Flicking through twitter this morning I came across a tweet from Grazia Daily about Equal Pay Day.
Apparently today is the day that women start working for free for the rest of the year based on the pay difference between men and women, which is apparently 15p an hour less than male colleagues doing exactly the same jobs!
After doing a day at work, that’s not a nice thought. It’s wrong that this still happens, but until measures are put in place to encourage and support women who take time off to have a family, I feel it is likely to continue for some time to come.
Things I’d like to see:
Help with childcare costs and not just those on a low income – childcare is so expensive, particularly when you have twins!!
Men being encouraged to have more time off for families or being allowed more flexibility.
Better flexible working policies across the board – my firm are great but many others out there are not.
I work 28 hours per week, 5 hours of which is from home. I’m really lucky that we get great support from our parents. If we didn’t and the twins had to go to nursery, I would be working for very little and I have a job that pays above the average wage – not the greatest incentive to return to work!
For more on the Grazia campaign visit their site http://www.graziadaily.co.uk/conversation/opinion/equal-pay-day
My thoughts are heavily focused on helping women with childcare costs, but realise there are other areas that need addressing too. I’d love to hear your thoughts.
J x