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It’s Tory heaven: a clear playing field
Thursday, September 22nd, 2011
Sep. 21, 2011
They have majorities in the House of Commons and the Senate. And with those majorities, they can do pretty much what they want… During the minority Conservative governments, pre- and post-recession, the size of government grew sharply… This is no Thatcherite, Tea Party or Reaganite crowd, although admirers of those approaches are part of the Conservative coalition. Instead, they’ve been more typically Conservative, delivering rhetoric about balanced budgets, lower taxes and smaller government, while delivering only lower taxes.
Tags: budget, ideology, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | 2 Comments »
America’s fiscal mess offers long-term opportunities for Canada
Friday, July 29th, 2011
Jul. 29, 2011
In the longer term, the U.S. fiscal mess offers Canada opportunities to improve its comparative position – but only if Canada invests in the minds of its people and its competitive infrastructure… an extra dollar spent on education and research will be a dollar well spent, in comparative and competitive terms, provided the teachers and professors don’t grab most of the new spending. An extra dollar spent, say, on even more health care will do nothing for Canada comparatively or competitively.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Policy Context | No Comments »
Do we care that Canada is an unequal society?
Wednesday, July 20th, 2011
Jul. 20, 2011
Canada, it turns out, ranks 12 among 17 comparable countries in income inequality… The United States and Britain, two countries against which Canada measures itself, are the worst performers – that is, the most unequal societies of the 17… The Conference Board notes that government transfer programs flatten out some inequalities, but not as effectively as 20 years ago. Unemployment benefits go to fewer people; welfare rates haven’t always kept up with the cost of living. Many of the Harper government’s tax cuts… have disproportionately benefited those better off, since they’re not geared to income
Tags: ideology, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Equality Policy Context | No Comments »
It’s Conservatives who changed to fit Canada
Sunday, July 17th, 2011
Jul. 16, 2011
True, roughly three-fifths of Canadians did not vote Conservative in the last election. True, too, would be that Mr. Harper ran the opposite of a conservative fiscal policy, having been a big spender from his first day in office… The Conservatives spent money before and during the recession as if governing from the centre-left… In this, they read their electorate correctly, since, for all the talk about Canadians moving in a conservative direction, most of them opposed any reduction in the ambit of government.
Tags: budget, ideology
Posted in Governance Policy Context | No Comments »
Stop shafting undergrads, get profs back into the class
Sunday, June 19th, 2011
Jun. 18, 2011
In provincial politics, universities are of little interest to vote-seeking politicians. They are interested, it would seem, only in increasing access. They promise and brag about how many more spaces they have created, without worrying about what the people who occupy those spaces learn or receive as part of their education experience. The largest number of those spaces is occupied by undergraduates who have been getting the shaft or, to put matters less crudely, have not been receiving fair value for their increasing fees.
Tags: budget, standard of living, youth
Posted in Education Delivery System | No Comments »
Wait times: So much money, such modest progress
Friday, May 27th, 2011
May. 27, 2011
…wait times… have declined somewhat since the federal and provincial governments began throwing money at five procedures… representing about 8 per cent of all surgical procedures pursuant to the 2003-2004 health accord that offered up an additional $41-billion, indexed annually at 6 per cent, some of which was targeted to reduce wait times… During the recent election campaign, the parties hurriedly pledged to extend that 2003-2004 accord – set to expire in 2013-2014 – without giving any thought whatsoever as to why or how the money should be spent.
Tags: budget, disabilities, Health, standard of living
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
Where’s Laurier when you need him?
Monday, April 18th, 2011
Apr. 16, 2011
Laurier’s greatest strength lay in the art of compromise. As Mr. Pratte deftly observes, “If Canada still exists today, it is because there have always been Canadians who felt that Laurier was right, that compromise is not surrender or cowardice, but rather daring and courage.” In this era of wedge politics, targeted tax cuts and slapdash spending promises, it’s painful to realize, through Mr. Pratte’s retelling, that Laurier’s Big Canada vision has all but disappeared.
Tags: economy, multiculturalism, rights
Posted in Governance History | No Comments »
Walking the line on corporate tax cuts
Friday, April 15th, 2011
Apr. 15, 2011
… what really counts is being competitive – which is what the Canadian rate would be wherever it stands in the 15-per-cent to 18-per-cent range… Parties, like provincial governments, are kidding themselves and, by extension, their electorates. Play with corporate rates all they like, governments are going to need more, not less, money to deal with an aging population. These costs – $2-billion to $3-billion a year for health care alone – will dwarf all the effects of corporate tax adjustments.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, tax
Posted in Policy Context | No Comments »
Conservatives are pedalling furiously but going nowhere
Saturday, March 26th, 2011
Mar. 25, 2011
Today, and for most of the past five years, Stephen Harper’s Conservatives have hovered around 36 per cent of the popular vote. So, in more than three decades, the organized national conservative political formations – the PCs, Reform, Canadian Alliance and Mr. Harper’s Conservatives – have not made major political gains… a fascinating tale because what we might loosely call the country’s conservative forces have never been better organized, financed or motivated. And yet, for all their strength, they appear not to have changed Canada, or at least Canadian politics.
Tags: ideology, participation
Posted in Governance Policy Context | No Comments »
Playing the politics of slogans and fear
Wednesday, February 23rd, 2011
Feb. 23, 2011
… what we have, sadly, is the politics of sloganeering about crime, rather than serious measures. About a dozen bills have been presented to Parliament by the Harper government as part of a “tough on crime” agenda… Almost the entire expert community – corrections experts, lawyers, judges, criminologists – opposes most of these measures. Many of them have trooped before parliamentary committees to say the measures either will do nothing to deter crime or will make things worse. To no avail, of course, because we’re not talking about rational policy-making – we’re talking about the politics of fear.
Tags: ideology, participation, standard of living
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
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