Sunday is still talking about the titting election

[AGinAg (37)]

Hi. Little to add about today.

 

[Sheena]

I was just about to start a Sunday thread and then decided not to because i couldn’t think of anything that didn’t reference politics

 

[Sheena]

Anyway, I’ve got a stomach bug. Properly vomiting most of last night, I’m better now but just lying on the sofa feeling sorry for myself really. Pity, I had lots of things I wanted to get done today, but I guess rather now than next week.

 

[Dark Carnival]

If it's any consolation, France has been striking for 10 days now over fucking Macron's pension reform law. We've been metro-less for 10 days, I've walked a thousand km and even took a Lime scooter once

 

[AGinAg (37)]

I was just about to start a Sunday thread and then decided not to because i couldn’t think of anything that didn’t reference politics

I am legit bored of it now. Its fucking Christmas now!

 

[Diddy]

Hi gang, I just moved apartment for the first time in 5-odd years. Finally got through it all, and no heating for a while. Just loads of unpacking to do, feeling a bit weird really. Is it like shock or something?

 

[Mats]

If it's any consolation, France has been striking for 10 days now over fucking Macron's pension reform law. We've been metro-less for 10 days, I've walked a thousand km and even took a Lime scooter once

so walk us through this. they're striking because they're considering raising age of retirement from 62 to 64? how inhumane!

 

[Indie]

Yet the worst we can raise is an eyebrow when they talk about moving it to 75...

 

[Dark Carnival]

so walk us through this. they're striking because they're considering raising age of retirement from 62 to 64? how inhumane!

More like 67. Also the strikes are mainly because Macron's government is targeting special regime pensions, mostly transport employees who currently retire earlier (but also pay more during their career for that) to compensate for the fact that they're often away from where they live.

The proposed reform would also have us switch to a point system like Sweden, where the value of the points you've earned during your career could just easily be changed later on by some other right-wing government to be worth less obviously.

Macron is a cunt.

 

[floppet]

I've been ranting about the raise in womens' pension age for ages but nobody gives a shit other than those affected and Jeremy Corbyn, people only seem to mention it when it's about raising mens' pension age too.

 

[Mats]

More like 67. Also the strikes are mainly because Macron's government is targeting special regime pensions, mostly transport employees who currently retire earlier (but also pay more during their career for that) to compensate for the fact that they're often away from where they live.

The proposed reform would also have us switch to a point system like Sweden, where the value of the points you've earned during your career could just easily be changed later on by some other right-wing government to be worth less obviously.

Macron is a cunt.

thanks. we don't often see strikes, and none as staunch as the French, but then we have a different model for negotiating terms and conditions. hence the recurring bewilderment

the retirement age here is currently 65,5 but for me, born after 1979, a new system now makes it look likely that it'll be 72 come my time

I don't think it completely unfair to raise retirement age a bit to make ends meet but where Macron seems to misstep is cutting taxes like some kind of reverse Robin Hood. this is what has been done here for the last ten years which just leaves a disproportionate part of the bill to the working poor

 

[octophone]

I've accepted I;m never going to retire and my only option will be to die on the job in style i.e. tumble down a lift shaft, electrocuted by a dodgy toaster, die on the bog and not be discovered for days because no-one wanted to knock etc etc

 

[Mats]

I've been ranting about the raise in womens' pension age for ages but nobody gives a shit other than those affected and Jeremy Corbyn, people only seem to mention it when it's about raising mens' pension age too.

weird to have one for men and one for women. what's the (outdated) justification for that?

 

[octophone]

Just had a very poor Xmas shopping expedition. Bought one pressie and the DVD of "The Man Who Fell To Earth" for myself. Just as well I work in the town centre really.

 

[Dark Carnival]

thanks. we don't often see strikes, and none as staunch as the French, but then we have a different model for negotiating terms and conditions. hence the recurring bewilderment

the retirement age here is currently 65,5 but for me, born after 1979, a new system now makes it look likely that it'll be 72 come my time

I don't think it completely unfair to raise retirement age a bit to make ends meet but where Macron seems to misstep is cutting taxes like some kind of reverse Robin Hood. this is what has been done here for the last ten years which just leaves a disproportionate part of the bill to the working poor

This is basically what's being done here. Add that to the fact that Macron has already done some many gifts to riches.

 

[floppet]

weird to have one for men and one for women. what's the (outdated) justification for that?

Women were more knackered by 60 due to them doing all of the washing, shopping, cooking, cleaning and child-rearing and then the joyous hit of menopause with brittle bones.

Really it was because men tended to marry women a few years younger than them. Pensions in the early 1920s were paid at a slightly higher rate to men but if those men were married and the wife was younger they had to wait until the wife hit 65 too before their full "married" pension was paid so in 1940 they reduced womens' pension age to 60 so they would get the married rate once the wife hit 60.

I understand that, all things being equal, it's only fair that women have to wait until 65 like men do. From my personal point of view though when I started work in 1984 my official retirement date was 22nd August 2029 and now it's 22nd August 2036 (and likely to rise even higher) so I feel jipped having to work an extra 7 years.

 

[lolly]

Been to an exhibition of feminism and queer resistance today. Feels kind of appropriate for some reason.

Had to go through the main shopping area on the way back, and surprised at how relatively unbusy it was. Like a normal Saturday really.

 

[Indie]

Women were more knackered by 60 due to them doing all of the washing, shopping, cooking, cleaning and child-rearing and then the joyous hit of menopause with brittle bones.

