Our Independence

Of course, university students doing essential work over the holidays are fortunate in this respect, they do not depend on that type of Job or trade for their living. The case of the four girls in the South Island may be cited here. Questions were asked in Parliament about them—they received considerable back money for overtime which their union claimed for them. Had they been ordinary employees they might have hesitated to jeopardise their employment by demanding payment for the excessive overtime worked. It is here that the student body can be of value in the community by its very independence. The writer of the article in last week's "Salient" pointed out that students could and should, endeavour to work in with the unions over the vacation. To my mind there is yet another matter the students should consider, and that is "equal pay for equal work." It may be said that this is an old feminist slogan. It is desirable that we as "educated people" should understand how it affects us and the community in which we live. Mrs. Roose-velt, while on a visit to New Zealand last year, told the "Salient" representative at the Press Conference that a United States women's committee in which she was interested had carried out a broad investigation which effectively disproved the idea of women needing less money because they do not have to support dependents. The myth that women cannot tackle difficult or responsible work was shaken in the last war and the post-war years; this war has completed the process. Of course it is not suggested that women wield pickaxes any more than that men should take up Karltane nursing, but there are shipyards in England where the majority of the workers are women, doing a "man's Job." We have learnt that over 65% of the doctors in the U.S.S.R. are women and in the U.S.A. on government munition projects the administration allows the principle of equal pay for equal work with most desirable effects on the work and the morale of the workers.

The differentiation in pay is a hangover. Women are no longer politically inforior; they have been given the vote. The removal of economic inferiority will have a desirable effect on our society.

There is another problem which, as we are young, affects us vitally. At the present time there is considerable trouble socially over the position of the home. The vexed question of divorce is in daily evidence. To a woman it seems apparent that this is knit up with the anomolous disparity of pay. A woman may be unconsciously tempted into marriage by a regular income and better living conditions. Such a marriage is likely to come to grief when it is founded on a desire for economic security rather than on affection and similar interests and companionship.