Today it was said on a program of a normal, commercial tv channel, that social spending is being cut in all countries of the European Union, as a general tendency.
It was in the context of the international widows day, which is today, for the first time in history. The idea for having such a day has been promoted by a certain Cherie Blair from England. I am not sure what significance there is in making the shortest day of the year the international widows day.
In Spain, when a wife looses her husband, she has the right to a pension equivalent to 52% of the pay or pension that her husband was receiving. If she had a pension of her own, she has to choose between hers and her husband’s. Whether there are dependent children or not, is not considered. So they are left with half the pay when the expenses are the same. And, if they start to work, they lose this pension automatically.
Now they the widows are vindicating to get 75% of those pensions. Some of us do not understand why they do not demand 100% since, although they have not worked for a salary, they have carried out an important work that should be valued – the work of a housewife.
I consider the statement of the tendency of cuts of social expenditure in a mass medium documentation of good value – not for me, but for the academic world where the things that do not appear in books are not considered. Taking that in order to believe something it has has to be documented, now that this has appeared on tv it must be true.
