Equity Report: Women in the Workforce

Originally Published:
Planet S Magazine
March 1 - March 14, 2007 Volume 5: Issue 14
Page 14

It's 2007, and the battle for equality has been won, right? Well, no. Regardless of what Bev Oda, the federal Minister for the Status of Women, might say, we're not there yet - and in many cases, we're not there by a long shot.

In terms of the Canadian work force, a quick scan of the most recent statistics shows that, although there has been some progress in moving towards equality in recent years, women still face some very real problems.

According to Statistics Canada, as of 2003 women aged 16 and older took in a pre-tax income that was substantially lower than their male counterparts: while men earned an average of $39,000 women made $24,000 - or roughly 62 percent of the men's earnings.

It only gets worse once unpaid work is considered, as the inequality becomes much more pronounced. According to Status of Women Canada, men undertake only about two-thirds of the unpaid work women do - although the "Department of Small Comfort" would point out that this is actually an improvement. It was much worse in the mid-80s, when men worked only half the amount of unpaid hours that women did. But obviously, this is still a glaring problem - with less time to devote to paid work, women can't help but have a lower average income than men.

But while income inequality exists between men and women in terms of the averages, at least the incomes of men and women performing similar jobs must be the same, right? Wrong again, unfortunately. Statistics Canada shows that women working in the natural sciences, for example, earn about 80 percent of what men in the same field earn on average, while women employed in teaching or the social sciences make 70 percent of the male average; women in managerial positions and those working in business and finance make 60 percent; and those in health-related fields make about 50 percent.

True, even these sorry figures are a significant improvement considering the history of income inequality between the sexes. Since 1997 the income of women has gone up by about 13 percent, while that of men has risen only 8 percent, meaning that women are at least gaining some ground in terms of relative wages. As well, the number of women in the workforce has been steadily increasing. As of 2004, 7.5 million Canadian women had jobs - roughly twice the number with jobs in the mid-70s.

Moreover, while only 42 percent of Canadian women were employed [in the workforce] in 1976, that figure now sits at approximately 58 percent. Perhaps most importantly, women currently make up 47 percent of the overall workforce, in contrast to only 37 percent in 1976.

Theoretically, this increase in the number of women in the workforce - and the increase in the number of women working relative to men - should lead to a reduction in income inequality, as employers will be forced to raise the wages for women in order to keep an increasingly sizable portion of their staff happy.

Unfortunately, conditions in the world of academia would suggest this optimism may be misplaced. In an arena that supposedly prides itself on both openness and progressive thought, women account for only about a third of university faculty members in Canada - far less than the 47 percent share they have in the overall Canadian workforce. Indeed, according to a report comparing Canada to the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand (entitled Women in the Academic Workforce released by the Canadian Association of University Teachers), Canada has the lowest share of women in the academic workforce. Furthermore, only 19 percent of those female faculty members are full professors - and those women that do become full professors have salaries that average roughly $6,000 less than their male counterparts.

So, the facts show a bit of progress for women in the workforce - and a much, much longer way to go. Inequalities in both gender representation and earnings are still marked, and no simple declaration from any federal minister is going to change that.

Wheel to Heal

A friend of mine is biking across Canada to raise money for the Canadian Cancer Society. Here's his site with more info: www.wheeltoheal.com

Hezbollah and war

The ceasefire following the Israel-Lebanon war of July and August 2006 never really felt conclusive. Hezbollah, in particular, only seemed emboldened by the trouble they caused Israel, and by Israel's inability to decisively defeat them. Now they may be preparing for another round of attacks.
War preparations

See no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil

The current ruling party in Sudan, the National Islamic Front (NIF), gained power in 1989. Almost immediately afterwards it began marginalizing and oppressing the people of Darfur, a region in western Sudan roughly the size of France. Around early 2003, rebel groups from Darfur began attacking government offices in the hopes of forcing the government to address these issues. The NIF’s response was sickening.

They created a force made up of the Sudanese army and a militia group known as the Janjaweed. Their sole aim would be to kill as many Darfurians as possible in the hopes of quelling the rebellion. This macabre goal hasn’t been so difficult to achieve. At least 400,000 have been murdered by the Janjaweed and Sudanese soldiers. Over 2 million have been displaced, mostly to eastern Chad. Countless have been raped. And many, in addition to the 400,000, have died during their trek to humanitarian safe-havens. All this makes the Sudanese government one of the great criminals of our time.

Nevertheless, at the moment, I would like to focus our attention, and lay a bit of blame, on someone other than the Sudanese government: the international community. This community has been confronted by the specter of genocide before, and it has done little to stop it then, as now. Yet previously they had a plausible excuse. Little was known about earlier genocides, like the Armenian genocide and the Holocaust, while they took place. Only after the tragic deeds were done did anyone really become aware of the extent of the damage. So, this community could tell itself it would have done something if only it had known.

