Archive for the ‘Debates’ Category
Did the Bank of Canada just push Canada over the tipping point?
Wednesday, July 19th, 2023
Profits as a share of GDP have averaged 21 per cent since the start of the pandemic and profit margins are higher too… We need policymakers at every level to address the real causes of excess/persistent inflation — profiteering, financialization, undersupply and supply chain bottlenecks. Without that we’re all left worse off regardless of the level of inflation.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
While Ford pampers spa users, our school kids fend for themselves
Thursday, July 13th, 2023
The government’s miserly approach to funding our children’s education seems curious in such a rich province… The government is actually swimming in money — even as it hollows out key public programs, underfunding schools, shutting down hospital emergency wards and doing nothing for the homeless beyond allowing developers to build ever more condos that are quickly sold to high-income buyers… The notion that we can’t afford a strong public sector has always been a scam.
Tags: budget, featured, Health, homelessness, privatization, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Why we need to rewrite the script on corporate taxes
Wednesday, June 7th, 2023
Canada’s tax-and-transfer system, which relies on taxing income and providing Employment Insurance and other benefits, isn’t reducing inequality as much as it did before the mid-‘90s. Specifically, despite increases in worker productivity, average real wages have stagnated while corporate profits have skyrocketed. This inequality manifests through middle-class household debt and significant personal savings of CEOs.
Tags: economy, ideology, participation, standard of living, tax
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Better for Workers, Better for All? Assessing a Portable Health Benefits Plan in Ontario
Friday, March 3rd, 2023
Millions of workers in Ontario have no access to supplemental health and dental benefits that reimburse most costs for prescription drugs, dental, vision and mental health services… One solution is a portable health benefits (PHB) plan that allows a worker to maintain coverage while moving from job to job… This commentary explores the purpose, structure and feasibility of a portable health and dental benefits plan in Ontario.
Tags: economy, Health, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, pharmaceutical
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Does Canada’s Sustainable Jobs Plan deliver on the promise of a just transition?
Friday, March 3rd, 2023
In 2021, the CCPA published Roadmap to a Canadian Just Transition Act, which laid out five guiding principles for an ambitious and effective just transition agenda in Canada. Those points serve as a useful benchmark for the Sustainable Jobs Plan… In the meantime, the federal government will need to focus on getting money out the door to the various training programs that it has promised to fund.
Tags: budget, globalization, Indigenous, jurisdiction, participation
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Affordability — not inflation — is the biggest crisis Canada’s economy faces today
Wednesday, March 1st, 2023
Five fiscal approaches… could lower costs, tackle long-term affordability and create more economic resilience… Reform Employment Insurance… Build more affordable rental housing… Fund school food programs… Focus on low-income households for energy-efficiency retrofits… [and] Avoid wasting money in health care… All governments need to prevent the galloping profitization of care…
Tags: economy, featured, Health, housing, immigration, Indigenous, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
COVID ‘blank cheque’: Report finds large corporations spent billions on dividends and share buybacks while receiving government wage subsidies
Friday, February 10th, 2023
Canadians For Tax Fairness found 37 corporations that had received the Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy and spent a total of $81.3 billion on dividends, $41.1 billion on share buybacks and $51.1 billion on taking over other companies… up to $9.9 billion may have gone to companies which weren’t eligible to receive it… some kind of clawback mechanism is needed, either for this time around, or when designing future programs.
Tags: budget, economy, Health, privatization, tax
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Where are your inflation dollars going? Inflation broken down by profit, wages and industry
Tuesday, January 24th, 2023
The data is clear—the largest driver of inflation is corporate profits… Of every dollar spent on higher prices in the last two years, 47 cents was converted into corporate profits in four industries, led by mining, oil and gas extraction, explains a new report by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA).
Tags: economy, standard of living, tax
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Why don’t we zone for rental apartments?
Sunday, January 8th, 2023
The speculation-driven condo business model encourages high prices for land, a dynamic that favours firms that want to get in and out quickly instead of operating a rental building for decades… a dynamic encouraged by the strange fact that apartment buildings are taxed higher than condos. Today, we build almost nothing but condos.
Tags: economy, homelessness, housing, ideology, jurisdiction, poverty
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
How workers are being sacrificed to a doctrine that intentionally keeps unemployment high
Saturday, December 24th, 2022
The economy risks serious recession from an interest shock that was neither necessary, nor effective in reducing inflation… Hundreds of thousands of Canadians could lose their jobs, and many their homes. Why? They’re being sacrificed to visibly reassert a doctrine that keeps unemployment deliberately high – not just to control inflation, but more importantly to control workers.
Tags: economy, ideology, participation, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Recent Comments