MARRIAGE AND WORK.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 94, 22 April 1931, Page 6

MARRIAGE AND WORK.

" UNFAIR AND CRUEL " ATTACK. (To the Editor.) People who object to married women working when other women are unemployed, have a good case, although not necessarily * conclusive case, but the method of their attack is unfair and cruel. Married teachers are not the only married women working, but they are exposed to attack because thev ar« employed by a public authority and the terms of their remuneration are known. But whyconfine the attack to employed women? There are businesses of many kinds run by husbands - and wives, with or without employees, which, could be carried 011 if the wives were replaced by other women. Further, as has been pointed out repeatedly, who can say whether or not the circumstances of a family oblige the wife to go to work outside the home ? But thera is, in my opinion, a stronger case to be made against the present popular (and mostly anonymous) agitation. If a wife should not work when her husband can provide for her then a husband should not work when his wife lias an income sufficient to keep both. More than that, every man who has amassed, say, £5000, should retire and live on the interest, and leave his place to be filled bv someone more necessitous. The result, o"f course, would be a country deprived of the services of its. most progressive members, and instead of there being more "jobs" to fill there would be fewer in existence. The whole agitation has in it so much of envy and sex antagonism, not to mention malice, that it is a pity to find amon; its supporters soma persons obviouslv public-spirited. MARRIED MAN.