Inequality in Contemporary Australian Society - Essay Example

Inequality in Contemporary Australian Society (Student’s name) (Institution) (Course) (Instructor’s name) December 31, 2011 Introduction In the recent past, inequality has been a major issue that has affected most countries throughout the world going by news headlines across an array of media. So what is inequality? Inequality is defined as a situation in which groups or individuals at various levels lack equal social class, social status and social circle (White 2003). Inequality takes various forms or dimensions including gender, race, ethnic background, caste and age amongst others. In the modern society, various non-governmental organizations, nations and other stakeholders have taken action through vigorous campaigns to ensure that all groups of persons are treated equally, given equal rights and included equally in various activities. However, despite these campaigns, inequality is still prevalent in Australia. Australian society was founded on inequality and the country has no real history of equality between people (White, 2003). In fact, research by Argy (2006) has shown the perception of equality in Australia I nothing but a mirage. Individuals’ ethnicity, skin colour, gender, social class background and sexuality persist to have a considerable effect on their life chances and social status. Inequality in the Australian society may be result of the terrus nullius concept during the initial occupation, the creation of penal colonies, the misuse, maltreatment and murder of Aboriginal Australians, Americans and British cultural imperialism and the White Australia policy among other factors (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2009). This paper will focus on how inequality in contemporary Australian society can be explained and analyzed using various sociological ideas including ethnicity and gender. Forms of inequality in Australia One of the core dimensions or form of inequality is gender inequality. Sharma (1998) defines gender inequality as inequality based on sex. In Australian society, gender inequality signifies the inconsistencies between persons due to their gender. Gender inequality in Australia can be explained and analyzed based on various factors including employment, sexuality, education, and health. A significant marker of gender inequality in the Australian society is violence, harassment and discrimination. This emphasizes the ways in which females are not capable to equally contribute to and also benefit from various aspects of social economic, political and cultural life. Despite the fact that males are also discriminated, research carried out by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (2007) revealed that out of the 472 cases presented under the Sex Discrimination Act between the years 2006 and 2007, 87% of these complaints came from women. This signifies that violence against Australian women remains a key human rights concern. Besides, studies have verified that almost one in three Australian women experience violence from their partners in their lifetime and this indicates how gender inequality is still widespread in the Australian society. Additionally, gender inequality costs the Australian economy approximately 500 million US dollars every year as a result of the impacts of violence on the workers of Australian businesses (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2005). This can be assumed that gender based harassment and violence towards females affects their general productivity in the workplace thus contributing to more inequality in terms of earnings and chances of promotion in the workplace for women. Therefore, it can be argued that violence, discrimination and harassment against women contribute toward gender inequality in the Australian society, and this may result to a myriad of problems both social and financial problems in Australia. Gender inequality in the labour force is a major concern that has obtained extensive coverage in the past few decades as the majority of women have fought with an aim of overcoming institutional, cultural and social barriers in their endeavours to attain the same rights and opportunities as men in the workplace. A key feature of Australian gender inequality in employment is the reduced number of women in well paid and high status positions (Australian Government, 2010). According to Sharma (1998), women only represented twenty six percent of managerial positions which is a clear picture of inequality in work places. Furthermore, Australia has a constant gender pay gap. Studies by NCSEM have demonstrated that between the years 1990 and 2009, the Australian gender pay gap ranged between 15 and 17 percent (National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling, 2009), and in August 2010, the gender pay gap in Australia labour markets was at 16.9 percent (Australian Government, 2010). The same study by NCSEM shows that, between 60 and 90 percent of the gender pay gap in Australia cannot merely be explained by dissimilarities in workplace or individual characteristics between men and women, but discrimination has been revealed to be a major factor. Discrimination thus may play a significant role in the Australian gender pay gap (National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling, 2009). Another report by National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling shows that gender pay gap in Australia is higher amongst the high wage earners compared to the low wage earners (Joo, 2006). This has been happening even after various actions have been taken with an aim of controlling various persons and workplace linked factors (White, 2003). In the Australian society, inequality is also portrayed in terms of wage rates. The average wage rate of women is approximately 65 percent of the average wage rate of males. The Aboriginal people in the Australian community have a median wage that is roughly 65 percent of the median wage of other people in Australia (Sharma, 1998). This suggests prevalence of inequality in the Australian society in terms of ethnic backgrounds. Furthermore, studies have proven that ethnicity is a major factor in most countries which has contributed to inequality in social, economic, and political activities. Gender inequality is also illustrated in the allocation of part time and full time jobs between males and females in Australia. Women at Work (1998) revealed that the proportion of full time employed males was 89 percent of the total. Only 11 percent were employed in part time jobs. On the other hand, merely 58 percent of the females were employed in full time employment, with the remaining 42 percent being employed in part time jobs. This as a result signifies that the large proportion of women working in part time jobs has considerable effects on the distribution of wealth and income between the male and female genders. Moreover, part time jobs usually provide low pays and fewer safeguards including job security. Certainly, casual work consist of two thirds of the part time jobs, and in such works there are a small number of standard employment entitlements including parental leave and annual sick leave. Efforts by the government and other stakeholders have addressed this issue through affirmative action. The number of women taking up fulltime employment has been n the rise though economic fluctuations have created more part-time job opportunities than full time ones. This as a result leads to employee insecurity and the erosion of benefits and rights linked with full time employment. There is need