An ovarian penalty?
An American businessman, investor, and philanthropist Warren Buffet’s ‘Ovarian Lottery’ thought experiment (based on an idea by the American political philosopher John Rawls) highlights the probabilistic nature of birth circumstances and their impact
on our lives.
Two recent events centred around women’s reproductive choices and responsibilities stood out, as they reflected how the narrative changes when the prism is gender-tinted.
Forget the ‘Ovarian Lottery;’ it’s the ‘Ovarian Penalty’ that is bothersome. A few months ago, it was reported in the media that a global phone supplier allegedly “systematically excluded married women from jobs at its main India plant on the grounds they have more family responsibilities than their unmarried counterparts.” Various reports cited family duties, pregnancy, and higher absenteeism as reasons for not hiring married women. While these allegations have yet to be investigated fully, we’ve heard similar excuses before. A few weeks ago, an old clip surfaced where the current US presidential candidate was once termed a “childless cat lady.” This was referred to in the context of her being irresponsible as a State leader because she has no direct stake in the future — in other words, she is childless!
The irony is striking: women are excluded from employment for having children or potentially having children, while a woman’s competence is judged on her lack of children.
At one end, women are allegedly being excluded from employment because they have children or may have children in the future, making them less desirable as assembly workers as they will consequently have responsibilities that the employer is not comfortable with. This is despite the fact that women have been systematically employed in related assembly jobs due to the nature of the precision work required. At the other end, a woman’s competence and decision-making are being judged on the fact of her not having children. Is women’s reproductive journey really anyone’s and everyone’s business? How many times have we heard a man being denied an opportunity because he has the ability to procreate, or because he has children, or because he does not have biological children?
When a society tacitly accepts women being denied their share in the workforce for childbearing and rearing, is it not normalising the very social constructs that societies the world over are trying to break? The social constructs that prohibit men from crying also prohibit women from getting equal opportunities. The social hierarchies that make men crumble under the burden of patriarchy also create an invisible shield, a glass ceiling, which effectively creates a boundary around a woman’s ambition. It is time that these dichotomies are acknowledged and altered.
Circling back to the dichotomy of the events under discussion, it baffles me why a woman’s reproductive choices and milestones still hold the potential to scare. A woman who bears a child is someone to stay away from, for her maternity entitlements mean a drain on resources. A woman who does not bear a child, by choice or otherwise, is again someone to stay away from, for the social stereotypes of a childless woman make her a difficult and myopic colleague or a leader. May I take a step back and state another observation? Substitute not bearing a child with not being married, and you will get the same stereotypes — the world is not prepared for women who are single, by choice rather than circumstance. The world is not prepared for women, still. The ovarian penalty takes multiple forms, not just denial of employment but denial of opportunity. But again the question: is women’s reproductive journey really anyone’s and everyone’s business? Should the intervention not be limited to aiding this journey rather than treating it as an invisible disqualification? After all, this biological responsibility is cast upon all of the genders equally, on some of us physically and on some of us socially.
Childbearing biologically is a woman’s task, but what about childrearing? Paternity leave is definitely a quantum jump forward, but have we heard of men losing out on jobs because they just became fathers? If it takes a village to raise a child (biological or otherwise), that village comprises all—all genders, employers, institutions, and the amniotic fluid of equity—and not just women as caregivers. The female labour force participation rate in India is 37 per cent. As per a statistic, the global female labour force participation rate is just around 50 per cent. The responsibility is cast equally on all of us to ensure its an upward trajectory, in substance and spirit, not just in statistics. When we talk about equal
pay for equal work, we must take the next step that says equal opportunity for equal work, globally.
(The writer is an officer of the Indian Revenue Service (income tax). The views expressed are personal)