Opinion: I want to see a decent percentage offered on International Women's Day

Forget sales this International Women's Day, I want some real change. Photo / Unsplash

Opinion:

Thirty per cent.

Is that a woman's worth I wondered, when the email dropped into my mailbox on Monday morning.

Apparently so, according to one women's fashion shop at least. Or so that appeared to be the message their marketing team was communicating.

"Celebrate International Women's Day with 30 per cent off."

I do love a good sale, but I can't help but wonder if a discount on a pair of jeans or a leather handbag is actually the best way for businesses to celebrate the social, economic, cultural, and political achievements of women.

Because that is actually what International Women's Day is about, it's a focus on the need for change, not a marketing gimmick based around the idea that women want cheaper clothes, a new lipstick and so on.

Heck, let's throw in a discounted washing machine or iron on to that list too, because if this year is anything like previous years, those marketing emails are merely the click of a send button away as we draw near to International Women's Day.

When we are talking women and percentages, I would actually like an increase, not a decrease please.

How about an increase in female representation at a local government level - now that's a gift that will keep on giving? Currently, Stratford's three out of 11 elected members makes a pretty paltry 27 per cent female representation at the council table and sits just under Local Government New Zealand's national statistics on gender in local government of 31 per cent as of the 2019 elections.

Thankfully, it's better news for women when we shift our focus to national politics where, fittingly for a country that was after all the first country where women won the right to vote, 48.3 per cent of our MPs are women, and eight of the 20-person Cabinet are women.

While those numbers are a lot more positive, things drop again when we look at representation in the boardroom. There, the percentage of women
directors on all S&P/NZXlisted company boards is just 22.5 per cent - that's under a quarter in total.

There are some areas in Aotearoa New Zealand where women are ahead of men, statistically speaking, unfortunately however not in the right way. Women in New Zealand are doing far more unpaid work than men for example, with Manatū Wāhine (Ministry for Women) reporting about 63 per cent of women's work is unpaid compared to 35 per cent of men's work.

Even when women are getting paid for their work, however, they are getting paid noticeably less than their male counterparts, $2.63 an hour less in fact according to Tatauranga Aotearoa Statistics New Zealand's 2021 figures.

That's a gender pay gap of 9.1 per cent - so perhaps that's why various marketing mavens are busily sending us poor and underpaid women offers on discounted fashion this International Women's Day.

Cheap jeans won't change the gender inequity in the world, but that doesn't mean fashion firms, electronic stores and even supermarkets can't do something to help. Instead of spending their money on glossy advertising and discounted "feminine beauty products" they could invest in paying their workforce equally, increasing the number of women in management and on their boards, and generally make a meaningful commitment to inclusion in their business.

Maybe then us women won't have to wait for a sale on jeans and dishwashers to be able to afford to buy them.