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It would help if Andrea Horwath had a billionaire onside
Friday, April 20th, 2012
Apr 19 2012
Conservatives have managed to peddle policy changes — notably tax cuts for the rich — that offer no benefit to ordinary citizens and in fact undermine public welfare by depriving government of revenue needed for social programs. They’ve pulled this off partly by being sneaky, but also by forcefully defending their positions. This has enabled them to present themselves as tough and principled — even when there’s no principle beyond enriching themselves and their allies — giving them an aura of strong leadership. By contrast, their opponents have often come across as unable or unwilling to articulate the case for progressive policies.
Tags: budget, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Rich have succeeded in keeping tax hikes off the political agenda
Tuesday, February 14th, 2012
Feb 13 2012
Drummond’s long-awaited report… will lay out a deficit-shrinking program of austerity that is expected to have harsh implications for public employees from hospital cleaners to daycare workers, as well as delivering service cuts with devastating impacts on the poor, the sick, women in shelters and the disabled… But… he presents a friendly banker’s face to the affluent, who are to be spared paying any additional taxes as their contribution to the province’s deficit fight. Premier Dalton McGuinty made that clear when he declared tax increases off the table in Drummond’s search for ways to reduce Ontario’s $16-billion deficit.
Tags: budget, ideology, poverty, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Ottawa favours foreign businesses over Canadian employees
Tuesday, January 17th, 2012
Jan 16 2012
Ironically, the Harper government has complained forcefully about “foreign” interference from outside environmentalists protesting a proposed pipeline across the Rockies. But when it comes to foreign companies stripping Canadian workers of half their wages and then moving operations out of the country, the government hasn’t a negative word to say. Harper is of course staunchly pro-capitalist, and has aggressively lowered corporate tax rates, while refusing to link lower taxes to investment or job creation.
Tags: economy, ideology, participation, standard of living
Posted in Policy Context | No Comments »
Occupy moves us into a new era
Wednesday, November 23rd, 2011
Nov 21 2011
Are occupations really necessary to draw attention to their cause? Perhaps not. But I’d trust their judgment over mine. After all, they’ve managed to change the public discourse, putting inequality front and centre — something activists and writers, myself included, have failed to accomplish despite decades of trying.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, rights, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
How to make inequality obsolete
Tuesday, October 25th, 2011
Oct 24 2011
While Flaherty seems determined to shelter the rich from progressive taxation, there was no such catering to them on the part of Henry Simons, a founder of the conservative Chicago School of Economics. Simons considered excessive inequality “unlovely” and supported progressive taxation, arguing that capitalism would never survive in a democracy if the general public didn’t benefit from it… The Occupy Wall Street movement has made unbridled greed — so distasteful to Adam Smith and Henry Simons — suddenly controversial.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
The great northern tax haven
Wednesday, September 28th, 2011
Sep 26 2011
For years, Canada followed the U.S. and U.K. almost lockstep in cutting taxes on the rich. Now that those countries are heading in the opposite direction, Canada is suddenly marching to its own drummer… The lack of controversy here is surprising, given that Canada also has deficit problems and, like the U.S., has seen a huge concentration of income at the very top in recent years. Canada’s ultra-rich — those in the top 0.01 per cent — now have a bigger share of national income than at any point in Canadian history…
Tags: budget, economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | 1 Comment »
Eulogy becomes rallying cry for the left
Tuesday, August 30th, 2011
Aug 29 2011
The economic reality is that we get richer every year as a country; our GDP has grown massively since 1937. Yet, as Lewis noted, we now have “an economy that excludes so many from our collective wealth.” It’s not that we don’t have enough collective wealth — our cup overfloweth — it’s that we’ve accepted a rigid and illogical ideology, preached by conservatives, that teaches us we can no longer afford what we plainly managed to afford when we had less money.
Tags: featured, ideology, participation
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
The trouble with the TFSA
Monday, May 2nd, 2011
Apr 30 2011
While corporate tax cuts have been fiercely attacked in recent weeks as giveaways to big business, the Conservatives have managed to avoid controversy over another costly election promise that seems poised to deliver an even bigger windfall to the Bay Street crowd. The promise involves Tax Free Savings Accounts (TFSA)… the program does little for moderate earners, and is really about eliminating taxes on capital gains and other income from capital – something the financial community has long lobbied for but been unable to achieve.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
Luxury for the rich but ‘realism’ for the rest of us
Monday, March 21st, 2011
Mar 21 2011
As deficits pile up, we are soon to be inundated with the message that we are living beyond our means and must learn to do with less. Certainly, our small wealthy super-elite seems determined to ensure that nothing gets in the way of its right to fully indulge its greed, and that the burden of deficit-reduction is imposed on others. A conflict appears to be looming therefore between Canada’s elite, typified perhaps by Kevin O’Leary, and the aspirations of millions of Canadians who don’t want to see programs they value — health care, education, pensions — sacrificed to deficit reduction.
Tags: economy, ideology, privatization, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
The hedge fund manager and the nurse
Tuesday, March 8th, 2011
Mar 07 2011
… the Harper government introduced legislation that effectively strips women in the public service of pay equity coverage. On this rather sombre International Women’s Day, it’s worth reminding ourselves that the gigantic incomes of the financial elite and the low incomes of nurses have little to do with merit — or even the workings of a “free market” — and a lot to do with who gets to make the rules.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living, tax, women
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
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