“Indeed, you would struggle invent a policy more perfectly designed to increase the gender pay gap than austerity” Another departure from me this week, as I wrote about feeling hope for the first time in my politically active life: “Scandal-hit maternity services have deteriorated to the point where they have the poorest safety ratings of any hospital service, with two-thirds of maternity units considered “not safe enough.” The pandemic obviously hasn’t helped with waiting lists, but Covid-19 cannot be blamed for the disproportionate increase in waiting lists for gynaecology— which began two years before most people outside of China had even heard of Wuhan. It also cannot be blamed for the 40% decrease in funding for reproductive and sexual services over the past decade. The disproportionate impact of spending cuts on women goes well beyond our spiralling healthcare system, however. As I wrote in Invisible Women, cuts in public spending always hit women the hardest, because the need for services like social care does not disappear just because the government is no longer providing them. Instead the responsibility for providing these non-negotiable services (which, by the way are a massive contributor to GDP and without which the formal economy would grind to a halt) shifts from the collective, funded by our taxes, to the individual (almost exclusively) women, who pay for it by reducing their hours (and as an inevitable corollary, seniority) in paid work.” If you want MORE (and how could you not!) the link to the full piece is in the comments
Superb as ever, Caroline 👏
Author of Invisible Women
1whttps://newsletter.carolinecriadoperez.com/p/invisible-women-independence-day