Just about one hundred years ago, the "Bread and Roses" strike took place in Lawrence, Mass., led by immigrant women mill workers. The "bread and roses" slogan came from James Oppenheim's poem of the same name. Like the women in the poem, the Lawrence strikers were demanding not just fair wages but dignified working conditions as well.
This Labor Say, with unemployment seemingly stuck in the stratosphere and ordinary women and men struggling to find work, keep their homes and figure out some way to give their kids a good start in life, I keep thinking about these lines from Oppenheim's poem:
As we come marching, marching, unnumbered women dead
Go crying through our singing their ancient cry for bread.
Small art and love and beauty their drudging spirits knew.
Yes, it is bread we fight for -- but we fight for roses, too!
***
No more the drudge and idler - ten that toil where one reposes,
But a sharing of life's glories: Bread and roses! Bread and roses!
"Ten that toil while one reposes" -- Oppenheim wrote that 100 years ago, yet today income and wealth inequality are near record levels. While millions of people can't find work, corporate CEOs are doing quite well. Last year, according to a new report from the Institute for Policy Studies, International Paper CEO John Faraci was paid $12.3 million -- a 75 percent pay hike. Bank of New York Mellon's Robert Kelly pocketed $19.4 million. And Stanley Black & Decker's John Lundgren got a 253 percent pay increase to $32.6 million. Wow! Nice work if you can get it.
Women aren't so lucky. Since the recovery began in 2009, women have lost around 300,000 jobs, while men gained about 900,000. That's mostly because women are over-represented in state and local government jobs, where layoffs are severe and continuing. Women's income is essential for the majority of families to make ends meet. Yet among women household heads, the unemployment rate was 17.4 percent for African Americans and 12.4 percent for Hispanics in 2010. And if women are not unemployed, they are under-employed and as often as not un- or under-insured.
Unfortunately, the pampered CEOs in this country are not interested in a "sharing of life's glories" to use Oppenheim's phrase -- far from it. The ratio of CEO-to-worker pay jumped from an already appalling level of 263-to-1 in 2009 to an even worse 325-to-1 last year. Compare, for example, Wal-Mart CEO Michael Duke's $35 million salary (equivalent to $16,826.92 an hour) with the $13,650 per year ($8.75 an hour), he wants to pay workers at his new store in Chicago. Duke makes more in an hour than his workers will make in one year. Really? Is one person really all that?
Workers who make less than a livable wage (and let's be real -- minimum wage is not livable in most communities) can't set aside savings for a rainy day, let alone a rainy year and counting. This problem is compounded for women by the fact that they work their whole lives at unequal pay. Women are paid on average 77 cents to the dollar paid men; for African-American women the ratio is 69 cents to the dollar, and for Latinas it is 59 cents. How do you save for an economic downturn in the face of systemic race-based and gender-based wage discrimination?
For women, job creation is not just good economic policy, it's a moral imperative. For the many women who are hanging on by their fingernails, it is an existential imperative. And those jobs must come with livable wages and equal pay.
Conservatives in Congress, and some with their eye on the Oval Office, have already signaled their ideas for job creation, and it's déjà vu all over again: lower taxes, less regulation. Oh, and lower wages too. Their argument is that corporate employers will start staffing up if their taxes and regulatory burden are lowered, and if they don't have to pay their employees so darn much (other than CEOs, of course).
But that's clearly wrong. With interest rates at near-all-time lows, corporate employers should be staffing up already, but they are not -- because they don't see any customers on the horizon. And they won't see any until the government, through an effective jobs program, creates employed people, also known as customers.
So with the other side proposing only more of the same misery, I am a lot more interested in what President Obama will say about jobs when he addresses both houses of Congress this week.
Like many progressives, I wish he would "go bold," by getting behind a powerful jobs program like Rep Jan Schakowsky's (D-Ill.) bill, which would create more than 2 million jobs for teachers, health care workers, police, fire fighters and other providers of much-needed goods and services. I wish he would be guided by suggestions put out by women's organizations, such as the Institute for Women's Policy Research, Wider Opportunities for Women and the Women Scholars Forum.
I recently learned this from IWPR:
The Levy Economics Institute of Bard College has calculated that investing in social sector jobs, such as early childhood education and home-based care, generates the most jobs per $1 invested and also provides the most jobs to the most vulnerable groups of unemployed. Investing in care jobs creates twice the number of jobs as the same investment in physical infrastructure and 1.5 times the number of jobs as the same investment in green energy.
To do well by women, the president would do well to follow the recommendations of these scholars and researchers. These are the policies we need to pull us out of a jobs crisis that, by the way, women had very little hand in creating in the first place.
Happy Labor Day, everyone.
Follow Terry O'Neill on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Terryoneill
Arianna Huffington: Sunday Roundup
Women's unemployment rise feared
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But no, in fact, women in the civilian world DO NOT get paid equally to men for the same work.
And I seriously doubt women in the military get the same opportunities for advancement that men do, which means they aren't promoted as often, which means they remain in the lesser-paid ranks.
Not to mention they can look forward to being sexually assaulted and even murdered with impunity by men IN THEIR OWN UNITS.
Nice.
Feminism has forced women into situations they are ill-suited for, and exposed female limitations to be visible for the world to see. In the past, female limitations were well concealed and no one noticed them. But now, basic female inferiority has been made far more visible.
