Forget the ‘squeezed middle’, it’s women who are being wrung out

If I hear the phrase “squeezed middle” one more time, I’m likely to squeeze the middle fingers up from the fists I’m making. You know who’s actually squeezed in Aotearoa right now? Wrung out like a toothpaste tube in a cost of living crisis? Women.

But regressive governments like ours already know that. They also know that public sector cuts will disproportionately affect women and children, and that women will be more hindered than they are helped by this cater-to-the-ignorantmasses cash reallocation (aka tax cuts).

These cuts fit their agenda because this Government is firmly anti-women. Especially women of colour. They’ve decided that “women and children first” is the answer to the question, “who shall we screw over?”

The truth is, our “have more babies” Prime Minister is making it harder for people to have and raise babies, and much harder for the people who decide to do so. Fertility decline aside, the actual choice to have children in New Zealand is an increasingly unattractive proposition. At least, for women.

If you’re a man, having kids is a no-brainer. “Family men” make more money, are healthier and live longer, are better regarded in society and in the workplace. Having children impacts men less than it impacts women in hetero whānau.

Mothers are more likely to take extended leave, affecting future earnings, KiwiSaver balances and career opportunities, ultimately ending up in a more financially vulnerable position than the men in their lives.

With extended 20 hours of free ECE hours off the table, this situation has got worse. Whether or not to return to paid work is a tricky equation, especially when you factor in that statistically, even when mothers are working full-time, they’re also doing the bulk of the domestic labour. They’re likely to have less social and leisure time than their male partners, and more likely to also be caring for ailing parents or young grandchildren (or both), or supporting niblings and the children of friends.

Feel free to get angry and defensive about these facts, but that won’t change them. Believe me, if anger solved gender inequality the simmering rage of women throughout the ages would have moved the needle by now.

The reality is, we’re in the squeezed women era. Spread so thin we barely exist as people.

Whilst society was telling us we could “have it all”, it was failing to backfill the roles women have been “volunteering” for that keep society functioning. Backfill in the form of modern men and modern policy decisions.

We had been making slow progress after a handful of feminist leaders, but along comes a decidedly un-modern coalition and it’s blow after blow to the fairer sex. And by that I mean the genders that tend to care more about equality.

Bulk cuts are a brutal move for the public sector workers involved (a workforce that is 62.7% female or genderdiverse). The results of these cuts will also be brutal on the wider community.

When you reduce the upstream funding for children, it is families (mainly women) who pick up the downstream care work. Less support for anyone that needs care, whether that’s children, the elderly, folks with disabilities, anyone with health issues or behavioural issues, ultimately means less support for women. Because the bulk of care work in our society is done by women.

Capitalism was built on the free labour of women. And this “back on track” Government is derailing all attempts to make progress on solving this.

On the individual and whānau level, men need to step up in a major way to combat the domestic inequality stats. This could be done today with increased awareness and effort, and have an immediate impact on every woman you know.

On a policy level, if we’re determined to stick with this whole capitalism thing (which we appear to be), we need to be funding the scaffolding that supports it.

That means healthcare, childcare, disability and aged care. It means upstream crime intervention. It means funding education properly so the sector can meet the KPIs being handed to it. It means having a functional benefit system for those who cannot do paid work for myriad reasons, including those stuck in lifelong care roles for severely disabled family members. And it means funding solutions to our mental health crisis.

This spending is not “wasteful” as this Government wants to frame it, these are actually the structures that support a healthy economy by increasing the number of people who can actively participate in it.

What’s wasteful is a blanket approach to cuts that dishes out millions in redundancy payments, only to have many of those roles likely re-established down the track then things start falling through the cracks.

We have two choices. Women can be contributing to our economy in paid roles, or we can be contributing to our economy in unpaid roles.

It’s very clear which of these options the people leading our country want.