Archive for the ‘Equality’ Category
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Housing crisis in Attawapiskat still isn’t solved
Wednesday, August 15th, 2012
2 August 2012
the federal government has never bothered much about the root causes of anything on First Nations reserves. That’s why many remain chock-a-block with poverty and hopelessness… Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who did his best to convince Canadians that the band council was to blame for the housing crisis because they had somehow mismanaged funds, was way off base. All he did was create even more distrust… To this day, the housing crisis in Attawapiskat – and dozens of other northern native communities – remains largely unsolved.
Tags: budget, homelessness, housing, ideology, Indigenous, standard of living
Posted in Equality Debates | 2 Comments »
The how, the why [violent crime]
Wednesday, August 8th, 2012
24 July 2012
After reading Margaret Wente’s article… on last week’s mass shooting… I paused for a moment and tried to imagine life there. A page or so later, I saw a description of a $4-million home that boasts a mahogany library and an 1,100-bottle wine cellar. You know the big predictor of violent crime in a city? Income inequality.
Tags: crime prevention, economy, ideology, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Equality Debates | 4 Comments »
Atleo needs to go back to the beginning
Wednesday, August 8th, 2012
20 July 2012
[Shawn A-in-chut Atleo] has the misfortune of serving as the country’s highest-level First Nations spokesman coincident with the term of arguably the most aboriginal-indifferent federal government in decades… Children attending on-reserve schools receive, on average, $3,500 less funding than other Canadian students. First Nations child welfare agencies receive, on average, 22 per cent less funding to do their important work than similar provincial agencies across the country… It will be Shawn Atleo’s task… to hold all Canadians… to live up to the letter of their own constitutional and court laws…
Tags: budget, featured, ideology, Indigenous, participation, poverty, rights, standard of living
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Rich-poor gap is making Canadians sick
Tuesday, July 17th, 2012
July 15, 2012
The top determinants of health in order are income status, education, social support networks, employment and working conditions, early childhood development, physical environment, personal health practices and coping skills and biological and genetic factors. Access to health care is ninth as a determinant of health… By tackling each of the social determinants of health with intelligent public policy informed by evidence-based best practices, our governments will knock down Canada’s unconscionable poverty rates…
Tags: featured, Health, ideology, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Equality Debates, Health Debates | No Comments »
The long climb from inequality
Saturday, July 14th, 2012
Jul. 14 2012
The real issue is equality of opportunity – the ability of people in the lower class to move up the ladder. Equality of opportunity is what we care about the most. We want to believe that we live in a meritocratic society where everyone has an equal chance to succeed. But that is less and less the case. And the remedies are not at all obvious… It’s not that lower-class parents are paying less attention to their kids than they used to. The gap arises because educated parents are investing far more time, effort and money in their kids than ever before… Racial disparities are narrowing, but class disparities are widening dramatically.
Tags: ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living, youth
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Fiscal “Crisis” In Context: Two Indicators
Saturday, July 14th, 2012
July 12th, 2012
… choosing today to slash spending on useful public programs very much reflects a political choice, not a fiscal necessity. In the long run, we can and should pay for the public services we need by putting Canadians back to work. In the meantime, there is clearly ample capacity for governments to continue to carry the cost of these programs… it is counter-productive to impose austerity in the public sector on top of the other painful economic challenges we are facing.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Equality Debates, Policy Context | 1 Comment »
Tackling the income gap in Canadian cities
Monday, July 9th, 2012
July 08, 2012
Toronto’s middle-class suburbs of the 1970s have turned into “urban deserts” of growing poverty while the city centre has become an enclave for the ultra rich… the middle class is shrinking… This type of large-scale data analysis combined with local, participatory research has never been done on a national scale… The goal is to create “a more inclusive society in which youth have hope for the future, newcomers are welcomed, the elderly have support in their communities…
Tags: economy, housing, multiculturalism, poverty, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Threats to Old Age Security
Saturday, June 30th, 2012
The Harper government… lavishes $ 13 billion in tax cuts for big corporations that don’t need the money… [but] can’t afford to staff the EI phone lines so workers can access benefits for which they’ve paid, they can’t afford to maintain meat inspection levels… can’t afford the non- taxation of veterans’ disability benefit… and they can’t even think about a national childcare, homecare or pharmacare program.
Tags: budget, child care, economy, Health, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Crime, victim
Friday, June 29th, 2012
June 29, 2012
Research by the Centre for Race and Culture indicates that immigrants and non-white people (racialized) do not commit more crime than mainstream Canadians with similar life circumstances… Crime is higher for those who are unemployed, have low levels of education, come from single parent families, or live in poverty. These are all exacerbated by the discrimination that immigrant, refugee, and aboriginal people experience. Why do racialized people consistently receive a lower quality of education, and have a more difficult time finding employment and income levels that are commensurate with their education and experience?
Tags: corrections, crime prevention, ideology, immigration, Indigenous, multiculturalism, poverty
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Repeal of Section 13 leaves only Criminal Code to deal with hate speech
Thursday, June 14th, 2012
Jun 13 2012
The Conservatives in the House of Commons have axed the anti-hate provision of the Canadian Human Rights Act… The axing of Section 13 has been presented as a free-speech issue, which it is only in part. The real motivation for repealing it has been Islamophobia… The human rights act and the commission it spawned came into being some 40 years ago as a result of yeoman efforts by the Jewish and black communities. There was to be freedom of speech but also freedom from hate. That was going to be the Canadian way…
Tags: ideology, multiculturalism, rights
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
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