxes already massivly subsidies children by getting child money,…

Agreed. And, there is a lot of dishonesty when it comes to how childcare money is spent. Case in point: My parents received about 100000 EUR in disability care money over the 14 years I was living at home. In that time, my family didn't go on a single holiday trip or anything like that. While I wasn't treated poorly, I also never saw any of that disability money used towards me. The truth is, my father spent it all for alcohol and things I probably dont want to know. And nobody ever evaluated if the money was spent on me. There is a lot to do when it comes to regulating how parents receive funding from the general public.

Another case in point: Someone we know is having their third child with the third father, and openly admits she does this so she can live off the childcare money. She doesn't particular care for her children, they are partly shoved off to her grandmother. She uses her cildren as a source of income. And she is not alone.

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#32

Post by kstenerud »

BigJono wrote: post #30
kstenerud wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And in a world where you can't both live off the man's income anymore, that's completely unfair. Forcing people to trade their future income and security to raise kids is terrible.

How do you fix it? Any way you look at it, the person spending 12 hours a day every day sharpening their skills is going to have a much higher income on average than the person that spends their time raising kids.

Same as any quality of life improvement program: You tax people and use the money to make things better for society.

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#33

Post by lazylizard »

kstenerud wrote: post #32
BigJono wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you fix it? Any way you look at it, the person spending 12 hours a day every day sharpening their skills is going to have a much higher income on average than the person that spends their time raising kids.

Same as any quality of life improvement program: You tax people and use the money to make things better for society.

Why do i have to help pay for your choice to have kids? I dont like kids. I like fish. Will you help pay for my aquarium?

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#34

Post by kstenerud »

lazylizard wrote: post #33
kstenerud wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same as any quality of life improvement program: You tax people and use the money to make things better for society.

Why do i have to help pay for your choice to have kids? I dont like kids. I like fish. Will you help pay for my aquarium?

Because that's how it works to be part of a society. You sacrifice some of your work to raise the quality of life of everyone.

Roads, parks, power lines, communications cables, police, welfare, healthcare, sewage, electricity, clean water, healthy food, safe consumer products, clean environment, justice, protection for the vulnerable, duck wetlands, women's shelters, protection of creative works... These all cost money, and you pay for them with your taxes. Not everything goes equally to everyone, and not everything benefits everyone (by necessity), but the aggregate benefit is huge.

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#35

Post by brutally-honest »

nickik wrote: post #29
brutally-honest wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your hobbies are, in the grand scheme of things, unimportant. Having a next generation growing up well-educated and well-fed is, in the grand scheme of things, important. Raising children is not a hobby, it's a social necessity.

Tons of people make a choice to have children because the would like to have and raise children. I don't see how that is not the same as hobby. Its a totally voluntary activity that primarly benefits yourself and your own family and most people do it because they just want to. > Having a next generation growing up well-educated and well-fed is, in the grand scheme of things, important. That is already provided curren…

> Its a totally voluntary activity that primarly benefits yourself and your own family and most people do it because they just want to.

I don't think the main beneficiary of raising children is their family. That child will one day grow into adult who will contribute to society with ideas and labour.

> Outside of nationalist 'we need to have a strong population' or basic evolutionary 'human survival' concerns I really don't see how it is a necessity for the actual people living in the country, specially all of those that don't have or want children.

Well, I don't think people who don't have or don't want children should have them. But within a society, someone needs to have them. Because someone needs to be your waiter, your janitor, your doctor, lawyer, grocer, plumber – I mean, every activity that is provided to us is provided by someone who once was a child. Everyone we work for and with was also once a child.

Given that both people who want and don't want children benefit of there being a society at all, and this society is made out of grown-up children, it's in society's interest to make it easier.

Raising a family is great but is also a burden. The benefits however are shared with the society at large. Also for people who don't want children to be able to not have them and still enjoy the benefits, it makes sense to try to spread the burden widely among society.

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#36

Post by config_yml »

colechristensen wrote: post #16
s9w wrote: post #9

> Swiss women's pensions are 37% lower than men's, primarily because women take time out from work to raise their children

Is this right or wrong? I am all for taking parental leave supported with full pay and benefits for a good long time, but is there a point where that support stops? Six months? A year? Two? It's not for everyone but some people will exit the work force for years for family. I don't think it is surprising or discrimination to expect there to be a gender bias in people making that decision. Those people are included in…

Parental leave (actually only for women) is 14 weeks on 80% pay. After that many women take unpaid leave to enlongate that time. After that they reduce to 20%-60% time on the job or quit their all together to raise their children for a couple of years. This reduces their pension, because they work less.

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#37

Post by ketsa »

mlang23 wrote: post #15

Absolute equality is not realistic. People are not equal, individuals are different from eachother. And I say that as someone belonging to a minority group. However, I am convinced that equality can not be forced. Differences are what make us interesting. And yes, there are differences between the sexes, no matter how you twist and/or turn it. Trying to ignore those is unrealistic and a fair bit naive.

Exactly. Blondes are paid more than the rest of women. Tall people are paid more.... Any criteria you select can lead to differences in outcomes.

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#39

Post by ketsa »

Funes- wrote: post #27

>women [...] are under-represented in management positions They are hugely under-represented in blue-collar jobs, as well. And over-represented in the health sciences, many fields of academia, and social work. Would all that be unfair to men?

Women are under represented in construction. Women are under represented in waste management. Women are under represented in front line duties. ...

Re: Swiss women strike for more money, time and respect

#40

Post by PappaPatat »

kstenerud wrote: post #32
BigJono wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you fix it? Any way you look at it, the person spending 12 hours a day every day sharpening their skills is going to have a much higher income on average than the person that spends their time raising kids.

Same as any quality of life improvement program: You tax people and use the money to make things better for society.

Reminds me of "I'm from the government and I'm here to help."

Living myself in Switzerland, married with a mother who stayed at home during the first 15 years of parentship, I can tell you we solved this without the government, we solved it as a team.

Just like we solved all our private matters.

The one thing we love about this country is that people here do NOT see tax as a solution to all. As a matter of fact, since this is a country with direct democracy, if we'd feel tax would be the solution we could initiate a referendum and solve that within months.

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