Official Statistics confirm CIPD view that women are not being relatively hard hit by jobs downturn
March 6 2009 - Figures released this morning by the Office for National Statistics (ONS)
ahead of International Women's Day on Monday 8 March clearly show that, contrary to recent common assertion,
women are definitely not suffering more than men from job cuts and rising unemployment in the current recession.
Commenting on the ONS figures John Philpott, Chief Economist and Public Policy Director at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD), says that today's figures are a reminder that we should be wary of special pleading by various interest groups using the recession to promote particular policy agendas.
Dr Philpott comments:
"The CIPD has been consistently sceptical of the common assertion that women are suffering more than men in the jobs market during the current recession. The claim is being propounded by an unholy alliance between protagonists for improved statutory employment rights for women, who find it easier to pursue their broader policy agenda if people think women are being hard done by, and business lobbyists opposed to employment regulation who, on the contrary, reckon the recession will validate their argument that women are now too costly to employ and will therefore suffer more than men when the axe falls on jobs.
"However, neither party to this alliance appears to have checked the facts. Hopefully, today's official figures from the ONS will finally shoot this particular fox. It's a truism that more women will lose jobs in this recession than in previous recessions - there are simply lots more women in the workforce. Yet while one can't yet entirely rule out the possibility that women will lose out relative to men in the jobs stakes as the recession unfolds this is categorically not true of the jobs downturn to date.
"As the ONS data show more men than women have lost jobs - in part due to the relative preponderance of women working in the public sector where employment has been rising - male unemployment has risen faster than female unemployment, and the male redundancy rate has risen much faster.
"None of this is to say that women who lose do jobs may not require particular forms of tailored help to enable them to cope with unemployment and return to work. The income pressures on lone parent mothers, for example, may be relatively severe as will the childcare requirements needed when women are looking for work. But these practical policy consequences should not be confused by misleading claims about the overall jobs impact of the recession.
"As the recession gets deeper and longer, politicians and the media will be bombarded by lobby groups claiming that this or that demographic group require special attention. To date women's rights and older worker's rights lobbyists have been most vocal even though, ironically, available evidence suggests that the groups being worst affected by jobs downturn are men and younger people. It is important that any such claims are supported by evidence and not simply taken at face value, otherwise we risk distorting the policy response to the emerging crisis."
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