I may have spoken too soon.
Not two weeks back, I had a discussion with a female employee of our company. She commutes from within Gurgaon. The commute is such a huge problem for her that she is considering quitting her job.
Due to a complete lack of (decent) public transport within Gurgaon, she is forced to use Uber both ways. If she uses UberPool, the time spent on the road is too high. If she uses regular UberGo, the cost is too high.
So yes, lack of public transport impacts the employment rates of women. In this case, the solution isn't to offer her free public transport. The shared auto system is already very cheap, but it isn't the right mode for her.
Women commuting from Delhi actually have it better. They use the metro or Shuttl. Commute times are longer, but the commute is safe.
Making the commute free for women will increase female ridership. Will that make the commute safer? I don't know, especially because one of the key issues is to make the families of the commuter feel comfortable about their safety. We can only know by trying. Ergo, we should try.
Second, this is a good way to subsidise public transport. It is the capitalist way 😁. Instead of the government owning and running public transport, the government is now paying for the tickets. This is not what is happening right now - the Delhi government (part) owns both the DTC and DMRC that it is subsidising. But I hope this is soon extended to metro feeder buses, Shuttl and charter buses.
Third, this should open up avenues for women's employment in sectors that involve a lot of travel. While @[100063777711947:2048:Thinvent] employs a fair number of women, there has never been any representation in field support and repairing/production. These roles require a lot of travel, and conventional wisdom (I know I know 🙄) is that women aren't safe commuting. Metro fares are now very high. We can actually offer a woman higher pay than a man for the same role, because her monthly reimbursement will be close to zero. What businesses really need are monthly passes on the metro system, but this can server as a substitute.
Yes, this is gender biased - giving something free to one gender because of their gender. But there is gender imbalance in the transportation system. You are fighting imbalance with bias. Messy, but you got any better ideas?
The metro has a monopoly. If it were a private entity, I could see it offering free rides to women just to grow its market over the long run. If it were to offer free rides to the poor, that would never grow the market - you could not change the behaviour of the poor, make them change their spending patterns to afford the luxury of the metro. But women cut across all economic strata.
PS: The production role does not actually involve a lot of travel. It does involve some heavy lifting. When we try to hire women for the role, we find that women with an education prefer jobs like security guards. Women without an education prefer working as domestic workers. Or maybe we just haven't tried hard enough.
Not two weeks back, I had a discussion with a female employee of our company. She commutes from within Gurgaon. The commute is such a huge problem for her that she is considering quitting her job.
Due to a complete lack of (decent) public transport within Gurgaon, she is forced to use Uber both ways. If she uses UberPool, the time spent on the road is too high. If she uses regular UberGo, the cost is too high.
So yes, lack of public transport impacts the employment rates of women. In this case, the solution isn't to offer her free public transport. The shared auto system is already very cheap, but it isn't the right mode for her.
Women commuting from Delhi actually have it better. They use the metro or Shuttl. Commute times are longer, but the commute is safe.
Making the commute free for women will increase female ridership. Will that make the commute safer? I don't know, especially because one of the key issues is to make the families of the commuter feel comfortable about their safety. We can only know by trying. Ergo, we should try.
Second, this is a good way to subsidise public transport. It is the capitalist way 😁. Instead of the government owning and running public transport, the government is now paying for the tickets. This is not what is happening right now - the Delhi government (part) owns both the DTC and DMRC that it is subsidising. But I hope this is soon extended to metro feeder buses, Shuttl and charter buses.
Third, this should open up avenues for women's employment in sectors that involve a lot of travel. While @[100063777711947:2048:Thinvent] employs a fair number of women, there has never been any representation in field support and repairing/production. These roles require a lot of travel, and conventional wisdom (I know I know 🙄) is that women aren't safe commuting. Metro fares are now very high. We can actually offer a woman higher pay than a man for the same role, because her monthly reimbursement will be close to zero. What businesses really need are monthly passes on the metro system, but this can server as a substitute.
Yes, this is gender biased - giving something free to one gender because of their gender. But there is gender imbalance in the transportation system. You are fighting imbalance with bias. Messy, but you got any better ideas?
The metro has a monopoly. If it were a private entity, I could see it offering free rides to women just to grow its market over the long run. If it were to offer free rides to the poor, that would never grow the market - you could not change the behaviour of the poor, make them change their spending patterns to afford the luxury of the metro. But women cut across all economic strata.
PS: The production role does not actually involve a lot of travel. It does involve some heavy lifting. When we try to hire women for the role, we find that women with an education prefer jobs like security guards. Women without an education prefer working as domestic workers. Or maybe we just haven't tried hard enough.