Archive for the ‘Debates’ Category
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Say no to more trade deals
… deals (they’re rarely called ‘free trade’ deals any more, just trade) written in secret with only corporate figures present alongside governments — versus workers,’ women’s’ or native organizations, environmentalists: basically everybody else — will reflect guess whose interests? … The chief argument… is that they raised wage levels in poor countries… there’s some truth to that but why does it fall solely on Western workers’ families to pay the price for such progress through their own desperate decline while the rich soar to levels never known before?
Tags: economy, featured, globalization, ideology, privatization, rights, standard of living
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Bold Reforms Needed for Business Tax System – Leading Tax Experts
“The problem is most capital income can be sheltered and therefore the system is not meeting its intended goal… The current system also places most of the tax burden on labour and distorts firms’ investment decisions, financing decisions, risk-taking and innovation efforts. The system desperately needs reform.” The authors recommend changing the tax base from shareholder income to above-normal profits, or revenues above the normal costs of doing business.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, privatization, standard of living, tax
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Employers should support expansion of the Canada Pension Plan
… employers who currently make no contribution at all to employee retirement savings would have to pay more under an expanded CPP. Hence the fierce opposition of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business. But a modest, phased-in premium increase in the range of 3 per cent of payroll costs up to maximum CPP earnings would not be economically disruptive, as shown by past experience.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, participation, pensions, standard of living
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The promise of the living wage movement
Twenty-eight communities across Ontario are moving forward with local living wage initiatives… Within its first year of existence, the Ontario Living Wage Network has signed up more than 100 living wage employers, and that list is growing… As more governments and employers unite to make the ethical, social and business case for a living wage, it will inevitably influence the conversation about the inadequacy of provincially mandated minimum wages across Canada.
Tags: economy, featured, globalization, ideology, standard of living
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The shame of our disposable workers
… thousands… come to Canada every year under the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP)… Evidence suggests many workers who are hurt or become ill while in Canada are simply sent back home. This year marks the 50th anniversary of the SAWP and its shameful legacy needs to be addressed: we are treating the migrant workers who grow and harvest our food like disposable, subhuman units of labour… workers currently lack permanent immigration status, full health coverage, and access to Employment Insurance (even though EI payments are deducted from their wages).
Tags: economy, globalization, Health, ideology, immigration, rights, standard of living
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Improvements Needed for EI Eligibility Rules
… current EI eligibility criteria do not need a major overhaul to expand eligibility, though addressing regional variations in eligibility should be a priority… “policymakers should revisit the ‘social’ side of social insurance programs, and as a first step they must begin to better understand the circumstances of a large number of unemployed workers who are not recent contributors to EI.”
Tags: economy, ideology, participation, standard of living
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What we need to know about neoliberalism (before it’s too late)
We expected that governments would act promptly to clamp regulatory restraints on corporate wrongdoers, constrain free markets, re-impose much higher business taxes, and punish financial felons with prison terms and huge fines. Instead, governments have allowed corporations to continue their iniquitous misconduct, and even lavished them with further tax cuts and subsidies… since the politicians we vote for are the only ones with the authority to stop the titans of capitalism from further impoverishing billions, worsening inequality, and eventually wrecking the planet, we find ourselves at an impasse.
Tags: crime prevention, economy, featured, globalization, ideology, participation, poverty, rights, tax
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Tax havens serve ‘no useful purpose,’ say more than 350 leading economists
To lift the veil of secrecy surrounding tax havens we need new global agreements on issues such as public country by country reporting… it was Adam Smith who said that the rich “should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.” There is no economic justification for allowing the continuation of tax havens which turn that statement on its head.
Tags: economy, featured, globalization, ideology, privatization, tax
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Ontario labour laws failing vulnerable workers
Since the mid-1990s, Ontario has seen a dramatic growth in income inequality. During that time, anti-union legislation has given employers in the public and private sectors more confidence and scope to undermine the influence of employees over their working conditions by subverting their ability to join a union and collectively negotiate at the bargaining table. It is time to restore balance and fairness to Ontario workplaces.
Tags: economy, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, rights, standard of living
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Ontario faculty throw weight behind day of action for $15 & Fairness
… the Changing Workplaces Review on how to raise standards for contract faculty and to update labour law to ensure all workers can organize collectively in a union. The proposals include requiring equal pay for work of equal value and equal access to benefits for contract workers, and requiring that all workers receive reasonable notice of their schedules… OCUFA is one of over 50 community and labour organizations that is part of the Fight for $15 & Fairness across Ontario.
Tags: economy, ideology, rights, standard of living
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