But now we know all too much about what’s happening in the Darfur; and still not a stir. We, the rest of the world, have been detailing each battle in the Darfur; we know of nearly every village intentionally pillaged and destroyed; we know how many have died, not in hindsight, but in real time; we have analyzed the conflict; and we have debated over whether these acts of aggression should be given the much-worse name of “genocide”. Everything is known but nothing is done.

This is incredibly disappointing for me since I have always felt the adage “The truth shall set you free” was essentially correct. I believed that if all the relevant facts were in, we couldn’t help but do the right thing. Something inside us will just not stand for something like genocide, once it’s clear that genocide is in fact taking place. I believed the truth would compel us. I was wrong.

Complete awareness of this tragedy has not kept the international community from remaining immobile and complicit. And, although thorough knowledge of the facts should elicit enough sympathy to set many on the course of action, it hasn't. This might say something against the relevance of journalism in a world of myopic and selfish states, but not necessarily. The detailing of events and description of suffering good journalists provide the international community with may be the Darfurian’s greatest resource, and only hope. The fact that it is often not enough says more about us, the immobile and the complicit, than it does about the good journalist.

We lie to ourselves when we say the only reason past genocides were not stopped was that we knew little of what was actually going on. It’s clear now that there have been other reasons. It’s clear now that even when genocide is perfectly evident, we will still do nothing. Sadly, we may find that in the long-run, this coldness, this indifference, will hurt us as well, if we ever need the kind of international support Darfurians currently hope for.

There is a Walt Kelly cartoon in which the title character, Pogo Possum, exclaims in a moment of clarity: “We have met the enemy and he is us.”

Further Links

Save Darfur

Human Rights Watch - Darfur

Cage

The other day I heard a performance of John Cage’s most famous piece, 4’33”. Let me describe it: A pianist approaches the piano and takes a seat, ready to perform. The audience, greatly numbered and open eared, wait for it – the music, that is. He lifts the lid and stares at the keys without playing a note. Nothing. More nothing. After a few minutes he closes the lid. This is repeated, making it a total of three completely silent movements. For a full 4 minutes and 33 seconds not a sound is made. Strange, don’t you think?

For Cage, though, it made perfect sense. There is never absolute silence, he came to realize at some point in his life. Every moment is accompanied by some sound, whether profound and unavoidable or, like one’s steady breath, passing nearly unnoticed. And Cage considers these ambient sounds to be music. The whirring of my computer, the squeak of the chair, the shutting of a door down the hall, etc. – all of them taken together make up music. And a performance, in which the pianist remains as silent as possible, not playing a note or moving a muscle, brings just those random sounds to the forefront. Every cough and every scratch in such a spookily quiet auditorium would be heard, and there would be a musical performance of a totally different sort.


Part of me is with Cage. Music, melody, and rhythm, all find their source in the way people talk and the kinds of sounds we hear in life. Our aversion to unsteady rhythms is possibly due to the comfort we got from the nearly perfect beat of our mother’s heart back when we each lived in a womb. So I can understand Cage’s insistence that music and the random sounds we’re so constantly confronted by are not so different after all. Cage isn’t so crazy, I guess.

But another part of me – a bigger and more correct part – thinks Cage is a little off. Not everything is music. Random sounds, especially, are not music. Random sounds are random sounds, and nothing else. When your instincts so strongly tell you something is not quite music, or not quite a piece of art, maybe it is right. I’m not about to convince myself the shuffling of feet in a hallway and the general din of sound one normally hears when it’s busy is anything to get too exited about.

I won’t try to explain what music is because I just haven’t figured that out. But I will commit myself to at least one idea: Music is supposed to move people on some kind of emotional level. And I feel Cage’s 4’33” just isn’t capable of doing that. Let me show you how I know this. I decided to test the theory that music is meant to move people emotionally by performing an a cappella version of 4’33”. While in Vancouver for the Christmas break I stood on a street corner where musical street performers, or buskers, normally go. I decided not to announce the commencement of my performance and just start when I felt ready. Well, I stood there and didn’t make a sound – Cage would have been proud – nor did I move a muscle. It was the perfect vocal performance of his 4’33”. But no one seemed to notice me. People just walked by oblivious of the fact that I was performing a great musical piece. I knew then that Cage’s 4’33” is not music since no one was moved on an emotional level upon hearing my street-corner a cappella version of it.

P.S. This was written before I realized I must have just looked like a guy standing quietly on a street corner. They might have thought I was waiting for a friend, or something.

This is an introduction

Welcome to my blog - a place to house my thoughts on politics, culture, philosophy, and whatever else I may find of value. Of course, for the sake of readership, I hope the things I find valuable and the things other people find valuable overlap somewhat. If they don't at all, or if they do, but only a little, I'll prepare myself to watch that ship (Readership) sail.