Alex Callinicos/SWP vs Laurie Penny/New Statesman Facebook handbags

[Idris2002]

That's the most mystic comment you've ever made.
You also have/had a reputation of making generally mystic comments.

These holy men speak in riddles.

Butchers, yesterday:

 

[cesare]

What is the gap for single women- and single middle-class vs working-class women?

And single mothers w/c v m/c perhaps more pertinently.

 

[sihhi]

And single mothers w/c v m/c perhaps more pertinently.

If anyone does know what are the true numbers of single fathers? Is it 8% or 12% of the total single-parent household population?

Also, what proportion of households with children use childcare at a paid-for facility?

Genuine questions btw.

 

[sihhi]

There just be a smiley for 'I'm dropping the acid now, will re-commence making sense in approx. 18 hours'.

It sounds like he's entered an archive full of documents from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, but is on a phone.

 

[cesare]

If anyone does know what are the true numbers of single fathers? Is it 8% or 12% of the total single-parent household population?

Also, what proportion of households with children use childcare at a paid-for facility?

Genuine questions btw.

I think you'd need to modify the households question to factor in w/c v m/c to get answers that mean anything in terms of normal incomes.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

What grass roots members want are mainly (a) effective collective bargaining for terms and conditions that includes/is relevant to all jobs in their workplace and (b) effective representation for individual and collective disputes. Yes?

As I said in a previous post

 

[cesare]

As I said in a previous post

And as a result of 3 and 4 they're not doing that effectively enough anymore. And as a result of 4 in particular there're going to be some big problems this year when the ever-increasing judiciary role in resolving workplace disputes ceases for the most part to be free.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Pretty sure I am using the term in the same sense as sihhi. In terms of the workplace, a highly skilled woman has more in common with a highly skilled man than she does with a low-skilled woman. Hence the lack of progress made solely on the basis of having more women in positions of power within unionism. People with power abuse it, regardless of whether they look like the traditionally dominant group or not.

The EHRC estimated the pay gap for middle-class women who have kids as 4%, compared to 58% for working-class women. Which group do you think dominates in the women's sections?

Ok well skilled workers are not a different class to unskilled workers.

Having said that certainly broadly speaking it is fair to say that skilled workers tend to be more effective at organising within the unions generally, and of course that includes within the the self organised groups - it is one of the ways I referred to previously in which the self organised groups can replicate the wider problems within the union movement.

Of course this is partly over come by unions also organising workers based on sector and occupation - for instance having formal or informal structures for say cleaners and catering staff which have the ability to deliver training and genuine representation within existing structures for generally lower paid members, also reserved seats on committees for low paid members.

Which then feeds into to the whole over complication thing we have already covered, and the need to change the way we organise at all levels.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

And as a result of 3 and 4 they're not doing that effectively enough anymore. And as a result of 4 in particular there're going to be some big problems this year when the ever-increasing judiciary role in resolving workplace disputes ceases for the most part to be free.

Yes as I covered in a previous post when I said the structures are no adequate to deal with all the new challenges

 

[ymu]

I'll go dig out the report.

How fair is Britain

Numbers given from page 411- in the main report, but it's a review based on multiple sources and doesn't report on non-mothers compared to mothers directly.

The level of earnings penalty that women face as a result of having children
varies greatly between better and worse educated women. Those with degrees are
estimated to face only a 4% loss in lifetime earnings as a result of motherhood,
while mothers with mid-level qualifications face a 25% loss and those with no
qualifications a 58% loss.(109)

The reference is to page 15 of Metcalf, H., 2009. Pay gaps across the equality strands: a review. Research Report 14 Manchester: Equality and Human Rights Commission. (.pdf)

which itself references Joshi, H. (2002) ‘Production, reproduction, and education: women, children, and work in a British perspective’, Population and Development Review, 28, 3: 445-74 (free registration)

 

[ymu]

Ok well skilled workers are not a different class to unskilled workers.

Having said that certainly broadly speaking it is fair to say that skilled workers tend to be more effective at organising within the unions generally, and of course that includes within the the self organised groups - it is one of the ways I referred to previously in which the self organised groups can replicate the wider problems within the union movement.

Of course this is partly over come by unions also organising workers based on sector and occupation - for instance having formal or informal structures for say cleaners and catering staff which have the ability to deliver training and genuine representation within existing structures for generally lower paid members, also reserved seats on committees for low paid members.

Which then feeds into to the whole over complication thing we have already covered, and the need to change the way we organise at all levels.

Oh right. It's not a class distinction. Just some other kind of power dynamic based on economic clout.

