Sometimes stupid things happen in the media and it’s dust in the wind, not worth paying any attention.
But some forms of stupid are dangerous, and it’s worth taking a moment to point them out. Also, unless someone is a serial offender (not the case here), I’m not interested in piling on an individual journo over a headline I know they did not write, or an article they may well have been told to write.
Having said that, let me say this:
NO. JUST. NO.
Women do not have less super because they had a few extra drinks each week.
It’s difficult to imagine a more idiotic take on the serious gender disparity in superannuation. Maybe if women were told to save money by skinning roadkill and knitting their own undies with it?
Maybe they should tie cats to their feet and thus save money on shoes.
Maybe they should sell their TVs and force their children to convey the nuances of QandA or The Bachelor through the medium of interpretive dance. There’s some good money saved right there.
Or, maybe, just maybe, if women were paid the same as men, promoted as often as men, given the same recognition as men and expected to exchange paid work for unpaid work at an equal rate as men, that might have some effect on gendered superannuation disparity.
Saying women can address gender disparity by drinking less not just ludicrous, it’s a hugely damaging one to make while the government is in the process of making superannuation policy without, as far as we know, doing anything to address the underlying cause of the massive disparity between men’s and women’s superannuation.
The article was based on a press release from The Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia, and quoted the average super balances and how much they’ve changed in the last two years. While the SMH article quoted the average superannuation savings for men and women, it failed to mention that while the average amount over all has increased since 2011/12, men’s super has increased by far more than women’s. A point that was made in the press release.
The press release did include a little infographic about the cost of wine and how dropping one glass a week could impact your super – IF you were cutting back to save money and didn’t need to put that money into something else, like rent or food – but the ASFA certainly didn’t direct that advice at women.
So why, WHY, did the SMH, which usually does such good journalism (they’ve got Jessica Irvine for god’s sake) publish this? And the journo who wrote this piece can and certainly has, done great work. They are all better than this.
Women are not to blame for the systemic economic disadvantage they suffer. Any more than they are to blame for the violence enacted against them or the power imbalance thrust upon them in every area of society. They may well be the ones who fight long and hard enough to change it, but they’re not responsible for the effects of it.
