Canadians unwilling to challenge income gap
‘WE LIVE IN A RACIST AND SEXIST SOCIETY,’ SACPA TOLD
Thursday was International Women’s Day but, as a Lethbridge audience heard, there’s not a lot to celebrate in Canada.
Women in our nation’s workforce are still paid significantly less than their male co-workers, they’re underrepresented in political decisionmaking — and few benefit from child-care services that are commonplace in Europe.
So Canada ranks far behind Scandinavian nations, New Zealand and even Rwanda on a variety of social indicators, participants at a Southern Alberta Council on Public Affairs forum were told.
“We live in a racist and sexist society,” explained University of Lethbridge professor Caroline Hodes — with women in visible minority groups being paid less again.
Educational levels make a difference, Hodes said, but Canadian women still earn 27 per cent less than men with similar post-secondary credentials.
And a sizeable chunk of that goes to pay for child care when they’re at work, she pointed out. A national daycare program would help reduce that income gap, she said, but despite promises there seems to be little political will to introduce one.
Canadians seem unwilling to challenge the income gap, Hodes added. Though both occupations require post-secondary training, few seem ready to ask why a plumber may make $55,000 per year while a hair stylist settles for $22,000.
Hodes, a professor in the university’s Department of Women and Gender Studies, was joined by colleague Glenda Bonifacio, also a faculty member of the U of L department.
Canada’s low ranking on issues of gender equality, Bonifacio said, reflects Canadian women’s reduced opportunities to participate in political and economic life, as well as their access to health care and education.
Canada ranked 35th on a recent survey for the World Economic Forum, which placed the U.S. in 45th spot and Japan at 111 among 145 nations.
Low-income nations like Rwanda and its neighbours in eastern Africa ranked much higher, she noted, because women have become prominent in the workforce and community leadership.
“They know if they don’t do it, nobody will.”
In their positions of relative wealth, Bonifacio said Canadian women could help advance women’s equality around the world while also improving their situation here. Affirmative action could succeed as it has in Nordic nations, she pointed out.
North Americans should “decolonize” their minds, she urged, by moving away from the male-dominant structures of state and religion.
Canadians should also abandon racial stereotypes, which seem to restrict immigrants or temporary workers to specific fields of work, regardless of their education.
Bonifacio pointed to “live-in nanny” positions with Canada’s upper-income families.
“Ninety per cent of them are Filipina women.”
At the grassroots level, she said, “People in Canada can actively shape how the world will be.”
“We have the land, we have the resources, we have the ability to connect.”
And in southern Alberta, with people from so many backgrounds, it’s easy to connect with people from distant lands. “The world is in Lethbridge.”