Even the Canadian Human Rights Commission has largely moved on in terms of the kinds of cases it hears these days. A minority of complaints the commission now investigates revolves around discrimination on the basis of sex. Instead, more than 40% of the complaints received last year touched on disability issues.
An additional 20% of the grievances filed centred on alleged discrimination because of ethnic origin or race.
Yet the usual suspects still insist that Canadian women continue to suffer and wider society is to blame.
Several unions announced yesterday they're donating a total of $170,000 to various women's groups, including the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women, the National Association of Women and the Law and the Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action.
Twenty-six years after Canada's ratification of the UN Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women, females are still not treated equally, the unions charged.
The Public Service Alliance of Canada, the Canadian Union of Postal Workers and the Ontario Secondary School Teachers' Federation denounced the Harper government for its funding cuts to Status of Women Canada.
NOT THERE YET
"Statistics show women haven't achieved equality yet," the unions warned, trotting out the well known fact that women only earn about 70% of what men make.
The pay gap, however, has nothing to do with institutional discrimination and much to do with women's lifestyle and career choices. As a 2006 Statistics Canada study noted, women continue to work in the traditional pink-ghetto jobs -- including teaching, nursing and the wider health-related field, sales and clerical positions.
(Although teachers and nurses make such good money, it's a pretty nice ghetto.)
Statistics Canada also pointed out that single women earn the same as their male counterparts or, in the 45 to 54 age category, significantly more than men.
There seem to be pretty clear solutions to women's economic problems -- and they don't include blaming Ottawa. Career-minded women who also want a husband and kids need to look for a mate who understands, unequivocally, that child-rearing isn't just women's work.
In 2004, women missed an average of 10 days of work because they had to care for sick family members. In contrast, men missed a day and a half of work, according to the Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women.
"Do women make choices to be economically disadvantaged, particularly by having children?" the institute asks in a paper on its website. Well, yes, of course they do.
FACE REALITY
That's reality, folks. Having children means making trade-offs. If women want to be the primary caregivers -- and it seems they usually do -- financial consequences generally follow. But that's hardly Ottawa's fault.
These are the sorts of personal decisions that need to be made within families. Instead, we get nonsense like the suggestion from the Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action that we analyze the federal budget "through the lens of gender."
Oh, those poor, downtrodden Canadian women. They now make up about 60% of bachelor's degree programs, half of master's programs and 45% of PhD studies in universities. Who can we blame? Source: http://www.edmontonsun.com/Comment/2007/12/11/4718263-sun
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