Really it was because men tended to marry women a few years younger than them. Pensions in the early 1920s were paid at a slightly higher rate to men but if those men were married and the wife was younger they had to wait until the wife hit 65 too before their full "married" pension was paid so in 1940 they reduced womens' pension age to 60 so they would get the married rate once the wife hit 60.

I understand that, all things being equal, it's only fair that women have to wait until 65 like men do. From my personal point of view though when I started work in 1984 my official retirement date was 22nd August 2029 and now it's 22nd August 2036 (and likely to rise even higher) so I feel jipped having to work an extra 7 years.

I have *some* sympathy with the plight of women caught in the time-net of the pension changes.

The original changes (made into law in 1995) was due to change things over the period 2010-2020. That was at least 15 years' notice. The changes brought in Cameron's government in 2011 sped that up rapidly. The first change was relatively fair - 15 years is arguably plenty of notice (ignorance should not be an acceptable argument - it was all over the news at the time) but the second was a big pile of dogshit.

Of course for everything to be entirely fair there needs to be wage equalisation at the same time. And that includes things like equal paternity pay.

 

[floppet]

Of course for everything to be entirely fair there needs to be wage equalisation at the same time. And that includes things like equal paternity pay.

It is equal now, it's called shared parental leave and pay so whichever parent has the time off after baby's born gets what would have been Statutory Maternity Pay providing they fulfill the conditions for it which are basically the same as the SMP conditions.

 

[Indie]

It is equal now, it's called shared parental leave and pay so whichever parent has the time off after baby's born gets what would have been Statutory Maternity Pay providing they fulfill the conditions for it which are basically the same as the SMP conditions.

I know about shared parental leave but that doesn't go far enough - the woman generally takes the lion's share of the leave for whatever reason.

My company gives 6 months full pay for both parents. No division of the leave required, and forced equality which doesn't leave it up for debate.

 

[floppet]

I know about shared parental leave but that doesn't go far enough - the woman generally takes the lion's share of the leave for whatever reason.

The main reason the woman usually takes most of it is that she's just spent nine months growing a new person inside her which takes it out of her a bit and then she's either spent several hours pushing that melon-sized person painfully out of a very small but stretchy hole with a separated pelvis or she's had an operation to remove it. Once that new person is out in the real world mum gets all kinds of new and exciting pains, leaks and hormone-related woes, her body is wired to automatically awaken when the baby cries even if dad says he'll do the feeds during the night so most new mums have to wake the dad up to do the night feed which kind of defeats the object and every time it does cry her tits leak again. If she decides not to breastfeed they turn into the most painful rock-hard chest appendages, oozing milk and unbearable to touch.

I don't believe that both parents should automatically be entitled to the whole nine months off with paid statutory pay, many smaller workplaces wouldn't be able to cover for it, much less afford it. Having a baby is a lifestyle choice, not a necessity, so I think that being able to share the leave is the fairest way of doing it and best for everybody. That your company gives 6 months off with full pay for either/both parents (if they both work there) is fantastic, I'd have welcomed that, but I don't believe it will ever become the norm in hairdressers, corner shops, pubs, tanning salons and small workplaces where the staff are generally paid minimum wage or slightly more.

 

[Star]

Jeez, I got 6 weeks at 90%, the next 33 weeks at statutory minimum and the last 12 weeks are totally unpaid...

 

[Shirley]

Actually I'm going to post that somewhere else

 

[Star]

Actually I'm going to post that somewhere else

No problem hun xoxo

 

[Indie]

The main reason the woman usually takes most of it is that she's just spent nine months growing a new person inside her which takes it out of her a bit and then she's either spent several hours pushing that melon-sized person painfully out of a very small but stretchy hole with a separated pelvis or she's had an operation to remove it. Once that new person is out in the real world mum gets all kinds of new and exciting pains, leaks and hormone-related woes, her body is wired to automatically awaken when the baby cries even if dad says he'll do the feeds during the night so most new mums have to wake the dad up to do the night feed which kind of defeats the object and every time it does cry her tits leak again. If she decides not to breastfeed they turn into the most painful rock-hard chest appendages, oozing milk and unbearable to touch.

I don't believe that both parents should automatically be entitled to the whole nine months off with paid statutory pay, many smaller workplaces wouldn't be able to cover for it, much less afford it. Having a baby is a lifestyle choice, not a necessity, so I think that being able to share the leave is the fairest way of doing it and best for everybody. That your company gives 6 months off with full pay for either/both parents (if they both work there) is fantastic, I'd have welcomed that, but I don't believe it will ever become the norm in hairdressers, corner shops, pubs, tanning salons and small workplaces where the staff are generally paid minimum wage or slightly more.

I didn't mean to be flippant about the trials and tribulations of childbirth. But it is true that women are more likely to have time off and it is also true that it can pause a woman's career. As such it is a roadblock in persuing a solution to wage equality.

As for the affordability point, I get it, I just don't buy it. Those corner shops, hairdressers, tanning salons have to already deal with statutory maternity leave. Some of those may indeed be already more staffed by women. It's just a replay of the whole minimum wage and/or pension auto-enrollment arguments over the last twenty years, and we've not seen a shrinkage in SMEs in that time. (In fact they've grown significantly)

 

[Indie]

Jeez, I got 6 weeks at 90%, the next 33 weeks at statutory minimum and the last 12 weeks are totally unpaid...

6 months is certainly the exception rather than the rule, but I still think that equal equivalence rather than the trade off method that currently exists is much fairer.

Not that I have any personal stake because kids are shit and I'm not having them ever

 

[dmlaw]

A guy at my work's wife had their first baby back in the summer. Apparently, he asked if they were going to share the parental leave, she told him to fuck off and that was the end of the conversation.