Hardly anyone knows but as a young teenager I was moderating a Kids TV Show at SRF called «KIDZ». Seeing all the TV Stars at the cafeteria in real life was really impressive to me. This is why my wish to become a journalist also as grown-up formed at a very young age. One of my best experiences was in 1997 interviewing a member of the Federal Council in Berne, asking him about his salary and reporting from the Federal Parliament, even meeting the Parliaments President at the time, Judith Stamm, and sitting on her presidential chair, ringing the bell. It felt really powerful and I thought it was amazing that a woman was the highest person of our country.

Until I became a mother, I was convinced that men and women had equal rights in Switzerland. But I had to discover that back then only women got state-aided maternity leave (we are still far away from an equal solution of a parental leave), that the tax system is discriminating part-time incomes if married and childcare is way too expensive. Married young mothers with an average income have therefore various incentives to quit their jobs – often not being aware of the risks of the gender pension gap leading to poverty among elderly women.
 
I quit my job at the newspaper myself, getting self-employed and raising my voice to better the compatibility of work and family in order to diminish still existing legal inequalities and changing the mind-set – for instance with our campaign WE/MEN.

Do what you love. Follow your vision, no matter if the job is known to be easy on “combining family and kids”. Try to work not less than 70% over your whole work life and let your partner be a real active father with all the responsibilities and joy that comes with it.


#Bettertogether: To achieve equality on all levels – socially, economically and politically, we ideally work together – women and men.