Look at the statistics, and at the politics.
Here are some strong reasons why the fight for gender equality in Sweden should not be blown away in 2024:
Wages are not equal. Women in Sweden work for free 48 minutes a day. This applies to women as a collective, regardless of class.
When it comes to blue-collar jobs, wages are at a level that makes it difficult to make a living. While the average actual monthly salary for a male worker is a modest 28,920 kroner, a female worker has to settle for even less at 23,210 kroner. And this is before tax. How can it be enough to provide for children?
Women go about suffering in miserable conditions because they cannot afford to make a life for themselves. The most common profession for a Swedish woman today is assistant nurse. Should all women move to male-dominated sectors to avoid value discrimination – “make different choices, get different results” as Ebba Busch said a couple of years ago? What will be the result for welfare then?
The work environment is not equal. In welfare workplaces, where women are strongly overrepresented, staff are under strong pressure due to understaffing and sickness rates are high. Members of Kommunal have testified that they do not have time to take shorter breaks during the working day, not even to go to the toilet. Close to one in three cannot determine their own pace of work.
The stress and lack of time for recovery is a huge work environment problem that has led to members of Kommunal cutting back on working hours to make ends meet. The result is that they pay for their recovery themselves. And over half of members who work in aged care say they have considered quitting.
The shortcomings in the work environment are structural. At workplaces in the municipalities, where women are overrepresented, the Swedish Work Environment Agency points out that there is no good communication between the managers and those who actually do the work. In addition, the managers in the health and care sector are responsible for an enormous number of employees than in other industries. How will they have time to listen, discuss, reconsider and evaluate? This is in comparison to the male-dominated professions, where the management listens to the professionals in the business.
The political will is lacking. We have a government that has grossly underfunded welfare while at the same time opening up to abandoning the surplus target in order to expand defense. When it comes to caring for people, most things are impossible, but when it comes to NATO, we aim for the stars.
All this proves that Kommunal needs to shift into top gear in the pursuit of gender equality at work, in society and in politics. Current government gives us no choice. We take every chance we get to talk about staffing guidelines, legislation on women’s working environment, the abolition of the qualifying period and the indexing of state contributions to welfare. The lack of interest is monumental, especially from the Minister for Gender Equality.
So if someone even breathes that equality and feminism are not needed in today’s society, you know what the answer will be.
The fight continues on March 8 and all the other 364 days of the year.