Women wanted: The story written in blood red letters on the horizon of the Great World WarDaggett, Mabel Potter
History
Women wanted: The story written in blood red letters on the horizon of the Great World War
Daggett, Mabel Potter
Women -- Employment; World War, 1914-1918 -- Women
Little peaches might not be worth more, it is true. The troubled
French minister was probably right when he complained that some of
his new office force were quite useless. But there is a Federation of
University women in England with perfectly good University degrees
attesting mathematical proficiency. They say, however, that they cannot
live on less than a minimum wage of three pounds a week. Awhile ago in
Italy a group of women accountants were asked by the Administration of
Public Instruction to replace men called to the front. With exactly the
same academic licenses as men, they were nevertheless offered but
two-thirds men’s pay. And they declined the proffered positions. Nor
is it only England or Italy or Russia or France that presents this ratio
between the wages of men and those of women in the business offices.
The first resolution adopted by the new Women’s Association of Commerce
of America was one demanding equal pay for equal work. Eventually the
Women’s Association of Commerce and the Financial Centre for Women
and the École Pratique de Haut Enseignement Commercial may succeed
in cultivating in the commercial world a taste for a higher type of
employé than the little peaches of the past. But for the present it is
the handicap that the business woman in routine office positions has to
accept. And there is no Trade Union in commerce to care. Can you manage
to give equal work on two-thirds man’s pay?
If you can, this is the hour of your opportunity. The women’s
battalions are with every month of the war drawing nearer, moving
onward toward the president’s office. The London and Southwestern
Bank has advanced 200 of its women clerks to the cashier’s window.
The London City and Midland Bank a year ago promoted a woman to the
position of manager of one of its branches. It was the first time that
a woman in England had held such a position. Newspaper reporters were
hurriedly despatched to Sir Edward Holden, the president, to see about
it. But he only smilingly affirmed the truth of the rumour that had
spread like wildfire through the city. It was indeed so. And he had no
less than thirty more women making ready for similar positions.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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