Source.
Penalise educated stay-at-home women
22 March 2006
AMSTERDAM -- The Dutch Labour Party (PvdA) has proposed recovering part of the cost of study from highly-educated women who decide not to seek paid work.
MP Sharon Dijksma, deputy chairperson of the PvdA's parliamentary party, believes the punitive measure is needed to stimulate more women to join the workforce. She outlined her ideas in Forum, a magazine published by employers' group VNO-NCW.
"A highly-educated woman who chooses to stay at home and not to work - that is destruction of capital," Dijksma said. "If you receive the benefit of an expensive education at the cost of society, you should not be allowed to throw away that knowledge unpunished."
The percentage of higher educated women which are unemployed is quoted at about 9.5% (NOS, the public news agency), less than 100.000 in total. I wonder how many of them are just in their early phase of looking for a suitable job...
Also, I think a "punitive measure" is never a good stimulus. Anything that is punitive is negative. In order to make people want to do something, one should address the issue in positive way.
Your comments are appreciated.