Women SPA this week

Silvertabby

POPPYOSCAR wrote: »

Oh come on.

Of course it was.

Yes some pioneering women blazed a trail but they were the exception and it was not easy for them.

A very intelligent friend of mine tells me that she could not go to university as she had to leave school and get a job to help support her family and it was not up for discussion.

If you think women had the same opportunities 40 years ago you are seriously deluded and should try googling it.

I, too, wanted to stay on at school beyond the minimum leaving age of 15 - but my parents didn't believe in 'swanning around in school' when I could be out earning, and bringing money into the house. However, that didn't stop me from going to night school the following year.

I was expected to do what most girls did back then - work for a couple of years, get married, move into a house in the same street as my parents, leave work to have children, etc. I don't consider myself to be anything special - but I knew that life wasn't for me, hence night school and joining the WRAF. Even back then, I did eventually have a choice.

Pollycat

POPPYOSCAR wrote: »

Oh come on.

Of course it was.

Yes some pioneering women blazed a trail but they were the exception and it was not easy for them.

A very intelligent friend of mine tells me that she could not go to university as she had to leave school and get a job to help support her family and it was not up for discussion.

If you think women had the same opportunities 40 years ago you are seriously deluded and should try googling it.

My parents were not well off and I knew that my going to university and not going straight into work after my 'O' levels and paying board (actually, my Mother took all of my wages from me and gave me 'spending money') would cause them financial hardship.
I'm sure their attitude would have been exactly the same if I had been a boy.

As I've previously said up-thread, I had exactly the same opportunities as a male.
I can only speak for myself.
I wouldn't presume to speak for anyone else.
And I'm talking over 40 years ago. I left school after my 'O' levels in late 1970.
I regret that you think I'm deluded.

As Silvertabby points out, there were other options.

Silvertabby wrote: »

I, too, wanted to stay on at school beyond the minimum leaving age of 15 - but my parents didn't believe in 'swanning around in school' when I could be out earning, and bringing money into the house. However, that didn't stop me from going to night school the following year.

I was expected to do what most girls did back then - work for a couple of years, get married, move into a house in the same street as my parents, leave work to have children, etc. I don't consider myself to be anything special - but I knew that life wasn't for me, hence night school and joining the WRAF. Even back then, I did eventually have a choice.

POPPYOSCAR

"Equal Pay Act was passed in 1970 but was not implemented until January 1976. During these years employers often re-graded jobs by changing job titles to evade the Equal Pay Act and to justify unequal wages for men and women doing the same jobs, for example, from Personal Assistant to Typist. Following campaigning by trade unions, there was much progress on equal pay as new laws extended and strengthened the first equal pay legislation.
More than 120 years after this issue was first raised, unequal pay still remains an important reason for women’s lower lifetime wages and poverty in old age in most countries."

https://www.striking-women.org/module/workplace-issues-past-and-present/gender-pay-gap-and-struggle-equal-pay#The%20History%20of%20the%20Struggle%20for%20Equal%20Pay

westv

But the really important question is this....



...... should I ask my wife to proritise the cooking, cĺeaning or ironing?!

:D:D

sammyjammy

lisyloo wrote: »

I agree with you in general, although not sure about your maths.

You talk about the largest single increase.
I’m not one of those complaining but my age went up 3 times, from 60 to 65, to 66 in 2011 And then 67 in 2014, so i have to cope with the 3 increases. Your maths needs to cater for multiple increases over the same remaining working life.

Same for me, such is life.

At the end of the day SP is a benefit, albeit a contribution based one, nobody should make life plans based upon benefits as they can and will change over ones lifetime.

POPPYOSCAR

westv wrote: »

But the really important question is this....



...... should I ask my wife to proritise the cooking, cĺeaning or ironing?!

:D:D

Being as you brought it up...........


"Women in Britain do about 60 per cent more unpaid work than men, meaning the UK, along with other English-speaking countries such as the US or New Zealand, sits somewhere in the middle. In the jargon of sociology these are the “transitional” countries, moving between traditional family patterns towards more equal structures."


https://www.ft.com/content/0c9f068c-711f-11e9-bf5c-6eeb837566c5
!

Gers

sammyjammy wrote: »

Same for me, such is life.

At the end of the day SP is a benefit, albeit a contribution based one, nobody should make life plans based upon benefits as they can and will change over ones lifetime.

I think the issue is that women made life plans based upon reassurances from central government which changed in a short span of time - I mean the 2011 changes specifically.

Malthusian

Silvertabby wrote: »

I, too, wanted to stay on at school beyond the minimum leaving age of 15 - but my parents didn't believe in 'swanning around in school' when I could be out earning, and bringing money into the house. However, that didn't stop me from going to night school the following year.

I was expected to do what most girls did back then - work for a couple of years, get married, move into a house in the same street as my parents, leave work to have children, etc. I don't consider myself to be anything special - but I knew that life wasn't for me, hence night school and joining the WRAF.

It's very anti-feminist of you to make other women look bad and question their life choices. Where's your solidarity?

That is basically what this side of the argument amounts to.

DairyQueen

Pollycat wrote: »

As Silvertabby points out, there were other options.

And precious few options compared to those available to men.

I popped back here to check whether anyone (other than a notable few) were interested in debating the bigger picture. I am not surprised to hear the same old voices saying the same old things. Apparently, any debate on pension inequality, that doesn't address the one gender injustice that has discriminated against men, is marginalised into oblivion.

I grant that I should have started a new thread. I deliberately didn't do so on the off-chance that the forum was at last ready to park the WASPI issue. Apparently not. It remains a subject on which the same people air the same views - ad nauseam.

I am a supporter of gender equality but am far more concerned about the unaddressed causes of the large disparity between male and female pension income, than I am about a headline figure of £30/k£40k/ or whatever is claimed by the WASPIs. That represents a small proportion of the gender difference in total income throughout retirement.

As for 'netiquette' (how quaint). I am reliably informed by those better-placed than I to judge that the polite form of emphasis is italics and that CAPITALS ARE INDEED CONSIDERED SHOUTING. I was politely and gently rebuked by my solicitor for this very breach in an email exchange. As she says: "italics are far more effective".

But I digress. To stay on-topic I should return to that most important of all pensions' issues - the WASPIs. Problem is that I'm tired of hearing about it. I am passed the point of caring. I have consigned it to the same metaphoric bin as Brexit so I shall politely and without shouting bow out.

I now await (with bated breath) lisyloo's excuse for her tasteless comment. Is that also symptomatic of dyslexia I wonder?

Silvertabby

“ I, too, wanted to stay on at school beyond the minimum leaving age of 15 - but my parents didn't believe in 'swanning around in school' when I could be out earning, and bringing money into the house. However, that didn't stop me from going to night school the following year.

I was expected to do what most girls did back then - work for a couple of years, get married, move into a house in the same street as my parents, leave work to have children, etc. I don't consider myself to be anything special - but I knew that life wasn't for me, hence night school and joining the WRAF.
Originally posted by Silvertabby

Malthusian wrote: »

It's very anti-feminist of you to make other women look bad and question their life choices. Where's your solidarity?

That is basically what this side of the argument amounts to.

I am most certainly not questioning other women's life choices - most of my school friends did follow 'the plan' by getting married early and having children, and all the best to them. I wasn't trying to make them look bad - I was simply explaining that they made their choices and I made mine. The option of attending night school was certainly open to all, regardless of gender - but some of my old school friends just laughed at me and said that they'd 'rather be out having fun'.

As for solidarity, I've already said on these boards that I would fully support any move to overturn the 2011 changes in respect of those hardest hit - the women born in 1953/54 - even though I wouldn't benefit.