Imag(in)ing career trajectories

There's been quite a lot of comment recently on the topic of older people working.  Several major businesses - Aviva, Boots, the Coop and others - have got together to see what they can do to increase the numbers of over-50s in the workforce, and to encourage people to carry on working beyond the official pension age.  Aviva's Andy Briggs is the government's business champion for older workers, and he wants to see UK companies increasing the numbers of over-50s in the workforce from 9m to over 10m in the next five years. The arguments are quite familiar, and have been made for some time.  On the defensive side, an…
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Contender for PP champion

I sometimes speculate on which country exemplifies the Paula Principle at its most powerful.  The most obvious contenders are Japan and, especially, Korea.  In both countries, women are very highly educated, to degree level and beyond, and yet the gender pay gap remains very large. The case of Korea is particularly striking, as women are well represented in science and engineering, so their careers are not as constrained by subject choice as they are elsewhere.  (Role models may be a slightly tricky issue there, with their first female president having been removed on charges of corruption.) But now there's another possible champion.  Step forward Saudi Arabia.  The country now has…
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Imag(in)ing career trajectories

There's been quite a lot of comment recently on the topic of older people working.  Several major businesses - Aviva, Boots, the Coop and others - have got together to see what they can do to increase the numbers of over-50s in the workforce, and to encourage people to carry on working beyond the official pension age.  Aviva's Andy Briggs is the government's business champion for older workers, and he wants to see UK companies increasing the numbers of over-50s in the workforce from 9m to over 10m in the next five years. The arguments are quite familiar, and have been made for some time.  On the defensive side, an…
Read More

Contender for PP champion

I sometimes speculate on which country exemplifies the Paula Principle at its most powerful.  The most obvious contenders are Japan and, especially, Korea.  In both countries, women are very highly educated, to degree level and beyond, and yet the gender pay gap remains very large. The case of Korea is particularly striking, as women are well represented in science and engineering, so their careers are not as constrained by subject choice as they are elsewhere.  (Role models may be a slightly tricky issue there, with their first female president having been removed on charges of corruption.) But now there's another possible champion.  Step forward Saudi Arabia.  The country now has…
Read More