Archive for the ‘Social Security Debates’ Category
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Building an economic floor under the poor
Friday, November 4th, 2011
Nov 03 2011
… the United Nations called for the creation of a worldwide social protection floor to prevent the poor from falling into deeper deprivation… The report does not prescribe a one-size-fits-all approach or a universal standard… But it does suggest four key principles: • Build on what already exists… • Aim to move people from income support to opportunities for decent employment… • Ensure that non-government groups are fully involved in setting the social protection floors and delivering the benefits and services. • Anchor the process in sustainable domestic funding sources…
Tags: featured, poverty, rights, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Debates | 2 Comments »
Stretched food banks a measure of Canada’s frail recovery
Thursday, November 3rd, 2011
Nov. 01, 2011
… recipients span the spectrum. Nearly 100,000 of them are first-time users and one in five actually has a job or has recently been employed. More than one in ten are immigrants or refugees – many of whom are highly educated, and usage is growing among seniors… The findings show 18 per cent of food-bank recipients are part of the working poor – people who have earnings from a current or recent job… Almost half of recipients are women and girls. One in ten is aboriginal. One in four are individuals from dual-parent families with kids.
Tags: budget, disabilities, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Debates | 1 Comment »
Tax-free savings accounts give wealthy access to poverty benefit: study
Tuesday, October 25th, 2011
Oct. 23, 2011
Wealthy Canadians are getting access to a retirement benefit that was intended for the elderly poor, suggests a new report on the country’s retirement-security system… Tax-free savings accounts, or TFSAs, allow Canadians to save up to $5,000 each year with all earnings and withdrawals exempt from taxation. FSAs also come with another big plus: none of the money counts when determining whether the account-holder is entitled to a retirement benefit for low-income seniors.
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Proactive plan could save Canada billions
Tuesday, October 4th, 2011
September 29, 2011
The council report says, in 2007, it would have cost about $12 billion to bring all Canadians’ income to a level that was above the poverty line, about half of what it says poverty costs Canadian taxpayers each year. Asked whether the government can afford to take such measures, he said it can’t afford not to. “If we’re already affording $24 billion, it’s kind of a nobrainer to afford $12 billion to make it better,” he said, though he added more money would be needed for measures that help keep people out of poverty.
Tags: economy, ideology, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Debates | 1 Comment »
Party platforms thin on fighting poverty, says coalition
Saturday, October 1st, 2011
Sep 29 2011
Tim Hudak’s Progressive Conservatives have made no campaign commitments to help vulnerable children and families get ahead, says a coalition of anti-poverty groups that has analyzed the various party platforms for the Oct. 6 election. But the Liberals, NDP and Greens offer only limited solutions to ending child and family poverty, according to the analysis by Ontario Campaign 2000, which has joined with the 25 in 5 Network for Poverty Reduction in calling for more political attention to the issue.
Tags: budget, ideology, poverty
Posted in Social Security Debates | 1 Comment »
Canadians cover $24-billion a year in poverty costs: Report
Wednesday, September 28th, 2011
Sep 28, 2011
The initial investment could be in the billions of dollars, the report suggests, which says it would be worth the expense in the long run. “In an investment model, the more resources devoted to preventing poverty and directly lifting people out of poverty, the greater the payoff would be for all Canadians in reduced health-care and other indirect costs,” says the report, titled The Dollars and Sense of Solving Poverty.
Tags: budget, ideology, poverty, standard of living
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What gives with charity crackdown?
Tuesday, September 27th, 2011
September 24, 2011
The Harper regime hasn’t been shy to go after charities it disapproves of. Therefore, in recent years, nameless bureaucrats at Canada Revenue Agency have been dispatched across the country to rough up charities – such as those preoccupied with the environment or animal welfare or birth control or international issues – and to threaten them with loss of their charitable status. Because they’re too “political.” … But to use the power of government to silence those you disapprove of? That isn’t just uncharitable. It’s unconstitutional.
Tags: ideology, rights, tax
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Look for the party that will do the most to help those in need
Tuesday, September 20th, 2011
September 19, 2011
The Liberals have taken some steps to address issues during the last eight years, such as dental care for children from low incomes and child tax credit, but as far as raising assistance rates to any livable rates, that seems to never gain traction. And the only party that I have heard tout the Guaranteed Annual Income that has been proposed time and again from Conservative Senator Hugh Segal is the Green Party… Our economy will grow if everyone has a chance to participate, and that includes those who are struggling every day to be included.
Tags: budget, ideology, poverty
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‘Not enough money for rent, food and bills’
Friday, August 26th, 2011
25 Aug 2011
Bilodeau… is one of more than 800,000 people in Ontario receiving social assistance, such as Ontario Works or Ontario Disability Support Program ( ODSP) funding. He and four other people on social assistance… organized a group in early June to give the province’s social assistance review committee their stories and to suggest positive ways to change the system… The group was assembled to send recommendations to Frances Lankin and Dr. Munir Sheikh, who head the provincial review committee commissioned January 2011.
Tags: disabilities, participation, poverty, rights, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Debates | 1 Comment »
The folly of benevolence
Tuesday, August 16th, 2011
Aug. 15, 2011
Australian philosopher David Stove’s What’s Wrong with Benevolence… is assertive… specifically, the benevolence of governments taken to its nth degree, its uttermost limit… Enacted in Elizabethan times, the Poor Laws originally gave succour to the poor, the sick and the elderly by means of a modest tax levied at the parish level. With the passage of time, the civic administrators noted a perplexing paradox: “It was found… that the proportion of the population receiving money under the [Poor] Laws (and consequently, of course, the burden on those who paid the tax) always increased.”
Tags: ideology, poverty, standard of living
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