Feminism is stunningly destructive to women. NOW has harmed women much like how Al-Qaeda has harmed Muslims.
And yet, Corporations have the gall to beg for more Tax breaks !
To Hell with more Tax Breaks for Corporations and the Rich !
Nobody in Congress better stand in the way of the creation of a 6 Million American Jobs Buid that will Rebuild America and get America Back To Work or they will receive the HELL that tey have so dispicablly earned !
Those Obstructionist Republicans in Congress are going to receive the wrath of unemployed America and the cowards that they are these Republican Corporate Shills are going to spend a lot of time running and hiding form now until the 2012 election !
Howard Scott Pearlman
Good luck on that one.
Who provides for us when men run off with the trophy wife? We do. No one else.
The jobs that she promotes creating in childhood early education which typically means preschool are minimum wage jobs so what good does that do it is not a liveable wage and she wants to create more of them. The person running the program might make a decent living but all the workers would be minimum wage. I find the whole story to be unbelievable except she probably got the CEO salaries correct but you are not going to change those salaries.
Be sure you get the Opinion and Judgment. It was heavily litigated, and resolved by Summary Jugment.
Equal Opportunity Employment Commission v. Bloomberg L.P. Written by Judge Loretta A. Preska.
It is on-line. I don't believe it is available elsewhere.
Yes, the Defendant is none other than Bloomberg News. It is very readable.
2. I have read the hypelink cited. I read to twice, top to bottom.
It contains, ABSOLUTELY nothing about male v. female compensation.
3. I read the Table of Content to the "long version" of the report by the same authors, and found no reference to male v. female compensation.
4. Both the long and short articles are an excelllent analysis of the misuse use of the United States Code by large corporation to minimize, and in some cases avoid U.S. Taxes.
5. The shorter version is well worth reading.
HOWEVER:
6. Neither of the posts by the "Institute for Policy Studies" makes make any mention of "women have lost around 300,000 jobs", while men have gained around 900.000" .
None whatsoever.
7. If you click on the hyperllink about "women have lost ..." you will be taken to the National Law Center, wwwnwlc.org. You will find it is an advocacy site.
8. Their motto, "We Campion Law and Policies That Work for Women and Families.
9. The Natiion Woment's Law Center provides no references of any sort to its assertion, it is merely an advocacy blog.
Ms.O'Neill,
"We have a credibilty problem".
PS - I learned that one from believing our politicians for too long.
However, the blog by the President of NOW (National Organization of Women) violated a cannon of journalism one learns in high school.
"Do not misattribute a quotation"
Mattie Mangum
Aside from you "intuition", how do you know what you are saying to be true?
The reality is is that women are actually overpaid relative to their output, and businesses can no longer afford this affirmative action special treatment.
. The ratio of CEO-to-worker pay jumped from an already appalling level of 263-to-1 in 2009 to an even worse 325-to-1 last year. Compare, for example, Wal-Mart CEO Michael Duke's $35 million salary (equivalent to $16,826.92 an hour) with the $13,650 per year ($8.75 an hour), he wants to pay workers at his new store in Chicago. Duke makes more in an hour than his workers will make in one year. Really? Is one person really all that?
The disparity between CEO pay and worker pay is the one that is really important. How did this degenerate into a war between the sexes?
One of the countries where income disparity is as high as in the US is Uganda, where there's a great deal of corruption and the majority of women and girls spend several hours a day just walking back and forth to get enough potable water and firewood for the family, and therefore have little time for education, gardening, home-based businesses, etc., that would improve their families' economic status. If the money that went into bribes and kickbacks to the already powerful in Uganda went into infrastructure instead, thousands of families could be more prosperous.
One could just as easily consider all workers instead of women (which I believe Ms. O'Neill was suggesting) and still reach the same conclusions.
Thank you, thank you.
If it is accepted, please read my reply posted an hour after yours.
Happy Labor Day
If you are interested, you might want to read Bloomberg v. EEOC. It is well written by a female fedeal judge.
It is about Bloomberg News, they won the case. Look for the Summary Jugment.
Yes, but is an impossible problem to fix.
I don't need coworkers sabotaging my efforts because I have more talent, creativity, and work ethics than they do, even though we share the same rank or title and they usually have more senority.
I SUCK at company politics, but I rock the house when it comes to getting things done, and done right. Like I said- I don't want the "office pollitickers" sabotaging me because their smoozing,slandering, whining about equality or seniority "earned" them some perceived advantage.
I keep a VERY low profile, put forth some sincere dedication, and get rewarded with loyalty and appreciation in return.
Do the right thing just because it's the right thing to do. You will always be rewarded, even if it's just from within. You'll be amazed how things fall into place.
Men, stick up for the ladies -- and we'll stick up for you.
How can women be "canaries in the coal mine" when they don't step foot in coal mines?
Agrred, there are low paid Americans across this country, but the cold hard fact is that women still suffer a pay disparity for the same work. In 2011 that should not be true. Our work is just as important in supporting our families. And in those households where Dad is absent and doesn't contribute financially, it's more important to the kids.
You have learned your talking points well. Too bad you don't have any analysis to back them up.
Google EEOC v. Bloomberg, LP summary judgment. An excellent analysis written by a female.