To keep things in perspective to the rest of the world, people living in tents, make shift camps, having their homes bull-dozed, as well as not knowing where their next meal is coming from, having a kitchen-sink go back to is Paradise in comparison.

Women minorities in workforce - Pimps

A former employee of a Perth Engineering company who was paid less than her male superior despite doing a higher level of work has had her sexual discrimination case thrown out of court.

The Judges who presided over the case found that Ms Turner and Mr Hunter had been inequitabley treated but this had nothing to do with their sex.

The engineering company who employs 140 staff has a ratio of 20 females and 120 males.

The 20 females mostly made up the lower paid administration jobs and was described as a male-dominated workplace where sexism was insidious in covert attitudes and conduct.

The engineering company who has no equal opportunity policy or formal job descriptions paid Ms Turner $8000 less a year despite being her male being less experienced and less competent.

Ms Turner had performed higher duties at every occassion without reward or recognition.

The judges however failed to find disparity between wages and titles because of her sex.

Ms Turner said this week she had lost faith in equal opportunity and the message is out that the ordinary worker doesn't have a chance.

As we move forward to the proposed change in legislation to our Industrial Awards, we will once again see a dilution of the issue and outcomes that consistantly support a fact that the female worker is underpaid and not recognised for her abilities.

Women's contributions in the overall profit needs to be accurately evaluted not the "Pimps" allowance women currently are paid in many workplaces.

The saving made by a male dominated senior management and the executive forces, in its consistant form, only serves to allow the top levels of business to pay themselves more than what they are worth and the value that they have given themselves.

Managements justifications of salaries of high amounts normally equate to added responsibility made through purchases which only create more debt for a company.

This imbalance is also to the detriment of a Business and should be realised in the overall evaluation of who is really useful and productive.

noted sue,

you must remember that a company is like a car, with a CEO being the driver of that car.

each individual slots into a machine, and whilst it is vital for each segment to work efficiently, the real success comes from the steely, innovative nature of the CEO.

Everyone can put their hand up and say how important they are, but like a car each part can be replaced by another with a similar efficiency.

The majority of the poor may fall into the mentioned child trap, but as with the rich people those poor people with the drive usually make it no matter where we come from, and we are one of the few countries in the world where the world is still your oyster no matter your background, if it is your clear vision to get somewhere.

As for women not gettig equal pay, enterprise bargain for god sake, no one is sexist in the manner people like to think in 2006, a woman with the goods to perform will get paid what she negotiates. If you are worth it, ask for it. in fact, it holds you in higher esteem if you do so coming from the side of the fence of an empolyer.

No one is out to get you women. Unfortunately your anatomy means you will bear children etc, but this should not stop you or your motivation to succeed, as you still can pursue big dreams and make it.

Stop looking for reasons why you can, and find the reasons why you can. The glass is half full ladies.

An interesting article by Alison Wolf.

I have some questions - is it true that volunteerism is in decline. My understanding - which may be flawed - is that volunteerism in Australia is alive and well. Maybe a little of the old fundraising via cake-bakes has declined (largely replaced by corporate donations - often flawed, though as was narowly, morally based volunteerism), but volunteering of time and expertise is at a highpoint in Australia and on offer from both genders. Furthermore, retired (but now healthy given the wonders of modern medicine and good nuturian) older people are taking up volunteerism where younger (now employed) women have left off. A great way for older people to remain vital and to continue contributing to and engaging with society.

Secondly, are we at a mid-point of social change where the end picture could resolve the mid-point problems? Will men increasingly share the responsiblity of childcare thus changing the nature of society and making this no longer women's domain hence problem. While I concede this may not be a widespread phenomena - the robust role of men in the home (including giving up work for a couple of years to look after the toddlers while the high wage earning professional women earns on) is a common experience in my social group and family. Perhaps this a tiny but growing trend that will tranform this debate?

I agree with Shell: good article, a lot of good points and we are in a transition. Not just the transition of men helping more with the kids, but also of people living longer, being healthy enough to work and volunteer longer.

The old dogma was that if you took time with the kids for a few years, your career was stuffed. If you are 26 now and thinking that you have a good chance that you might live to be 90, you might think "well then I might work in some way until I am 70." A 20 year retirement does not sound too bad. If you are 26 now you will be retiring in 2050 and you might think medical technology and improved lifestyle might give you a pretty good retirement. That means taking a few slower years when you are 26 to help with the kids and starting back up hard at it when you are 30 means you still have a 40 year career ahead of you. A lot of people will think that this little blip does not mean your career is really stuffed.

50 years ago when life expectancy was 58, you had to plan your life much differently. If you missed a couple years your career was half over. Now it is easier to take some time and still have a long successful career. As time goes on this transition will continue, workplaces will become more friendly for families and "elite" couples will have more children.

On a separate subject, its great that Online Opinion gets these good articles on a variety of topics. Well done and thanks OLO.

I believe that the current Higer Education Loan Program (HELP) which is the payment of fees for courses also acts as a barrier for women and others who come from minority groups.

