Archive for the ‘Debates’ Category
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Impressive GDP numbers don’t tell the real story of the economy and inequality
Sunday, September 8th, 2019
From 1982 to 2015, the share of total income going to those in the top 1 per cent grew from 8 per cent to 14.2 per cent — a jump of 78 per cent. Meanwhile, the share of income going to the bottom 50 per cent — half the country — fell by 29 per cent. So while our economy has grown, the bulk of those gains are flowing to the richest 1 per cent of people.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living, tax
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Many companies are choosing to underfund pensions even though they have the cash, study finds
Thursday, August 29th, 2019
The study found that in 2017, the 90 defined pensions were collectively underfunded by roughly $12 billion. The companies responsible for those pensions, meanwhile, paid out $66 billion in dividends to shareholders — more than five times the amount it would have cost to fund the pensions… “Shareholders are supposed to take on the firm’s risk. Instead, that risk is being shouldered by workers whose retirement security is compromised by outstanding pension deficits.”
Tags: economy, ideology, pensions, rights, standard of living
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Canada should have a federal minimum wage
Tuesday, August 13th, 2019
Last year the federal government passed legislation that… will improve job security for federally regulated workers through scheduling rights, equal pay for temporary employment agency workers and protections against contract flipping that lower wages. Now it’s time for the next step: a decent minimum wage.
Tags: economy, ideology, jurisdiction, standard of living
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Premier Ford cries poor but subsidizes $700 million for fossil fuel consumption
Monday, August 5th, 2019
In the last year alone, Ontario provided nearly $700 million in subsidies for fossil fuel consumption… No one wants to see public dollars wasted, least of all the Government of Ontario. If it takes the opportunity to buckle down on fossil fuel subsidies and reinvest those millions wisely, not only will it set the province on a path to a more sustainable future, it will also prove itself to be Canada’s vanguard for smart, fiscal efficiency.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, tax
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Money has never been cheaper. Should Ottawa be borrowing more?
Wednesday, July 31st, 2019
Ultralow interest rates are a problem, but also an opportunity. Borrowing has never been cheaper. If the federal government were to increase borrowing, only for a short period and only to fund one-off items such as new education facilities or transit infrastructure, it could finance that at very low costs, locked in for decades.
Tags: budget, economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living
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Jim Stanford on Uber and the future of precarious work: ‘It isn’t inevitable’
Monday, July 8th, 2019
… we should be continuing to invest in skills and the knowledge infrastructure… But we also need to be actively nurturing the jobs that people with those skills can most productively do… They only came to Canada because smart policy interventions brought them to Canada. We hustled for them, and we put in place rules. We said to a company like Boeing, for example, ‘you want to sell a bunch of extremely expensive aircraft to Air Canada? Well, you’re going to have to produce something in Canada.’
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, participation, standard of living
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Beware gurus with plans to reinvent conservatism
Thursday, July 4th, 2019
Protectionism, then, does not protect our workers against other countries’, nor even workers against consumers, though that is nearer the truth. In reality, it protects some Canadian workers against other Canadian workers. Which workers fall into which group is decided not by how hard either works or the quality or price of what they produce, but by which can most successfully lobby politicians… The conflict… between the interests of consumers and producers, is ultimately illusory.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, standard of living
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The world needs more Greta Thunbergs
Friday, June 28th, 2019
Ms. Thunberg began by offering some sobering perspectives on the greatest plague facing mankind, such as the fact that roughly 100 companies are responsible for emitting just over 70 per cent of our total carbon-dioxide emissions. And the fact that the richest 10 per cent of the world’s population emit about half of the planet’s total emissions and the wealthiest 1 per cent emit more than the poorest 50 per cent… “People who have a lot of power. People who consume enormous amounts of stuff, who often fly around the world, sometimes in private jets.”
Tags: economy, featured, globalization, Health, ideology, standard of living
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What is the problem to which creating a wealth tax is a solution?
Tuesday, June 25th, 2019
The stock of wealth in a country is typically many multiples of the flow of income; its concentration in a few hands is likewise greater. The top one per cent earn roughly 20 per cent of America’s income, but control 40 per cent of its wealth. They also pay 40 per cent of the income tax, but never mind: by taxing their wealth as well, vast sums of money could ostensibly be raised from relatively few people, and at relatively low rates.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living, tax
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The Ford government’s proposed wage-cap legislation: Debunking the myths, outlining the facts
Tuesday, June 18th, 2019
The Ford government has introduced sweeping wage legislation that will undermine free and fair collective bargaining under the pretense of a fiscal crisis. The reality is that Ontario faces a revenue problem and not a spending problem, as Ford continues to falsely claim… the Ontario government has the lowest per capita program spending in the country. This includes spending on essential public services such as long-term care, childcare, education, transit, water, and infrastructure.
Tags: budget, ideology, rights
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