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Your thoughts about Finland prompted me to look up information about Finland, and it's impressive in its particulars and also in its overall satisfaction ratings - one of the happiest countries to live in, they say. If only it weren't so dark there in the winter....

The huge question that underlies your arguments for salary for homemakers / childcare is how do they fund it? Not that I am against the idea, not at all, but it is the taxpayers who are funding that sort of program. I see that Finland has eliminated the top marginalized tax rate so it is no longer 60%, so I looked a little farther, and found that their military expenditure as expressed as a % of GDP is about 1.3%. The military expenditure for the U.S. is over 4% of GDP, so that is one area where many social programs could be funded if we elected a President and Congress with different priorities.

But maybe this is not what you meant. It seems like you are looking for one organization that will be the standard bearer for millions of US women. But why do you insist on it being one organization, one way of attacking the problems, ... one solution? I don't actually think that that is possible, though one stronger feminist organization would be useful to accomplishing those goals.

So let me put it to you this way - your goals seem to align with NOW's. See: http://www.now.org/issues/economic/

Are you a member of NOW? If not, why not? I used to be a member of NOW a long time ago. For me, NOW blew it when it 1) wasn't able to pass the ERA, and 2) wasn't able to change its organization from a white, upper/middle class, straight organization to a place where many diverse voices were heard and where many people felt at home. Yet, I look at their website today because of this conversation, and see that race, sexual orientation, and economic justice are among their top priorities, and that they claim half a million members.

But to step back and ask why can't they get it done? Isn't political power located in corporate America today, not on the streets? When I think about issues that corporate America will support, there is no incentive or actually even disincentive to support, say, "equal pay for equal work," since it invites employment litigation. Corporate America will support progressive reform when (and I would say only when) it aligns with its interests. So for example, corporate America has supported non-discrimination employment policies for GLBT employees years before Congress could pass ENDA. Why? I would say because the case has been made that discrimination against GLBT prospective employees and employees costs the companies more than non-discrimination.

This reply has been all over the map, but your comments interested me on many different levels.

Ann