There's loads of reasons high-skilled workers are more effective at organising - longer-term more secure contracts, more likely to be full-time, more power over management, more time because they're less likely to be working more than one job and more likely to be able to afford childcare.

Which is why low-skilled women have been done no favours by being lumped in with high-skilled women.

 

[ViolentPanda]

How are they the same?



The bureaucracy did not generally just hand structures down to members - members who wanted them argued for them and votes were held among delegates at conferences in general over a period of several years...

They are not seperate from the rest of the union, generally members of regional women's or black committees have to be nominated from their branches, certainly in the big 3 unions.

Although we should always bear in mind that bureaucracy tends toward inertia, which generally indicates that anyone wanting to even slightly alter/amend the status quo will have to struggle harder than they should need to in order to do so.

 

[ViolentPanda]

Spot on. Unions are not, never have been and never will be potentially revolutionary organisations.

History speaks differently, even here in the UK. Just because there seems nothing stirring presently, doesn't mean there hasn't been and won't be again.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Although we should always bear in mind that bureaucracy tends toward inertia, which generally indicates that anyone wanting to even slightly alter/amend the status quo will have to struggle harder than they should need to in order to do so.

no - leadership always tends towards inertia the bureaucracy just helps to reinforce but otherwise I agree.

 

[ViolentPanda]

As an aside the entire industrial strategy of the fake left union leaders, like Serwotka etc, has been based on 1 day set piece stoppages of their entire membership rather than sustained targeted action by smaller groups of their members who possess genuine leverage.

It's almost as if they don't want to win their disputes. Perhaps this is the point that Athos is making?

It's also to do with having to operate on the right side of restrictive laws around industrial action, or see the unions' (i.e. the meberships') assets sequestrated.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Oh right. It's not a class distinction. Just some other kind of power dynamic based on economic clout.

Yes.

There's loads of reasons high-skilled workers are more effective at organising - longer-term more secure contracts, more likely to be full-time, more power over management, more time because they're less likely to be working more than one job and more likely to be able to afford childcare.

Yes I agree.

Which is why low-skilled women have been done no favours by being lumped in with high-skilled women.

Which is why the various structures and groupings have tried to come up with ways to ameliorate it - they are clumsy and complicated ways because that's how big capitalist bureacracies work.

 

[cesare]

Yes as I covered in a previous post when I said the structures are no adequate to deal with all the new challenges

Which takes us back full circle to where you said that it's difficult for unions to get democratically agreed decisions quickly implemented (or words to that effect) and I said, well that particular issue has a lot to do with structural decisions that they've made themselves in terms of creating corporate behemoth structures, which you disagreed with.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Which takes us back full circle to where you said that it's difficult for unions to get democratically agreed decisions quickly implemented (or words to that effect) and I said, well that particular issue has a lot to do with structural decisions that they've made themselves in terms of creating corporate behemoth structures, which you disagreed with.

No I didn't, unless I misunderstood

 

[ymu]

If anyone does know what are the true numbers of single fathers? Is it 8% or 12% of the total single-parent household population?

Also, what proportion of households with children use childcare at a paid-for facility?

Genuine questions btw.

Single parenthood might be covered in the EHRC report.

Dunno where you'd find the figures for childcare, but the cost of it must be a major contributor to the pay-gap being so much smaller for middle-class mothers. If you earn enough to pay a nursery or child-minder (without also needing to cut your hours or take a more flexible job) having children doesn't affect your lifetime earnings very much.

Free childcare is key for equality, I think. If men were as likely as women to take responsibility for childcare then the pay-gap might more or less disappear*, but there'd still be half the country put at a massive economic disadvantage. It's a bit like social mobility vs income equality - we're focusing on the wrong thing (capital is quite happy for us to keep playing musical chairs, as long as we don't demand that the shitty chairs are made as good as the comfy ones).

*Not saying it would, but it might; notoriously difficult area to research and I don't know what assumptions Joshi made yet, I haven't the energy to work through it right now.

 

[ViolentPanda]

There aren't classes within unions?

My point is not that these separate groups should never have formed. It is that they should have made themselves obsolete a long time ago, if their function was to create class unity.

Class stratification of membership has become a bigger issue since the consolidation of unions into "super-unions" over the last 30 years, IMO. It could be that the mechanism supposed to reinforce the ability to "get the job done" for the membership has actually made it harder to do so. Unions before then were much more job/trade-specific, which was why you originally had dozens of different railway unions: One for the boiler-makers; one for the engine drivers; one for the firemen; one for the guards; one for the janitorial staff etc etc. Now I think there's about a round half dozen.
So, I'm not sure that "class unity", in the way you seem to mean it, was ever a primary ambition. Unity of the local class (at that time in industrial settings often meaning male employees, with their families meekly fellow-travelling) against an employer, sure, but not so much as part of an over-arching struggle.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

*Not saying it will; notoriously difficult area to research and I don't know what assumptions Joshi made yet, I haven't the energy to work through it.

