Archive for the ‘Equality’ Category
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Providing safe drinking water on reserves is simple. Just do it
Drinking water on reserves is a federal jurisdiction. Ottawa provides 80 per cent of the funding… in July there were 133 Health Canada drinking water advisories in 126 First Nations communities… One-quarter have been ongoing for more than 10 years. [Some] have been boiling water since the 1990s… Every Canadian needs clean drinking water. It’s not a complicated position, morally or technically. The money is there and the problems are fixable. No more excuses.
Tags: Health, ideology, Indigenous, jurisdiction, standard of living
Posted in Equality Delivery System | 2 Comments »
We need action, not just talk, to close wage gap between men and women
Women earned 31.5 per cent less than men in Ontario in 2011… It’s not much better than when the Pay Equity Act was passed in 1987 when the gap was 38 per cent… in 2005, the Royal Bank estimated that if Canadian women had the same labour market opportunities as men, personal incomes would be $168 billion higher each year. The gap can’t be blamed on a lack of women’s participation in the work force, as nearly half of it is female. Nor can it be attributed to a lack of education. Or a lack of women in high-skill jobs.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, rights, standard of living, women
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Let’s focus on the real barbaric practices
It’s barbaric that almost half of the population of Nunavut cannot access healthy food… that federal cuts have led to defunding of crucial services for women, such as rape crisis centres, shelters and reproductive health services… that more than 1,200 indigenous women have been murdered or gone missing… The Charter of Rights and Freedoms was not created for some at the expense of others. We are all deserving of the rights that are enshrined therein, and we all have a responsibility toward each other.
Tags: budget, crime prevention, Health, ideology, mental Health, rights, standard of living, women
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
How the deck got stacked against young Canadians
Ottawa contributes to a federal/provincial spending pattern that invests more than $33,000 per person over 65 compared to less than $12,000 per person under 45. This calculation includes the PM’s universal child care benefit, and income-splitting for one in three families with kids… it’s time all parties commit Ottawa to reporting how spending breaks down by age, and whether we are leaving at least as much as we inherited.
Tags: budget, featured, ideology, participation, standard of living, youth
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
How a modest tax change can help low-income families and lower inequality
A modest change to the tax system that converts existing non-refundable tax credits to credits that are refundable constitutes an effective step toward improved income security for Canada’s poorest families in the fashion of a guaranteed annual income. The new benefits would be almost entirely realized by families below or near Statistics Canada’s Low-Income Cut-off and so the poorest families would benefit the most… improv[ing] the fairness of tax filing while addressing Canadian income inequality.
Tags: featured, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
The Inequality Debate: We must build prosperity for all
We in the developed world are all healthier, richer, freer and even, with a few notable exceptions, taller than our early 19th-century ancestors. There were two keys to our success then — and they will be the keys to our success now. The first is a fundamentally positive attitude to technological progress, even as we are realistic about its side-effects… The second is to understand the essential role of government in harnessing technological change so that it serves us all.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Do Canadian voters even know where their self-interest lies?
… support for policies that benefit the select few reflect a simple misunderstanding… That 87 per cent of the public have nothing to gain from income splitting and 95 per cent have nothing to gain from higher TFSA limits does not mean they have nothing to lose. The unavoidable consequence of such policies is that the overwhelming majority of Canadians will be losers in the form of future public-service cuts or tax increases.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, participation, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
The Inequality Debate: We can do something about it
The first step is to restore the welfare state. Since 1980 there has been an unwinding of redistributive policies in OECD countries, with adverse distributional consequences… It’s one of the reasons income inequality in Canada is greater than in France, Germany or Japan. To change this involves raising taxes… based on a return to progressive income taxation… But reducing inequality is not just a matter of taxes and spending… [It’s also] the market distribution of income: what people receive in wages, interest and other forms of capital income.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, poverty, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Policy Context | No Comments »
The Inequality Debate: Canada’s middle class is losing ground
Global markets and a revolution in technology hold the promise of prosperity, a promise that needs sustained policy attention because it is fickle, uncertain, and generates higher inequality, both in the United States and in Canada… In Ontario, the typical income has not grown since 1999, and things are not much different in Quebec. There has been no middle-income prosperity and the only winners have been those who already had the most.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, participation, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Cast your vote: think tank unveils platform to end income inequality
The user-friendly platform, available at GoodForCanada.ca, lays out a four-plank strategy to tackle income inequality, focusing on good jobs, a good safety net, good public programs, and progressive taxation… “The platform also raises the question: how can we pay for it? It outlines a tax plan that asks those who have more to contribute more, for the good of Canada. Spoiler alert: there’s not a single tax cut in our income inequality platform because that’s not how Canada will ever reduce the growing gap.”
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Equality Policy Context | No Comments »
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