The main factors fuelling the quite steep rise in nannies' wages over the past few years have been a shortage of qualified or experienced nannies who can meet the greater desire by parents to employ the highest standard of private childcare they can possibly afford. Increased training provision for childcarers has now been put on the agenda by Government policymakers, but it will take some time to affect these 'market forces'.
In the press reports, there is also more than a hint of prejudice based on gender. Would they say the same about men's work? If another wages survey had reported similar pay rises for taxi drivers, or some other male-dominated occupation, the sense of outrage - or indeed newsworthiness - that they should earn 'so much' might not have been as great as it was over a group of young working women achieving such earnings levels. There is still a considerable gap between men's and women's wages in most types of work in the UK, and if nannies are bucking the trend because of their unique role in working parents' lives, then surely this is to be welcomed, and is good news for working women everywhere.
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