Archive for the ‘Social Security’ Category
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Strong society requires strong social safety net, symposium hears
Friday, May 17th, 2013
We blindly cut, hoping that will drive us back to prosperity and out of the worsening cycle of child and family poverty… Three decades of austerity-worship, and the promise of four more austerity budgets to come in Ontario, have worsened child and family poverty… In 1989, about 10 per cent of Ontario kids lived in poor families. By 2010, that number was up to 14.5 per cent… The conversation needs to change… Forget minimum wage and the discussion of what costs business will bear. Let’s talk about the living wage.
Tags: economy, ideology, poverty, standard of living
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No pension savings crisis: Canadians have $7.1-trillion in net worth savings
Wednesday, May 15th, 2013
… we believe that the “inadequate savings” argument ignores a significant component of savings, namely the investment in real estate including principal residence, other forms of real estate and business ownership… aggregate statistics exclude those in the bottom quintile who may not own their own home and thus cannot avail themselves of home equity… [but] the bottom quintile actually do better in retirement due to OAS, GIS and CPP and their pension income is typically higher than the income earned in their working years.
Tags: economy, ideology, pensions, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Debates | 2 Comments »
Province playing welfare shell game
Sunday, May 12th, 2013
There is a strong sense of disappointment that the previously expressed social justice convictions of the new premier have not moved from rhetoric to action and that the NDP leader never advocated for the interests of Ontario’s poorest with the same vigour as for its car owners… It is a strange notion of social justice that asks disabled people with medical needs to sacrifice essential health supports in order to begin to relieve the deep poverty of single adults not in the labour market.
Tags: budget, disabilities, featured, Health, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living
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Good news on the poverty front in Kathleen Wynne’s first budget
Thursday, May 9th, 2013
… buried within the budget are several surprisingly robust improvements to Ontario’s current welfare mess. And behind the scenes, the Liberals are looking at an even more ambitious second phase of reforms that could be rolled out within the next year: indexing the minimum wage, hiking welfare payments by an additional $100, and indexing those payments… But financial analysts frown upon welfare increases that drag down the bottom line, threatening Ontario’s credit rating. And the more Wynne talks up welfare, the more she plays into Tory caricatures of her as a left-leaning premier.
Tags: budget, disabilities, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living
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Once-in-a-generation chance to modernize welfare lost
Thursday, May 9th, 2013
This is the end of the road for anti-poverty activists who fought tenaciously to get the province to overhaul its punitive, rule-bound welfare system. It is a tacit acknowledgement by Wynne that she cannot create the escape route from poverty that she once envisaged. And it is a signal to taxpayers that they can expect to keep pouring billions of dollars into what is essentially a poverty maintenance system.
Tags: budget, disabilities, featured, ideology, poverty, standard of living
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Budget Makes Progress Towards Poverty Reduction
Sunday, May 5th, 2013
This budget… starts the process of social assistance reform… [but]… We are disappointed that Ontario’s political leaders have failed to increase the Ontario Child Benefit to its maximum… in 2013, a crucial step to meeting our poverty reduction target… The 25in5 Network was also disappointed that the budget did not announce a much-needed increase to the minimum wage… [which]… should be poverty-proofed.
Tags: budget, disabilities, poverty, standard of living
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Changes to social assistance ‘far-reaching and fundamental’
Saturday, May 4th, 2013
Anti-poverty activists are welcoming the Wynne government’s “first steps” to transform Ontario’s $8.3 billion welfare system into a program that helps more people, including the disabled, escape poverty through employment. However, they want… the Liberals during budget negotiations to increase the Ontario child benefit by $200 per child this year to $1,310 as originally promised in the its five-year poverty reduction plan.
Tags: budget, ideology, poverty, standard of living
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Ensuring the Welfare of ‘Welfare Incomes’
Tuesday, April 30th, 2013
The Canada Social Report will present key socioeconomic data and will track major policy developments in such areas as child care, seniors, disability, mental health, home care and affordable housing. Its purpose is to provide… accurate and up-to-date information on key social and economic trends… Maintaining Welfare Incomes as part of this work will protect an invaluable source of data that took years to develop and is still evolving with various shifts in provincial and territorial policies.
Tags: budget, ideology, jurisdiction, poverty, standard of living
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Use the tax system to fight poverty
Tuesday, April 30th, 2013
First.. the maximum level of income-tested child benefits should be raised to cover the full cost of raising children. It is deplorable that one in seven Canadian children live in poverty… Second, Canada should significantly increase the federal Working Income Tax Benefit (WITB) to deal with the growing reality of low pay and precarious work… Third, as a long-term goal, we should abolish welfare as it currently exists… A negative income tax has been broadly championed across the political spectrum
Tags: featured, ideology, poverty, standard of living, tax
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It’s time to end the erosion of public assistance in Ontario
Saturday, April 27th, 2013
For the last 20 years, social assistance has eroded to the point that it would take a 56-per-cent rate increase to bring the single rate back to where it was in 1993. For a single person with disabilities, a 22.2-per-cent increase would be required to restore purchasing power to levels paid in 1993… We live in tough times. But social assistance costs and the number of people receiving assistance have moderated. The scare of high caseloads that began the erosion of benefits did not materialize in the worst recession since the Great Depression.
Tags: budget, disabilities, economy, ideology, poverty
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