Need for new value system
The economic progress of women is necessary for fulfilling the promise of a democratic SA
THE FIRST person I knew who worked at a university was my late grandmother who was a cleaner at Wits University for nearly 20 years. She cleaned what is now called Solomon Mahlangu House, the main administrative building.
My 92-year-old grandfather still marvels at her genius with money and how she managed to educate three children and provide them with a stable life on their meagre wages. I’m convinced Gogo would have been an accountant if she had the same opportunities I had access to.
Women’s participation in the labour force has improved dramatically since 1994.
Research by Jacqueline Mosomi, an economist at the University of Cape Town, demonstrates that the introduction of anti-discrimination legislation has significantly improved employment opportunities for black women who joined the workplace after the enactment of the Employment Equity Act in 1998. However, despite these milestones, gender inequality in the economy persists.
StatsSA data shows that although women represent 51% of the population of South Africa, they only accounted for 44.1% of total employment in the first quarter of 2020. In the same period only 36.9% of women were employed compared with 47.5% of men.
The International Labour Organization (ILO) reported that in 2017 the median gender pay gap was 28.8% based on hourly wages and 30.3% based on monthly salaries.
This is compared with the global gender pay gap of approximately 20%. About 37.9% of South African households are headed by women, and these households are approximately 40% poorer than male-headed households.
Moreover, 48.2% of female-headed households support extended family members compared with 23.1% of those headed by men. Women also spend more money on food and childcare in the home. This means that increasing wages for women has a multiplier effect that improves the wellbeing of many people in their households and beyond.
The main reason for the gender pay gap is that women are over-represented in informal and low-income work, as well as in jobs that are undervalued by our society. For example, research by economist Debbie Budlender in 2009 demonstrated that despite nursing and engineering both requiring a four-year university degree, only 1% of nurses earned R16 000 or more a month compared to 36% of engineers. The Covid-19 crisis has highlighted the significance of care work and the care economy that is predominantly composed of women.
In 2013 the Employment Equity Act was amended to outlaw gender-based pay discrepancies for unequal pay for work of equal value.
However, for this provision to be realised we need to change our societal value system to place as much value in working with people as working with machines.
Young women are particularly under-represented in the South African economy. According to Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator, 60% of unemployed youth are women. Young women bear the brunt of childcare and household responsibilities and face greater barriers to accessing work opportunities because they have less time and money than their male counterparts.
This lack of representation is prevalent in politics as well. South Africa has nearly an equal number of men and women in Parliament – women make up 45% of seats in the national assembly. But young women don’t fare well – of the 400 members of Parliament elected in 2019, only 15 were women below the age of 35 while 25 MPs were men younger than 35.
Yet 57% of women between ages 18 and 34 turned out to vote in the elections compared with only 43% of men. What this means is that there are very few voices representing young women in our Parliament and promoting their distinct interests.
Women’s issues rarely dominate the political agenda. Now that I work at a university as a lecturer of political science, I aim to instil a sense of value and confidence in the young women I teach. Women are often the top students in my classes.
But I know that they will be entering a working world that won’t value their contribution as equal to their male colleagues.
This is why I support Women of SA (WoSA) in their campaign to demand women’s fair share of South Africa’s economic dividends. WoSA aims to promulgate the Gender Equality Bill and to criminalise gender-based pay disparities.
They also aim to increase the economic participation of women in decision-making structures in the private and public sectors.
This commitment to the economic progress of women is necessary for fulfilling the promise of a democratic South Africa my grandmother dreamt of as she was cleaning the corridors of Solomon Mahlangu House.