Bernie Sanders, über-feminist: Making America more Scandinavian would mark a gender equality breakth
Bernie Sanders wants America to look a lot more like Scandinavia, the land of lingonberries, herring, tasteful minimalism, paid family leave and living wages for fast food workers. The newly declared presidential contender told George Stephanopoulos over the weekend that he wants to lead a “political revolution” and make the United States more like Sweden or Denmark when it comes to healthcare, education and the social safety net.
“In those [Scandinavian] countries, health care is the right of all people,” Sanders said on “This Week.” “College education and graduate school is free. Retirement benefits [and] child care are stronger than the United States of America. In those countries, by and large, government works for ordinary people and the middle class, rather than, as is the case right now in our country, for the billionaire class.”
Stephanopoulos replied: “I can hear the Republican attack ads right now: ‘He wants America to look more like Scandinavia!’”
“What’s wrong with that?” Sanders asked.
Nothing at all, Bernie. Nothing at all!
And while having a socialist make the cable news rounds talking about a “political revolution” may seem like the kind of thing that would scare the average voter, the policies he’s talking about — subsidized child care, paid family leave and a living wage — actually have wide support from people across parties.
According to data released earlier this year by the Make It Work campaign, 79 percent of voters — including Democrats, Republicans and Independents — want to require employers to provide paid sick days, 78 percent want to expand tax credits to families and 75 percent want to see childcare made more affordable. Most Americans also support raising the minimum wage.
But Scandinavia has more going for it than just paid family leave and universal preschool. Beyond having supports in place to give families options when it comes to balancing work and home life, there has been a whole lot of experimentation in these countries to find how to make those programs really work.
We can look to Sweden for a case study on the limits of simply having a paid leave policy without challenging other barriers — like cultural norms and pay disparities — to gender equality. It’s been 40 years since Sweden replaced its paid maternity leave policy with a family leave policy that all parents could use as they wished. The change meant that each family was given a lump sum of time to split up according to their preference, and either parent could use it.
The new policy gave men the option of staying home with their families, but many still didn’t take it. Instead of using the time themselves, lots of men were just giving their portion of leave to their female partners. Women were still doing most of the childcare and facing the same kind of career interruptions and gendered divisions of labor that the new family leave policy was supposed to help address.
It was a lead a horse to water situation. Sweden had a progressive policy in place, but lackluster progressive outcomes.
More here: http://www.salon.com/2015/05/07/bernie_sanders_uber_feminist_making_america_more_scandinavian_would_mark_a_gender_equality_breakthrough/
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