Archive for the ‘Social Security Debates’ Category
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Now is the time to bring a basic income program to Canada, says B.C. senator. But the pilot project could cost $100 billion
Thursday, July 9th, 2020
Woo’s proposal would put the basic income project in place for six months from October of this year until March 2021. A basic income could replace income support programs like welfare with money everyone would receive, but the support would gradually be reduced as a person’s income rose. Woo said the COVID-19 pandemic is the ideal time to do a broad test of the idea.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, jurisdiction, participation
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New report shows why a basic income makes sense during COVID-19 recovery
Monday, June 29th, 2020
… Canada should adapt a progressive version of basic income, similar to how the country’s Old Age Security and child benefit programs are calculated. Essentially, your basic income cheque increases and decreases depending on how much other income you make… the country can pay for basic income — either through existing tax programs, or with a new wealth tax, or by increasing sales tax slightly… “It gives people both the security and the flexibility to manoeuvre through transitions”
Tags: economy, Health, ideology, jurisdiction, mental Health, participation
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New report shows how Canada could fund $22,000 basic income for adults
Friday, June 5th, 2020
All options are based on BICN’s principles and goals—to reduce inequality, including inequality between women and men; prevent poverty; provide everyone with greater income security, including middle-income earners; and ensure the wealthiest individuals and corporations contribute their fair share. Each option in the report, Basic Income: Some Policy Options for Canada, meets these overall goals.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, jurisdiction, poverty
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Why do provinces often confiscate federal benefits from people who clearly need them?
Saturday, May 23rd, 2020
Taken together, as many as 52,000 people on social assistance receive federal and provincial benefits that are subject to complete clawbacks… Those clawbacks poured about $34 million into provincial coffers in April… Ontario isn’t ready to give any of that money back to people such as Demerse by treating EI the same as CERB during the pandemic… it may be time to consider uploading social assistance to the federal level and leave provinces to continue offering supports such as employment training, prescription drugs, dental and vision care for low-income residents
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, poverty, standard of living
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The CERB is nothing like a basic income, but it might be the platform we use to build one
Friday, May 22nd, 2020
the possibility that today’s pandemic-induced mass unemployment may continue for longer than anticipated makes reform of income support both more likely and more urgent. And the general idea of a basic income – a single, unconditional transfer, without the intrusive and bewildering eligibility requirements that demean its recipients and leave many others without – remains as valid as ever… The CERB, for all its limitations, has created the precedent for a federal benefit of this kind. Maybe there’s an opening here, after all.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living, tax
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CERB and other coronavirus benefits won’t last forever. Or will they? What a universal basic income could look like
Sunday, May 17th, 2020
We long for some good to come from this crisis, some national purpose that future generations will point to and say: There, that is when the new world began, when we started to win the war on poverty with an income for all. But maybe a basic income is simply beyond our means… We’ll predict this much: When the crisis finally ends, we’ll be talking about basic income in a way we never have before.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, poverty, standard of living
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COVID-19 presents lessons in how a guaranteed basic income program could work
Monday, May 4th, 2020
Basic income can be designed to target only those who need a top-up to provide for and maintain a very basic standard of living. And it can be implemented with speed, simplicity and efficiency by the keepers of our tax files, the Canada Revenue Agency… Fifty members of the present Senate (from the left, right and centre) have written to the government recommending that transition planning work be done now…
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, poverty, standard of living
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Trudeau rejects turning CERB’s $2,000 a month into a universal benefit for Canadians
Thursday, April 23rd, 2020
“We feel that targeting the maximum amount of help to the people who needed it quickly was the right way to begin to get through this process.” … A group of 50 senators from different political and partisan backgrounds signed an open letter to Trudeau on Tuesday, also calling for the CERB to be turned into a universal benefit… A universal payment would ensure greater social and economic equity as well as greater efficiency, the senators say.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, participation, poverty
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CERB is an unintended experiment in basic income
Monday, April 20th, 2020
… we have a historic opportunity for Ottawa, the provinces and territories to reshape cash transfers for Canadians who have low incomes, regardless of the reason why. COVID-19 could create a legacy: an income-support system that is efficient, non-stigmatizing, encourages work and is sufficient to provide better health outcomes and liquidity for people and communities. This would be a streamlined national reform vital to the economics of rebuilding and recovery.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, Health, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, poverty, standard of living
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Ontario seeks more information from Ottawa on how to treat CERB for people on social assistance
Friday, April 17th, 2020
… until the province determines how to treat the CERB, case workers have been told not to record the income in Ontario’s computerized benefits system, where the extra cash may trigger automatic clawbacks and even termination of benefits, including drug and medical coverage… A coalition of more than 130 health-care workers, community agencies and Ontarians living in poverty … [are] urging Queen’s Park to boost social assistance rates and not to claw back the CERB from those on OW and ODSP.
Tags: budget, disabilities, ideology, jurisdiction, poverty, standard of living
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