A woman, may carry for instance a HELP debt for greater length of thime after graduating from a law degree, taking time out for family as well adds to the challenge of paying for their studies.

The highpowered corporate legal world where the money is big bucks is far from what most women graduates will achieve in the current climate.

I would like to suggest that as a way of paying off their debts that law students and law graduates are able to provide legal aid services which are credited against their HELP Debt.

as it is at the moment the rich can pay for their studies up front and recive a discount = just for being rich you save money.
Marcus

Realist, I presume the analogy of the CEO as the driver of a car is a joke? And "the real success comes from the steely, innovative nature of the CEO"? Too funny.

The average Australian CEO runs over the pedestrians, sacks half the car's components and stacks the car after running all the red lights. The car owner then has to pay the driver off to get rid of him, takes the car to the crash repairer (in an overseas workshop) and employs a new driver in the hope that he won't stack the car again. The outplaced CEO begrudgingly accepts his multimillion dollar payout and says that it is all the government's fault for having too many red lights getting in the way of a free run to the bank.

Alison Wolf says three things are being detroyed as women advance:
1. The death of sisterhood.
2. The erosion of female altruism.
3. The impact of employment change on childbearing.

Women are becoming more like men, and the more like men they become the more they 'advance' in the men's world of work.
Is that something to be proud of in making the world all one gender.
The average married couple once had sex about three times a week and the result was about three children.
Now it is down to about 1.8 times a week, also resulting in about 1.8 children to make a family.
It seems both men and women and the family are going backwards as money becomes the goal instead of altruistic values.

Eledna. Why assume it is sombody elses reasonsibily.
Unless ypou can afford them dont have kids.
Why do you expect others to pay for you having kids or the people in Africa or anywhere else.
We send aid and they have more and more kids for us to feed or starve.Then people like you blame us!. Give it a rest.
Ever heard of birth control and living up to ones own reasonsibilty.

Why on earth should the tax payer pay for any child care for god sake.
It really bugs me when people go on tV complaining that John Howard does not give them enough to mind THEIR kids. Thats a personal reasonsibilty.
That is why good old fashion marraige and saving up for a house together BEFORE the kids worked in years gone by. We have a useless lazy unmarried mother in our suburb who gets child care because they rekon she must have a break. 5 kids 5 dads,and on top of that we pay child care.
Speaking of breaks its time the tax payers refused their hard earned money was spent on this waiste.

Some people studied and worked two three and four jobs and did not have kids irresposibly until they could afford them. They worked part time to pay for their own taff courses.

AND if you cant afford kids dont have them.
That goes for africa too.[ Actually especially Africa

Wendy,

children are both a asset to the individual family as well as our society. I think the point of the article was that in Western circles we are underinvesting in living infrastructure and those elements that support it.

If you think of children on an 'afford only basis' you will see why the government supports even the 'dubious' lifestyle options of Mrs Fivehusbands - demographic & economic survival means children need to be born & supported, and if rational people such as yourself have figured out that they don't want their lifestyle compromised by expensive, time consuming (and numerous children) then somebody needs to have children.

Telling Africans and others that they can't have children is funny when we are seeing European countries heading into social & genetic oblivion. Eurabia is perhaps only 2 to 3 generations away.

Children are best brought up in stable families, and this is not helped by mothers & fathers competing for the same jobs and neglecting or farming off children to the ABC millionaire factory childcare centre. Nor is it helped by accumulating debt on degrees that are of dubious worth or practicality - this is not a dig at the Arts, just that one can as easily study philosophy or any science from books at home, and the piece of paper is merely recognition of being able to comply with contemporary preocupations with 'paper qualifications, rather than talent or hands on work.

Finally, the stats provided by the former contributor about sex per week & children is highly suspect. As a father of six, I can assure you that the suggested ratio does not come anywhere close to reality!

Reality Check you are too kind...I think Wendy needs to spend some time with the sole parent in her neighbourhood- perhaps then she would appreciate the need for 'a break' or better still attend school with some local children (some of whom may be African) and learn how to spell!

Kate and RC.
I dont know why you think you know what we do up here but spending time with single mums is certainly not going to do anything to change my mind as I already do.

Just yesterday I actually pointed out to a young lady who simply loves to come around here that as shes not working maybe she should spend at least one day a week with her three children instead of putting them into child care.
She pointed out that at least she has them weekends which is more than the other single mother I mentioned did.
Reality is that we the tax payers pay a fortune to support these bludgers and to top it off we pay again for them to put these kids in child care.
Thats right these women dont work and also get child care leaving no places for the ones who do want to work.
By average women using themeslves as breeding machines for financial support come from the uneducated. most times those kids are the ones who grown up to steal the cars and follow a life of crime so I think its you that need to get real.
Those kids are no help to soceity and the circle continues .
Oh and by the way Suz we run a international laungage colledge and work on many progects to assist lots of people in many ways.
The overall is something that you sound like you would not even begin to understand. Australia has the highest numbers of unmarried mothers and most having several kids to several dads. That is nothing to be proud of and its the poor little kids who start out with these examples in life who suffer. Thats real not your stupid personal attack on myself you idiot.

