Men and choice

Since I have to rewrite my  PP book completely (a difficult verdict  to swallow from a publisher, but one I now recognise as correct), I've been doing some further interviews, or conversations as I prefer to think of them .   My latest respondent described to me the remarkable case  of her father, a senior engineer who chose to leave his job and be the main parent for his four girls, while his wife took up her career as a teacher.  This was not for financial reasons - the father would have earned more, even though the mother ended up a headteacher- - but simply because the couple decided that…
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ages and cohorts

  On Monday evening I went to an interesting meeting on older women and politics, at my old stomping ground Birkbeck (never miss an opportunity to promote it).  The event was convened by  two political scientists, Joni Lovenduski and Rosie Campbell.  They showed some evidence on  older women's political attitudes, voting patterns and other issues, eg on retirement age.   Older women (already retired) are apparently more opposed to the raising of the State Pension Age than their younger counterparts.  Rosie interpreted this as a sign of altruism (i.e. these older women didn't want the next generation to have to work longer);  I thought it could be looked at differently, that…
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Gender job splitting

Some familiar-but-important and some new material from a discussion on a new report today from the TUC/Work Foundation, on the Gender Jobs Split. The familiar was about the dismal and depressing overall levels of youth unemployment, and their probable long-term impact on the futures of this generation.   Familiar too, but in a different sense, is the way young women and men go into their separate groups of occupations - the difference being that many of the commentators expressed surprise (as well as dismay) at how little things have changed on this over the decades.  Ian Brinkley described progress on gender desegregation as 'glacial';  others went further and suggested that the…
Read More

Men and choice

Since I have to rewrite my  PP book completely (a difficult verdict  to swallow from a publisher, but one I now recognise as correct), I've been doing some further interviews, or conversations as I prefer to think of them .   My latest respondent described to me the remarkable case  of her father, a senior engineer who chose to leave his job and be the main parent for his four girls, while his wife took up her career as a teacher.  This was not for financial reasons - the father would have earned more, even though the mother ended up a headteacher- - but simply because the couple decided that…
Read More

ages and cohorts

  On Monday evening I went to an interesting meeting on older women and politics, at my old stomping ground Birkbeck (never miss an opportunity to promote it).  The event was convened by  two political scientists, Joni Lovenduski and Rosie Campbell.  They showed some evidence on  older women's political attitudes, voting patterns and other issues, eg on retirement age.   Older women (already retired) are apparently more opposed to the raising of the State Pension Age than their younger counterparts.  Rosie interpreted this as a sign of altruism (i.e. these older women didn't want the next generation to have to work longer);  I thought it could be looked at differently, that…
Read More

Gender job splitting

Some familiar-but-important and some new material from a discussion on a new report today from the TUC/Work Foundation, on the Gender Jobs Split. The familiar was about the dismal and depressing overall levels of youth unemployment, and their probable long-term impact on the futures of this generation.   Familiar too, but in a different sense, is the way young women and men go into their separate groups of occupations - the difference being that many of the commentators expressed surprise (as well as dismay) at how little things have changed on this over the decades.  Ian Brinkley described progress on gender desegregation as 'glacial';  others went further and suggested that the…
Read More

Men and choice

Since I have to rewrite my  PP book completely (a difficult verdict  to swallow from a publisher, but one I now recognise as correct), I've been doing some further interviews, or conversations as I prefer to think of them .   My latest respondent described to me the remarkable case  of her father, a senior engineer who chose to leave his job and be the main parent for his four girls, while his wife took up her career as a teacher.  This was not for financial reasons - the father would have earned more, even though the mother ended up a headteacher- - but simply because the couple decided that…
Read More

ages and cohorts

  On Monday evening I went to an interesting meeting on older women and politics, at my old stomping ground Birkbeck (never miss an opportunity to promote it).  The event was convened by  two political scientists, Joni Lovenduski and Rosie Campbell.  They showed some evidence on  older women's political attitudes, voting patterns and other issues, eg on retirement age.   Older women (already retired) are apparently more opposed to the raising of the State Pension Age than their younger counterparts.  Rosie interpreted this as a sign of altruism (i.e. these older women didn't want the next generation to have to work longer);  I thought it could be looked at differently, that…
Read More

Gender job splitting

Some familiar-but-important and some new material from a discussion on a new report today from the TUC/Work Foundation, on the Gender Jobs Split. The familiar was about the dismal and depressing overall levels of youth unemployment, and their probable long-term impact on the futures of this generation.   Familiar too, but in a different sense, is the way young women and men go into their separate groups of occupations - the difference being that many of the commentators expressed surprise (as well as dismay) at how little things have changed on this over the decades.  Ian Brinkley described progress on gender desegregation as 'glacial';  others went further and suggested that the…
Read More