for more research to indicate how economic fluctuations in the country have affected gender equality especially on the employment front (Women at Work, 1998). Moreover, females may face major issues whilst re-entering the labour market after leaving for various reasons such as maternity reasons. White (2003) writes that women encounter major difficulties and problems while re-entering the labour market compared to males, with research revealing that approximately 70 percent of females re-enter the workforce into a different job. This career break for women, due to various reasons may be linked with a downward shift to employment with lesser skill requirements, and results to the perception amongst employers that women are less capable than their male counterparts (Miller, 2005). Racial discrimination is another pointer of inequality in Australia (White 2003). White (2003) goes further to define racial inequality as a belief whereby persons are treated on the basis of their race and on the racial characteristics they possess including physical characteristics, their skin colour, their culture and place of origin. Racial inequality exists due to the perception that some races are more superior compared to others, therefore, leading to unequal opportunities and treatments in most societies. However, globalization and advancement in information technology has greatly reduced racial inequality. The media and especially the internet have been instrumental in demystifying social and cultural myths that promote social inequality. Real time communication provided by the internet allows sharing of information and cultural values amongst people over distances thus in away promoting understanding which is key in fighting social inequality. In the Australian society, racist intonations have been witnessed especially against the Aboriginal people and Torres Strait Islanders. For instance, in 1994, the then tourist spokesman Mick Vievers, of the Queensland National Party, expressed his disapproval of the Aboriginal Australians choice to live in Gold Coast, a tourist area, saying that these people should live by food gathering and hunting instead of building on tourist spots (White, 2003). The spokesman’s statement shows the extent of racial inequality in Australia. It is apparent that racism has severe impacts on Aboriginal employment, land rights, housing, health, education and imprisonment. Besides racism, the dominion of the capitalist systems, Anglo-American culture and the English language have highly intensified the marginalization of most persons whose life experiences are mainly from non-white racial background (White, 2003). Inequality in Australia is also depicted in terms of immigration. Current commonwealth immigration laws in Australia have some elements that promote inequality. Certainly, refugees are the prospective immigrant source who possess the greatest requirement but with least resources. In Australia, the quota of immigrants is a very small fraction of the entire immigrant quota and in fact, the percentage has again been reduced. Moreover, the immigration mix is to a greater extent shifting to the prosperous business immigrant (Wilkinson and Pickett, 2009). Questions such as how the measuring of individuals appeal based on their wealth is better compared to measuring their desirability by race. A further limit of chances to immigrants with a smaller amount of wealth is also depicted with the talks of necessitating migrants to pay a 30, 000 US dollars bond (Argy, 2006). This illustrates how inequality in form of ethnicity and wealth is depicted in the Australian society. In this case, it can be deduced that this type of inequality may have been caused and aggravated by the Australian public institutions. The possibility of differential policing in Australian society maybe linked with inequalities in immigration into the country. Wealth distribution is a factor that is linked to Marx’s economic ideas and can be used to explain the extent of inequality in Australia. Studies have proven that inequality in the Australian society is very obvious in the division of income groups to very poor and very rich. Furthermore, it is evident that the Australian society persists to move further away from the egalitarian utopia where ‘no child will live in poverty’ (White, 2003). Information from 30 years ago indicates that the number of Australians living in poverty is growing with the number of rich people getting smaller but richer (National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling, 2009). This income inequality amongst Australians has been aggravated by investors earning a lot from their investments but paying very little for labour wages. Capitalists benefited most from this in the 1980’s when 10 percent of the national income was shifted from labour to capital. The distribution of this income from profits is the major issue. According to ABS Household Income data, more than 42 percent of Australia’s population has an average disposable income of less than $21,000 in a year. Of this population, 23 percent are in aggregate income below $400 in a week. Based on this argument it is true saying that majority of the Australian population is poor compared to the mean average wealth of all Australians (Australian Government, 2010). Conclusion From this analysis it is apparent that inequality is very prevalent in contemporary Australian society. Inequality in Australia has been revealed in various forms including gender, ethnicity, racism, and wealth amongst others. Gender pay gap, wealth distribution, racism and biased participation in the labour markets are some of the factors depicting the extent of inequality in Australia. These forms of inequalities have been very costly to the Australian economy and there is a great need to address inequality at all costs. References Argy, Fred. 2006. Equality of opportunity in Australia: Myth and reality. http://www.tai.org.au/documents/downloads/DP85.pdf Australian Bureau of Statistics, (2005). Personal Safety, Australia, 2005, Cat no. 4906.0. Australian Government (2010). The Sex Discrimination Act. Online available at http://www.ag.gov.au/www/agd/agd.nsf/Page/Humanrightsandanti-discrimination_Sexdiscrimination (Accessed December 31, 2011). Australian Government, (2010). Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Agency. Pay Equity Statistics. Broderick (2008). Gender Equality: What Matters to Australian Men and Women. Available at http://www.hreoc.gov.au/sex_discrimination/listeningtour/ListeningTourCommunityReport.pdf (Accessed December 31, 2011). Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission, (2007). Annual Report 2006-2007. Joo, K H (2006). Glass Ceiling or Sticky Floor? Exploring the Australian Gender Pay Gap. The Economic Record, 82, (259), 408-427. Miller, Paul W. (2005). The Role of Gender among Low-Paid and High-Paid Workers. Australian Economic Review, 38, (4), 405-417. National Centre for Social and Economic Modelling. (2009). The impact of a sustained gender wage gap on the economy. Report to the Office for Women, Department of Families, Community Services, Housing and Indigenous Affairs. Sharma (1998). Gender Inequality in Australia. Available at www.sydgram.nsw.edu.au/CollegeSt/extension/oct97/Inequality.pdf (Accessed December 31, 2011). White, G L (2003). Inequality in Australia. Cambrige: Cambridge University Press. Wilkinson, R and Pickett, K (2009). The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better. Allen Lane. Women at Work (1998). publication by the Department for Employment, Education and Training – Issue 3. Read More