Parking permit equality

When I was working at our large and growing hospital I had parking permit, living as I did then deep in the countryside with no public transport. After a couple of years the parking became so congested that the hospital investigated remote parking sites with regular shuttle services during peak times, on demand out of hours.

It wasn’t particularly inconvenient and I appreciated that the doctors and nurses needed to be given priority. However I started to notice that the only man ever on the bus was the driver. On one occasion I had to go to the parking office and mentioned this to the person in charge. I asked if men were more adept at finding reasons to park on site. They certainly were in our department: walking distance didn't count for anything. “Oh no,” was the reply, “it’s just that men are in the more senior jobs”.

Plus ça change …