Remind me next week and I will dig out some figures I had which basically suggested everyone would be a winner with free childcare and that some circles with the Labour leadership are taking it seriously.

 

[cesare]

No I didn't, unless I misunderstood

Well you said that I'd misrepresented the position, which I took as disagreeing with me. And then your representation was half the story so I added the other half. And we still haven't covered non TU work struggle which is an interesting conversation itself

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Well you said that I'd misrepresented the position, which I took as disagreeing with me. And then your representation was half the story so I added the other half. And we still haven't covered non TU work struggle which is an interesting conversation itself

In that case I must have misrepresented you at least partially - I think I've said consistantly on this thread that the structures are not fit for purpose and it is them and inertia that are the real problems in the union movement - not a lack of belief in revolution now...

Yes non TU work struggle is really interesting - and is always a good reminder to everyone of what a union actually is -

A group of workers coming together to take action to defend and promote their interests collectively...

 

[ymu]

Class stratification of membership has become a bigger issue since the consolidation of unions into "super-unions" over the last 30 years, IMO. It could be that the mechanism supposed to reinforce the ability to "get the job done" for the membership has actually made it harder to do so. Unions before then were much more job/trade-specific, which was why you originally had dozens of different railway unions: One for the boiler-makers; one for the engine drivers; one for the firemen; one for the guards; one for the janitorial staff etc etc. Now I think there's about a round half dozen.
So, I'm not sure that "class unity", in the way you seem to mean it, was ever a primary ambition. Unity of the local class (at that time in industrial settings often meaning male employees, with their families meekly fellow-travelling) against an employer, sure, but not so much as part of an over-arching struggle.

I'm not arguing that class unity was a primary ambition. I'm responding to people who didn't like me saying that the unions were and still are a bit shit for class unity.

I read summat a while back about the move from skills-based unions to workplace-based being in response to corporations bypassing the unions and training their own workforces?

Now it's so easy to bypass workplace unions, what sort of reorganisation would combat that? And how do we make it happen?

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Will those going on about class stratification within unions please provide an example or explanation of what they mean?

How is a middle manager in local government a different class to a cleaner in local government?

If it is purely down to economic and social power does this mean that a male senior social worker is a different class to a female social work assistant?

Is an illegal immigrant cleaner in a hotel a different class to the crane opperator on the building site next door?

 

[ymu]

Are you arguing that class is a simple binary distinction, with no power differentials between people who fall on either side of the [has to work for a living]/[does not have to work for a living] line?

Does the middle-manager who can easily afford childcare experience the pay-gap in the same way as a woman who cannot afford childcare? Or will she automatically understand and empathise purely because she's a woman, despite never having experienced earning less than her childcare costs?

I don't buy that. Sorry.

 

[Spanky Longhorn]

Are you arguing that class is a simple binary distinction, with no power differentials between people who fall on either side of the [has to work for a living]/[does not have to work for a living] line?

Does the middle-manager who can easily afford childcare experience the pay-gap in the same way as a woman who cannot afford childcare? Or will she automatically understand and empathise purely because she's a woman, despite never having experienced earning less than her childcare costs?

I don't buy that. Sorry.

I'm asking what you think

 

[sihhi]

Will those going on about class stratification within unions please provide an example or explanation of what they mean?

How is a middle manager in local government a different class to a cleaner in local government?

If it is purely down to economic and social power does this mean that a male senior social worker is a different class to a female social work assistant?

Is an illegal immigrant cleaner in a hotel a different class to the crane opperator on the building site next door?

If you accept the division that ruling-class hires and fires and working-class is hired and fired.
Then some roles that are for hire, help the ruling-class make those decisions about hiring and firing.
The past 30 years has seen more people more layered out into more a pyramid structure of helping the ruling-class above.
So middle managers in local government definitely monitor the performance of workers below, definitely have input in the restructurings (90-days everyone, make everyone reapply for new but fewer posts) that seem to go on every year nowadays.
Occasionally, they get restructured too so they are kept on their best behaviour and do their function properly, but not to the same degree.

 

[sihhi]

Are you arguing that class is a simple binary distinction, with no power differentials between people who fall on either side of the [has to work for a living]/[does not have to work for a living] line?

I don't think anyone is arguing that, are they?

 

[ymu]

I'm asking what you think

I've just told you.