Thursday, April 19, 2007

Why women should pay less tax

Normally, free-marketeers and those who are worried about the efficiency costs of taxation are in opposite camps from those social activists who believe you need extensive government intervention to achieve a range of social goals. Here is a policy proposal that should make the two camps agree: reduce income taxes on women and increase, by less, income taxes on men.
As surprising as it may look, this can be done while keeping total tax revenue constant and reducing average tax rates. Thus, this policy would at the same time reduce overall tax distortions and increase women's participation in the labour force. It would achieve similar goals to affirmative action policies, quotas or subsidised childcare and could substitute for those policies. It would also make gender discrimination more costly for employers and would be fair because it would compensate women for bearing the brunt of maternity and for the fact that the possibility of having children can negatively affect their career prospects.

Financial Times April 18 2007 page 11

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

this is what a feminist looks like

this is a picture my friend took of me. i'm just another person in this world trying to have a good time and hopefully do some good along the way.

feminism is for everybody

I remember the time when I thought racism wasn't my issue because I'm white. But after some soul searching and education, particularly by reading bell hooks, I realized that I had always wanted men to care about sexism. But why should men care about feminism? Most people perceive feminism as giving women hand outs or unfair advantages. In reality, men are benefiting every day form privileges that women don't have. So really these "hand outs" are just an act of balancing the power. Taking some off one side of the balance and putting on the other, until they are even.

There is a lot for men to gain from feminism. Even though men get the most privileges and access to power, sexism puts limits on both men and women. And besides, don't we all believe in equality?

bell hooks also talks a lot about how people of color often choose to fight racism rather than sexism. But what bell hooks so adequately and eloquently explains is that to truly obliterate any one oppression, the best way is to work to end them all.

this means sexism, racism, classism, homophobia and even environmental destruction.

bell hooks provides the most tangible explanations of feminism. her book can be bought from http://www.southendpress.org/ or from big distributors as well.

(the photo is from www.southendpress.org)