Here's one example:
Caltex has introduced a new ‘return to work’ 12% bonus to lure its female employees back to work after maternity leave.Here's another:
The quarterly bonuses of 3% of salary will be paid up to the child’s second birthday.
For a worker on a $75,000 salary, the 12% annual bonus would amount to $9000 a year before tax.
Caltex already gives maternity leave of 12 weeks at full pay or 24 weeks at half-pay.
Of Caltex’s 3500 employees, 30% are women. The company is actively pushing to attract and retain a diverse group of employees, including more women, and is keen to reduce its staff turnover as a result of primary carers of children not returning to work.
Caltex chairman Elizabeth Bryan said the package was designed to retain skilled employees...
One of Australia's largest companies is set to unveil a new paid parental leave scheme that offers women a "welcome back to work" payment.There was once a time when men were paid more on the understanding that this would enable them to support a family and allow a mother to spend time at home with her children.
Insurance Australia Group already provides 14 weeks' paid leave, but will now double the salaries of women for their first six weeks back at work...
The payment comes on top of the Federal Government's parental leave payment of up to 18 weeks at minimum wage.
IAG chief executive Mike Wilkins says the offer is designed to help women overcome the challenges of returning to work.
But this was shouted down on the basis that equal pay was a sacrosanct principle that could not be violated.
But the equal pay principle is not so sacrosanct when it comes to paying speical bonuses to women.
I wonder what would happen if a company paid its male workers an extra $9000 a year for a couple of years after having a child, on the basis that such men would be facing extra costs in supporting a family? If Caltex and IAG can run with this kind of logic for women, then why shouldn't a company do it for men?
It makes sense from a business standpoint. But feminists will see it as a victory because it singles out women for bonuses.
ReplyDeleteI am just curious. Are these companies private or state? Comes the money from their own profit?
ReplyDeleteHell, where are they going to get the money?
What impact it has on male productivity?
So wait, first we have to pay them to do nothing (maternity leave), and we also have to pay someone else to do their job while they're doing nothing, and now we have to pay them MORE to come back from doing nothing? Screw that. Hiring them is a waste of time and money.
ReplyDeleteBoth men and women are equal, individualistic and interchangeable, yet somehow women are more equal than men.
ReplyDeleteIf Caltex and IAG can run with this kind of logic for women, then why shouldn't a company do it for men?
ReplyDeleteOne alternative right blogger once wrote that since equality between men and women is elusive and a nightmare (because clearly men and women have different capacities on average), that the only way to mitigate the damage and lies of "equality, liberty, fraternity" (aka French Revolutionary principles), is to make men as a whole, and on average, to pay for these costs.
But it all turns into a fiasco and a circus, because women become more feral (since women are a herd) and the men get the blame plus the costs, not to mention all of the white knights on the male side.
True equality doesn't exist, will never exist, and since they will never stop to reach for that dream (*ahem* nightmare), the search will only intensify. Pick any unreachable goal, and you will spends ages on it. Never finishing.
Basically, what is happening right now, is that the Human Resource Departments are under heavy PC Orwellian environment regulations, and so the men (the average dudes) get paid less for more, and suffer other costs, while women get paid more for less (in addition to the benefits they accumulate).
ReplyDeleteThis doesn't hurt the apex males though. They get richer.
Hiring them is a waste of time and money.
ReplyDeleteAfter the Adria Richards (Human Resources) fiasco over Donglegate at a Tech (STEM) Conference (overhearing a couple of dorks joking around about "big dongles" and "forking a repo"), there is a new unspeakable motto: "Hire a woman, hire a lawsuit."
There are some companies in Australia which are now paying female employees more than their male counterparts on the basis that it's necessary to give women bonuses to keep them at work after having children.
ReplyDeleteThese companies are probably all big multinational corporations. Due to their size and purpose, they can withstand a lot of damage that this stuff would usually do in an instant to smaller businesses.
One can have maybe half of the workers productive in a big corporation and they can still limp along (they will fail sooner or later, unless of course they are TBTF = Too Big To Fail). When one has, say, 100 workers or less, then one can't really afford such absurdities. One would be crushed.
What's really disgusting is the fact that these women are being paid more for the explicit purpose of luring them away from their own children. It's so baffling, so overwhelmingly evil, let me say it again. Businesses are paying money to separate children from their mothers.
ReplyDeleteCapitalist totalitarianism can still startle me sometimes.
What's really disgusting is the fact that these women are being paid more for the explicit purpose of luring them away from their own children.
ReplyDeleteWell, I agree with you Bonald, but we're apparently out of line with contemporary thinking on this one.
These companies are probably all big multinational corporations. Due to their size and purpose, they can withstand a lot of damage that this stuff would usually do in an instant to smaller businesses.
Good point.
Businesses are paying money to separate children from their mothers.
ReplyDeleteBusinesses are paying money to separate children from both their fathers and mothers. Not to mention the extended family.
It all started with the British Industrial Revolution, which pushed labour/work outside of the household...
No surprises really. It is win/win for big business. They get the PR rep and it also gives impetus for more demands of this kind which smaller and mid range companies cannot afford, hence crushing future opposition. Nothing new to see here.
ReplyDeleteHow many of these companies face a penalty from the government if thier male/female employee ratios fall below a certain number? I know in canada and the US any company doing work with the government MUST have a certain number of female and minority employees or their contract will be nullified.
ReplyDeleteThis might be the cheaper option from the companies standpoint, no matter how much turnover or lack of corporate loyalty it causes amoung the men.
Perhaps this is not a totally relevant comment, but after searching for over two hours it is the only forum whereby I can express myself. Every other search I instituted was either pro-feminist, inviolably politically correct or allowed no response. I have no comment on the above-mentioned bonuses for women returning to work after childbirth. My problem is the 'equal pay for equal work' mantra. From 2006 until 2011 I worked as a packer in a supermarket on minimum wages, which were enjoyed equally by both women and men. The discrepancy occurred and still does because the women were allowed to work their shift, packing shelves in relative air-conditioned comfort, whereas the males, along with their shelf packing duties were required to collect trolleys from the carpark, sometimes in temperatures as high as 38 degrees C (100 degrees F) and higher, all the while wearing a tie (women were not required to wear a tie or have their top button fastened. Furthermore , males were required to lift excess stock to males on ladders to place above the shelves; males were called individually or in numbers to clean up spills by the almost exclusively female 'front-end' staff; males exclusively unloaded trucks; males exclusively split this load, usually between 10 and 20 palettes requiring back damaging lifting;
ReplyDeleteonly males were ever called to theft or anti-social behavior matters, risking potential injury (personally I have been punched and kicked but subsequently responded to such calls nonetheless). I could easily continue, however this diatribe is copious enough for you to get my gist. Equal work for equal wages-what a ridiculous joke!