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Poverty, not inequality, should be the target

Tuesday, January 10th, 2012

Jan. 10, 2012
… this urgent issue is poverty, not inequality per se. In other words, it doesn’t matter much how high the top end soars; what public policy ought to concern itself with is how low the bottom drops. This quibble isn’t just theoretical… there’s little doubt that a widening gap reflects bad news for people lower down on the income scale… [but] focusing on where to set the poverty bar and how to ensure everybody clears it is far more important than fretting about what portion we and our neighbours have of some other guy’s wealth.

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Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »

One-parent family poverty drops by half

Monday, June 28th, 2010

June 24, 2010
A decade and a half of welfare-to-work policies — some offering carrots and some dependent on big sticks — have dramatically reduced poverty among single-parent families in Canada. The percentage of single families who live in what’s considered to be poverty is down to less than half of what it was, says a new study by SFU public policy professor John Richards. But what’s been accomplished so far is the easy part, Richards cautions. Dealing now with those one-parent families who remain poor will be tougher.

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Posted in Social Security Debates | No Comments »

Investment is great, but what about people?

Thursday, June 3rd, 2010

June 2, 2010
… making low tuition fees a cornerstone of post-secondary education policy would make it impossible to properly balance costs between individual students and the broader society… I think income-contingent loans, along the lines of what’s offered in Australia, are also well worth considering… The income contingent system has been criticized as being unduly costly for graduates who don’t make big salaries and therefore take a long time to repay. But this could be solved with something as simple as a cap on eventual repayment costs.

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Posted in Education Debates | No Comments »

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