_
LIFE'S WORK: Low earning power affects the main child-bearing, career-making years of a
man's life. DEAN KOZANIC/The PressMen on the edge 31 May 2003 The Christchurch Press It's the men's club no-one wants to join, but it claims as many as a third of the country's men in its ranks. Geoff Collett reports on New Zealand's army of blokes with little cash and few hopes. In a tidy, modest, rented house in a tidy, modest, Christchurch suburban street, 47- year-old Richard is spelling out some of the mundane realities of life as a marginal man. He rarely goes out, except to work. He sold the motor mower because he couldn't afford the petrol. He won't use electricity for heating, and he relies on his teenage son's op- shopping skills for clothes. Such are the facts of life on $300 a week. Richard (his name has been changed for this article) clearly displays many of the traits associated with masculinity in this day and age � he is proud, capable, fit-looking, resourceful. He is also better off than many might be, working in a bar for $12 an hour, 30 hours a week. But no matter that he can bake his own bread, grow his own veges, and look after himself around the house. Richard � like tens of thousands of other Kiwi blokes � is falling far short in a crucial measure of being a man � the ability to earn a decent whack. And the vast presence of these marginal men in the population statistics is emerging as a troubling trend, calling into question the ability of a large chunk of this country's men to contribute to society in the way traditionally expected. Membership of this least exclusive of men's clubs comes from earning below $25,000 a year, or $12 an hour � roughly two-thirds of the average wage and a point not too far above where poverty starts to scratch at the door. Besides being poor, many of their number are isolated and alienated. At the last Census, a third of New Zealand men in the prime of their lives � aged 25 to 44 � qualified. Of those nearing retirement, those aged 55 to 64 , the proportion was 42 per cent. In Canterbury, a third of men aged 25 to 64 � 40,000 in all � declared their annual income at Census time to be below $25,000. While it is tempting to dismiss their plight as paling alongside the lot of other minorities � sole mothers, for example, or the profound disadvantages stacked against Maori � and while many more women than men occupy low-paying jobs, these marginal men have problems all their own. Many are single, or separated and embittered by child-custody proceedings, their meagre incomes further reduced by child-support obligations. Their financial circumstances mean their prospects for starting a new family are slim indeed. An Australian researcher has linked their prevalence in his country to declining fertility rates. These men have little hope of owning their own home if they don't already. And at least some social workers are convinced there is a connection between the numbers of marginal men and the fact that in 2000, men aged 25 to 55 accounted for almost half of New Zealand's suicides. Being poor, isolated, and alienated cuts manhood to the quick. Even in a generation where most women have more than proved their ability to look after themselves financially, a man's ability to earn remains a core expectation "that society has of its men and men have of themselves", says Rex McCann, the director of Auckland-based Essentially Men. "The ability to earn is very deeply connected to our identity," he says, likening it to the birthing and nurturing role in women. And women look for a partner who can offer them financial security. That, McCann says, is instinctive, too. Simon Jones, a counsellor and social worker with Catholic Social Services in Christchurch, sees familiar signs in the struggling single men he works with. They suffer low self-esteem, have poor communication skills, "often feel they don't know how to approach women ... they think basically they haven't got anything to offer". And to rub their nose in it, a relationship is often all they really yearn for. They feel that if they found a woman, got married, and had children, that would be the answer to all their dreams, Jones says. Another counsellor, Don Rowlands of the Home and Family organisation, and co- ordinator of the Caring Fathers' Group, sees men who are excluded not just from the dating game, but from any social activity that requires money. They cannot afford a night out, or live in such seedy accommodation they are embarrassed to bring guests home. A round at the pub, a sports club membership, a car to go on outings are all beyond them. Karen Whittaker, the manager of the Salvation Army's Hope Centre in Christchurch, tells of the men she and her staff see, the sort "who just manages � I wouldn't say he has quality � but manages, to go to work, he has his cigs, and that's probably about all". "And every fortnight, he'll have the kids for the weekend, and there's not enough money to feed the kids," she says. That is when the Sallies will see him � when he swallows his pride and shows up at the food bank. Or when it's kids' birthdays, and he is scouring the op-shop for presents. "A dad on his own would say he could go without a lot of things," Whittaker says. "He's not worried about heating and that sort of thing. "But he would rather come to us than lose face with his kids." Whittaker worries about what she is seeing: the legacy of men who have lost their place in life. "Society and culture has stripped so many of the things from them that are instinctively theirs to do. "There has to be some breaking out of that." One of her staff, Hope Centre advocate Rance Stuart, knows all about the peculiar hardships of being a man trapped in a low-income existence. He works with some pretty dire cases. His own income squeaks in above the $25,000 level, and while he doesn't think that is too bad, he knows about struggling to get by. He shares custody of two daughters with his former partner. He doesn't run a car. That