Gender and Social Policy: the impact of the public expenditure cuts and reactions to them

Abstract

In social policy research the gender dimension has been relatively neglected in Britain. The attempt to selectively reduce public spending is examined with reference to its objective impact on men and women using official statistics and specialist reports. In addition, on the basis of a large-scale interview survey the subjective impact of and political reactions to the cuts are analysed by gender. The main findings are that this current social policy negatively affects women as both public sector workers and consumers more than men. Political reactions to the cuts were extensive but unrelated to gender per se. However, when one controls for economic activity and related variables, gender differences in terms of both political attitudes and behaviour were insignificant compared to the contrast between the economically active and inactive. The main social policy implication is that the restructuring of the welfare state hits women first and foremost.