Feminisation of poverty

In recent years there has been evidence to suggest that there has been a feminisation of poverty and that women are more likely to experience poverty than men. In the last three decades the proportion of poor families headed by women has grown to more than 50 percent.

 

Women face the problem of being stereotyped in the work place. As a result they receive lower wages and lack access to promotion. According to the guardian (1 November 2012) women generally earn 15% less than men. Women have stereotypical career choices which are lower paid positions than men. For example women are stereotypically thought to do caring which receives an average annual salary of £14,000 (Aberdeenshire Council, accessed 6 November 2012). Compared to a man's stereotypical job of an engineer which has an average salary of £35,000 -£37,000 (The Job Crowd accessed 6 November 2012).

 

Women face poverty due to the fact they have childcare responsibilities, especially those who are single parents. Feminists have criticised the welfare state for failing to provide adequate high-quality, affordable universal childcare for women who wished to pursue a career. It was reported in the guardian that due to the rising cost of childcare, going out to work full-time is now hardly worth-while for middle- and low-income families. " In the most extreme case – where a second earner takes a full-time job at the minimum wage – a couple who use childcare could be left just £4 a week better off with two incomes than with one" Guardian 1 November 2012.

 

 

A study by Oxfam called "A Gender Perspective on 21st Century Welfare Reform" shows how women would be worse off due to proposals for a single payment of benefits to be made to one member of the household. By doing this Oxfam feared that it would make one member of the couple a dependant (usually the women) on the other and as a result make them poorer. If a man was given the money he would not prioritise his families’ needs first such as buying things for the children. He would give the women a small percentage of this pay before spending the rest on him, the women would then have to go without in order to ensure her children's needs are put first.  Oxfam also noted that the proposal for mean testing benefits would be a problem for women. For many women, income from universal benefits such as Child Benefit may be the only independent income they have, if this is stopped then the women is even more so controlled by the man in the amount of money she is given for her and the children. The use of stronger conditionality, which lone parents (mostly women) in particular may not be in a position to meet, has also become an issue of concern for Oxfam. If stringent conditions are in place then this could especially hit parents bringing up children alone. Oxfam also pointed out in the study that the impact of the changes in earnings disregards on labour market motivation for those affected, many of whom will be women. Larger earning disregards can help part-time and low-paid workers. However, women cannot move into part-time or full-time work unless there is affordable childcare provided. Help with childcare costs in tax credits is not available for jobs with fewer than 16 hours. Oxfam suggests that there should be a legal right to request more hours of work just as there is the right to request reduced hours. (Veitch, J 2010)

 

Women occupy many public sector positions which are stable and offer job security. However, these jobs are often gender stereotypical. If matriarchy replaced patriarchy, this would not resolve the issue of class and discrimination. Feminists have been accused of generalising the wishes of women and not looking at the individual. Some women do want to be at home supporting their family’s fulltime (Haralambos & Holborn, 2008).