is an obstacle to social activities � he would like to join a tramping club, but doesn't want to be in a situation where he would always be hitching rides. He doesn't go out much and has chosen to concentrate his money on things such as food, so the family can eat properly, and on activities his daughters want to pursue. But, as he laments, "there are little hidden traps in being poor". Like not being able to afford insurance � he recalls buying on hire purchase a mountain bike for one of his girls who wants to ride competitively, only for the bike to be stolen with just three payments to go. His dream is to own his own home. He could afford the mortgage payments, he says, but scraping up a deposit seems a distant hope. "I'm frustrated, very frustrated, because for a lot of my life I wasn't concerned about owning a home, but since I've had a family, particularly since I've had them in my care, I've wanted to." Stuart is philosophical about his own struggles, especially compared to men who don't share even his modest lot, nor his determined optimism. The men who have said to him that they have achieved nothing with their lives. The men, single, alone, and poor, who count up the positive aspects of their existence and settle on suicide. It's ironic, Stuart reflects. Women who struggle alone, raise children, and defy the odds simply by getting by are typically praised for their fortitude. A man in such circumstances is called a loser. One of the few attempts to raise the profile of New Zealand's struggling men came earlier this month from a New Plymouth-based employment researcher, Vivian Hutchinson. He used his website publication, The Jobs Letter (www.jobsletter.org.nz), to report on their prevalence, highlighting research by Professor Bob Birrell, who heads the centre for population and urban research at Melbourne's Monash University. Birrell sees a link between Australia's high proportion of single men (40 per cent of Aussie guys aged 30 to 34) and the high proportion of low-income men there (42 per cent of men aged 25 to 44). It is not a direct correlation, but Birrell is convinced the connection is there � and, as he wrote in Melbourne's Age newspaper, he considered the low rate of partnering was less to do with men "enjoying their manly freedom" than with simple if bleak economic realities. Another Australian academic, Professor Bob Gregory of the Australian National University's department of economics, believes unskilled men have been left behind during Australia's past two decades of economic growth. Their low earning power was now affecting "the main child-bearing, career-making, income-generating years of a man's life", he told the Australian Financial Review. "It is becoming a much more permanent thing," Gregory warned. "It is stuck there as a mucking-up-people's-lives phenomenon, and all the policy changes haven't been effective in getting to this group." Wellington economist and researcher Paul Callister has studied the issue in this country, and while his work is now a few years old, he reached similar conclusions. He thinks many low-income men will eventually escape their straitened circumstances, but about a fifth of all New Zealand men are in a "fairly difficult long-term position" as far as job and earning prospects go. And, like the Australian researchers, Callister believes that throws up doubts about their preparedness to enter the family way. The numbers may seem huge, but economists and social researchers working in the area can readily point to the reasons why. Prominent among these are the waves of redundancies and corporate restructurings of the 1990s which left thousands of men stranded with out-of-date skills. Divorce and the high costs to some men of custody disputes is another popular theory. Less obvious causes include the number of men hampered by physical injuries, especially from their youth, and former convicts trying to get back into society. Poor education, illness, dumb decisions and simple hard luck are other factors blamed for holding men down in the sub-$25,000 income bracket. And, of course, there is unemployment, and the general loss of union power in the employment market. Council of Trade Unions economist Peter Conway says: "Essentially, we had an economy for 10 years or more run on the basis of getting the cheapest possible labour, making it as flexible as possible." The award system was abolished, removing minimum pay rates and conditions (Conway is keen to point out that both men and women suffered). There was a dire lack of investment in retraining and improving workers' skills. "The extent of poverty is a lot more embedded from the last 15 years than many people realise," Conway argues. The CTU may see the current Government as generally moving to address the shortcomings of the 1990s, but "we don't bounce back from that in a couple of years". Back in that tidy, modest rented house, Richard makes clear his dismay with the way New Zealand has gone. For much of his life he did well for himself. But circumstances � such as an expensive custody dispute after his divorce, and a serious accident while working overseas after the dispute � have conspired against him. He returned to New Zealand with his savings gone, to discover a place which had no room for a man down on his luck. He is embittered about the divorce and child custody laws, about demands on hard-up men to pay child support when the female partner may be better off financially. He is angered by a social welfare system that treats its users as the enemy. And he is frustrated at being part of a low-wage economy. Richard struggled for a year to find a job. He still has a folder stuffed with job advertisements and rejection letters. He is loath to complain about the one he now has, his $12-an-hour, 30-hours-a-week behind a bar. But he can't help himself, saying wearily: "It's tough coming home and being in a slave market." A man expects more. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
