The "Social Wage" is a name used in Europe for the total benefits package that is available to people in most industrialized countries. It includes Universal Healthcare (low cost or free), Paid Family Leave (in some countriess up to two years), eldercare, affordable universal childcare, mandated vacation days for all workers (i.e.: 25 days per year in Sweden), free higher education...and more.
According to National Women's Liberation, which has been campaigning for over a decade for a Social Wage in the U.S., it is a program that is integral to the liberation of women. Support from the government for birthing and raising children would eliminate the stark choice of "motherhood or career" often faced by women in the U.S. and enable women to be less dependent on men for their survival and that of their children.
In this show, our guest will be Stephanie Kollgaard, Chair of the New York City Chapter of National Women's Liberation. We will discuss the differences between a Social Wage and the peice-meal solutions being offered by even the most 'progressive' of Democrats, such as Kamala Harris in her current bid for the U.S. presidency. We will do this for the purpose of using what women (and unions) have wond in other countries, as a yardstick for what our demands should be in the U.S.
As Frederick Douglass famously said: "Power concedes nothing without a demand". Another saying from the radical feminist movement thati is pertinent: "Feminists should go for what we really want".
We will be taking listener phone calls at 212 209 2877 and asking women/caregivers to tell us their experiences with finding childcare and what they think solutions should look like.
The show will include a feminist news segment and topical muslic.