Kate and RC.
I dont know why you think you know what we do up here but spending time with single mums is certainly not going to do anything to change my mind as I already do.

Just yesterday I actually pointed out to a young lady who simply loves to come around here that as shes not working maybe she should spend at least one day a week with her three children instead of putting them into child care.
She pointed out that at least she has them weekends which is more than the other single mother I mentioned did.
Reality is that we the tax payers pay a fortune to support these bludgers and to top it off we pay again for them to put these kids in child care.
Thats right these women dont work and also get child care leaving no places for the ones who do want to work.
By average women using themeslves as breeding machines for financial support come from the uneducated. Most times those kids are the ones who grown up to steal the cars and follow a life of crime so I think its you that need to get real.
Those kids are no help to soceity and the circle continues .
Oh and by the way Suz we run a international laungage colledge and work on many progects to assist lots of people in many ways.
The overall is something that you sound like you would not even begin to understand. Australia has the highest numbers of unmarried mothers and most having several kids to several dads. That is nothing to be proud of and its the poor little kids who start out with these examples in life who suffer. This forum is for comments not personal attacks which is an insight to your own background. It all goes back to how we were raised which was my point in the first place.

Typical.

Why dont you look to the female dominated vocations and analytically deconstruct. Like nursing, child caring and teaching. Early child care and teaching are almost exclusively female. In that context, females are responsible en masse for the socialisation of human beings in the most formative part of life. Drawing the typically long bow that these silly artices do... women socialise human beings, therefore they are responsible for the shape that society takes.

The self obsessed are so adept at making everything about them, spinning any and everything to self validate. Like the stats regarding male to female engineers (140 males to 20 females). An equally self serving way to spin that...men do 7 times as much work as females (140/20), men get chastised for it, women complain about how unfair it is. Silly propoganda infused interpretation huh? Purely for effect... when in rome...

How do womens rights advocates keep a straight face advocating for alleged equality of opportunity and access and never speak out against say womens only gyms. Why do they never qualify the statistcs used re equal pay for equal work, like the longer hours men work and how we scrifice family and life balance, working ourselves into early graves (about 7yrs earlier than women) to pay for a bigger house and new SUV every 4 yrs?

Why dont they ever speak out about the fact that over 90% of workplace deaths and injuries are sustained by men? That over 90% of prisoners are men. That prostate and breast cancers effect same number of men and women but breast cancer gets twice the funding?

If it were women, there would be a massive outcry that there is some underlying sociological disadvantage and oppression that criminalises and incarcerates women.

Why is there all the media hoopla about military bastardisation in the navy when a woman experiences it and nary a murmour over the centuries that men have endured greasy broom sticks up the clacker and feaces smeared over their backs on some ship deck on the high seas?

Hmmm... could it be gender bias? Surely not.

Great article Alison. Stories of how harem mothers plotted to have their son made heir suggest that the notion of female solidarity might be more romance than fact.
We have just completed a 30 year experiment where women have controlled their fertility thus enabling them to compete in high status careers with men. An unintended side effect has been that career women find they have to choose between career and single motherhood. In Australia in the 1920s middle class women did not work or were not paid for work. In the 1940's when 1 in 7 Australians were mobilised, at war's end women gave up their jobs so the demobbed men could work. Marriage was a 1945 career option taken by many.
Its interesting to note that in Australia engineering and IT jobs are reserved for men, India and Iran have far higher proportions of women engineers.

Well The main
thing unmarried mums seem to do is say they are studing a home course.

Today I spent all day with another mother of four to several Dads.
She comes here at 7.30 am and goes home at 4.45 in time to pick up her latest lover[live in ]

Her 6 months old and her two year old and her three year old go six days a week to care.
She explains she has to say she is studying otherwise it would cost her over five hundred dollars a week for the three.
The other ones been palmed off on her mother who is an alcolic in nZ
She doesnt really want the seven year old but wants the welfare money and lerks and perks.

So thats three single mums who come here regually
Anymore information you would like
Get real

Working the system gives new meaning to the idea of work.

Yes it does trade . This idea about unmarried or single mothers dont plan to be the way they are is crap.

Sure anybody can make one mistake but these are caree breeders.

Now if you think about it she gets paid for having them[ Hense the 6 months old] Then she gets the support money and child allowence AND even after we the tax payer pay her to stay at home to look after HERE [pre martiual affairs she runs up another 600.00 dollars a week! of your funds declaying she needs a break. There There diddims. There are laughing all the way to the bank dropping off kids at 6am and collecting them at 6pm 6 days a week and you ladies and gentlemen PAY for it.

Why is it even non welfare person somebody else! should mind their! dam kids.
Surley you would consider its your reasonsibily if you want kids to dam well bring them up.
AND if you cant afford to have them then dont expect others to pay1

Thanks. A nice clear read. My compliments to the author (and editor).

It makes a change in this world of endless retail advertising, Big Brother, and news stories read in slow-motion Kindergarten teacher style.