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Structural inequalities, exacerbated by the covid19 crisis, see women make up most unpaid care work and in precarious conditions that gender-sensitive fiscal policies could reverse.
Nairobi, 8 March 2020 – Whereas millions of people fall into extreme poverty, many corporations and wealthy individuals accumulated more profits during the pandemictriggered crisis. Its impacts are not gender-neutral because of pre-existing inequalities brought about by the neoliberal and patriarchal economic system. For instance, women make up almost 70% of the health care workforce, exposing them to a greater risk of infection.
The issue of unpaid care work has been discussed for a long time and needs to take a central place in today’s policy planning. Governments should recognise the contribution of unpaid care work to their GDP and remunerate through fiscal and tax policies centred on public service provision. Covid19 underlined the importance of investing in public services because it has put pressure on public health care. The rich would prefer to go to private facilities that are well equipped and based on their ability to pay. The poor, the majority being women, struggled to access quality services in public institutions.
Tax Justice Network Africa (TJNA) urges government officials to look at policies with gender lenses and apply those that will not discriminate against women. In the same vein, multilateral institutions need to review the global policies, especially those that rob countries of their taxing rights. The lack of revenue caused by those policies is usually compensated by women unpaid inputs or worsen public services. These lacks underline the importance of establishing a United Nations tax body to ensure equal taxing rights for countries, especially those in the global south. ‘‘The campaign on make taxes work for women could not be timelier because of the differentiated socio-economic impacts of the pandemic and women bearing the worst brunt! The response and recovery measures must centre women's rights and use tax justice as a solution! The campaign provides the tax justice movement and the women's rights movement with an opportunity to join efforts in solidarity to demand tax justice for women's rights’’ says Caroline Othim, GATJ’s Global Campaigns and Policy Coordinator for Africa.
On the 24th of March 2021, in parallel with CSW 65, GATJ will launch the feminist taxation framework guide. TJNA invites civil society organisations to use it as an advocacy tool to push governments to implement structural reforms that uphold redistributive justice, including just and progressive reforms. Besides, from the 15th to 25th of March 2021, TJNA will join the Global Days of Action (GDOA) on Tax Justice for Women Rights dubbed: Make Taxes Work for Women. Through this campaign, TJNA seeks to empower the grassroots woman to speak up when the taxes collected in her country are not working for her. All stakeholders' efforts are welcome to make changes in the highly patriarchal fiscal system that deprive women of their rightful place in society.
Contacts: Cynthia Umurungi, Communication Officer, Mail:cumurungi@taxjusticeafrica.net