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Why not put all Ontario doctors on salary?
Friday, May 11th, 2012
May 11, 2012
In spite of doctors’ initial misgivings, fee-for-service medicare turned out to be a bonanza. They could still charge piece-work rates. But their payments were guaranteed by government… Ontario’s government, for instance, began by negotiating overall financial settlements with the Ontario Medical Association, leaving physicians to divvy up the pot. But that proved unsatisfactory since it allowed the most politically powerful factions within the OMA to reap the bulk of the rewards. This in turn left some areas — particularly general practice medicine — woefully underfunded.
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, tax
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Ottawa’s low-wage immigration policy threatens turmoil
Sunday, April 29th, 2012
Apr 27 2012
this government… says that if Canadians don’t want to see jobs going to foreigners, they should quit whining and accept lower wages. Which is why Ottawa’s answer to complaints made about temporary foreign workers is to toughen Employment Insurance rules. Kenney has warned that unemployed workers who refuse to take low-wage jobs will have their EI benefits cut off. If Canadians agree to work for less, he explains, Ottawa won’t have to bring in as many low-wage outsiders. All of this is a solution of sorts, I suppose, albeit a 19th century one. But it is a solution that threatens to bring with it the kind of agitation now seen in countries like France, Holland and Greece — where the racist right is on the rise and where far too many workers view immigrants as mortal enemies out to steal their jobs.
Tags: economy, ideology, immigration, participation, rights, standard of living
Posted in Policy Context | No Comments »
Stephen Harper’s attack on charities doesn’t go far enough
Saturday, April 21st, 2012
Apr 20 2012
… you and I are both on the hook for a portion of $2.8 million in so-called charitable donations that the Fraser Institute raised in 2010. Its donors too received charitable tax receipts. I don’t know about you. But I resent having to subsidize an organization that spends much its time fulminating for neo-liberalism. For the same reason, I have no interest in helping to fund the Canadian Constitution 2005 Foundation, which agitates against medicare… So what is to be done? The simplest answer is to scrap charitable tax receipts entirely. Distinguishing between real and bogus charities is an almost impossible task. Even established charities can be controversial.
Tags: featured, ideology, philanthropy, rights, standard of living, tax
Posted in Inclusion Policy Context | No Comments »
Budget aims to remake Canada in Stephen Harper’s image
Friday, March 30th, 2012
Mar 30 2012
What matters in the budget is not the immediate impact of $5.2 billion in annual spending cutbacks announced by Finance Minister Jim Flaherty. Rather, it is the attempt to gradually transform Canada, from a country in which private and social needs live in uneasy balance to one where the urge for profit dominates. To Harper, private needs must have primacy.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Harper’s pension cuts will hit the young hardest
Thursday, February 23rd, 2012
Feb 22 2012
Were Old Age Security a frill, this might not matter. But it is not. It provides a basic stipend of about $500 a month to people 65 and over — with all or some being taxed back from those who earn more than a net income of $69,562. Along with an add-on Guaranteed Income Supplement for the very poor, OAS is credited with vastly reducing the poverty rate among seniors… However, CPP doesn’t provide enough to live on for most. And some, such as homemakers, don’t qualify for this pension at all. An even more fortunate minority has recourse to employer-sponsored pension plans. But these are swiftly disappearing.
Tags: budget, economy, pensions, standard of living, youth
Posted in Social Security Debates | No Comments »
Drummond-style restraint would be Ontario’s Greek tragedy
Wednesday, February 22nd, 2012
Feb 21 2012
Government workers are laid off to save money, which leads to higher unemployment. Higher unemployment reduces tax revenues, thereby widening fiscal deficits. Governments are forced to borrow more to cover these shortfalls, thus increasing debt… If we assume, as Drummond seems to, that the U.S. economy will never fully recover and that the price of oil (and therefore the loonie) will stay perpetually high, then Ontario’s economy will remain precarious. In this scenario, “unprecedented” spending cuts of the kind Drummond recommends would be the worst possible action.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, globalization, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Caterpillar closing part of a coordinated attack on unions
Sunday, February 5th, 2012
Feb 03 2012
Since it locked out 460 Canadian workers in January, the giant U.S. firm had made little secret of its intent to move their jobs to Muncie, Indiana. All it was waiting for, apparently, was a signal that the state government there was serious about crippling trade unions. The London plant closing is not an isolated event. It is part of a coordinated attack across North America on unions and wages… But the attack on wages is also being aided and abetted by governments. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government is blatantly anti-union. Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty’s government is simply useless.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Policy Context | 1 Comment »
Stephen Harper’s old-age pension cuts unnecessary
Saturday, January 28th, 2012
Jan 27 2012
There is no fiscal crisis in this country. True, the government predicts that the cost of pensions for the elderly, now about $35.6 billion, will triple by 2030… And when baby boomers start to die off, as they will from about 2020, spending on the elderly will start to decelerate on its own… the myth of pensioner excess provides an easy talking point for those anxious to cut social spending in Canada. The euro may be the true villain of the piece. But the story of the slothful Greek hairdresser is easier to understand.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, pensions, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Policy Context | 5 Comments »
Cure for Ontario’s credit woes worse than disease
Sunday, December 18th, 2011
Dec 16 2011
… the more governments reduce spending by, for instance, slashing public service jobs, the lower their tax revenues. And the lower the tax revenues, the harder it is to meet fiscal targets – which spooks the financial markets even more. It is a pernicious circle. What should Ontario’s government do? First, it should avoid panic… Second, it shouldn’t scapegoat public sector employees… Debt and deficit – while costly – are sometimes better than the alternative. Bond rating agencies notwithstanding, this is one of those times.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Canada’s never-ending medicare fight
Tuesday, November 29th, 2011
Nov 29 2011
… two-tier medicine… simply shifts costs. Private-pay medicine may save governments money. But it provides no net savings to citizens who end up paying out of pocket for the same or worse health care… the Quebec government spends less in proportional terms on health care [but] it spends more in absolute terms on everything else… other countries have two-tier systems. But they don’t necessarily do any better. The Germans, Dutch and French, all of whom are praised by two-tier fans, spend more of their gross domestic product on health care than we do.
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, privatization
Posted in Health Policy Context | No Comments »
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