New federal wage protections for part-time and temp workers are coming soon. Will they work?
Friday, October 9th, 2026
Under the new rules, employers are required to pay workers equally, regardless of whether they are full-time, part-time, permanent or temporary, as long as they perform “substantially the same kind of work” in “the same industrial establishment.” Federally regulated temporary help agencies will also be prohibited from paying their employees less than a client company pays its own workers for comparable work, or charging workers fees to secure job assignments.
Tags: economy, standard of living
Posted in Debates | 5 Comments »
How Ontario’s private clinics are draining taxpayer dollars and staff from public health care
Thursday, October 1st, 2026
Funding private clinics drains our public system, poaching staff and siphoning taxpayer dollars from front-line care. If interprofessional health teams are to succeed, the province must guarantee competitive salaries to staff them. Nurse practitioners need immediate provincial funding… Private clinics cost Ontario more, threaten patient safety and increase public wait times. They erode equity, accessibility and universality — the very foundation of the Canada Health Act.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, Health, ideology, jurisdiction
Posted in Health Delivery System | 7 Comments »
To save Canada, Mark Carney is courting foreign money. He’s risking an ‘investment invasion’
Tuesday, September 15th, 2026
The aim is simple: build Canadian assets, don’t just buy them. Assets aren’t only physical. They include the human capital that drives the economy. The terms we negotiate determine whether public or private interests prevail. But terms mean little without enforcement.
The details determine whether the deal creates value for Canadians or extracts it. The investment invasion coming to Canada may have a polished look, but keep your eye on the price-tag.
Tags: economy, Health, ideology
Posted in Governance Debates | 8 Comments »
Why anxiety and mood disorders are skyrocketing in Canada — and who is being hit the hardest
Tuesday, September 15th, 2026
In the past decade, we’ve seen the internet transform the way people, especially youth, connect and spend time with each other. It’s led to growing social isolation, fewer in-person events and less physical activity; a recent report from Mental Health Research Canada linked extended screen time and negative online experiences with higher rates of depression, anxiety and suicidal ideation among Canadian youth. At the same time, the world is in a period of growing uncertainty… we’re also seeing greater socioeconomic disparity and uncertainty over time…
Tags: mental Health
Posted in Health Debates | 1 Comment »
Why simplifying Canada’s tax code is about social trust, not just saving money
Saturday, August 22nd, 2026
Economic researchers at the University of Calgary have developed a framework to evaluate what happens when a government undertakes a tax reform, and they are taking a broad view of the social returns of tax… “Administrative reform can enhance fairness and trust, but if designed or evaluated narrowly through cost and yield metrics, it can deepen distributional inequities and erode public confidence”… The first plank is measuring the social return per administrative dollar spent…
Tags: budget, economy, standard of living, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | 26 Comments »
The predictable consequence to the gaps in our health funding? Private spending keeps growing faster than public
Tuesday, August 18th, 2026
Bilateral “Aging With Dignity“ agreements have earmarked funding for home, community and long-term care, allowing for valuable investments in capacity, staff wages and infrastructure. But public coverage to directly displace household spending is nowhere to be found… This fragmentation carries with it significant costs, including duplicated administration across thousands of private insurers, weaker collective bargaining power over drug prices and coverage gaps that push some patients toward hospitalization when they can’t afford medication.
Tags: budget, featured, Health, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, pharmaceutical, standard of living
Posted in Health Policy Context | 1 Comment »
When politicians tell us health-care spending is unsustainable, they never seem to mention this
Monday, August 17th, 2026
… the single largest private-spending category in Canada is prescription drugs. We remain the only high-income country in the world whose universal healthcare system lacks a universal drug plan…. the notion that our health-care system is at risk because governments are spending too much is misleading in a country where seniors cover the cost of long-term care beds, parents pay out of pocket for their children’s dental work and patients spend too much on the medications they need to be healthy.
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, jurisdiction, pharmaceutical, standard of living
Posted in Health Debates | 4 Comments »
Ontario got $3.2 billion for health care. What did patients get?
Thursday, August 13th, 2026
The Ford government spent a record $111.9 million to advertise in 2024—25. Yet its public agreement update does not give Ontarians a provider-level accounting of where the $3.2 billion in federal health funding went or what each investment delivered… Ontarians have a right to know how federal and provincial health dollars are spent and what public services, shorter waits or better access those dollars deliver.
Tags: budget, Health, jurisdiction
Posted in Health Debates | 2 Comments »
Canada’s oil giants are cashing in on conflict. Consumers are paying the price
Sunday, August 9th, 2026
It is neither inevitable nor reasonable that one industry should profit so obscenely from a war that is killing thousands, dislocating millions, and undermining the livings standards of billions. This situation reflects a deliberate policy choice: to give a few corporations power to charge whatever the market will bear for an essential commodity, regardless of cost of production or harm to society.
Tags: economy, featured, privatization, standard of living, tax
Posted in Debates | 6 Comments »
Carney government restores some health coverage it had cut for refugees
Sunday, August 9th, 2026
“The July 2026 update is expected to impact a very small proportion of current IFHP beneficiaries and will largely maintain the approximately $200 million in projected annual savings associated with the May 2026 program changes, while better aligning coverage for these select services with how they’re typically delivered through publicly funded provincial and territorial health care systems”… “When we ensure that everyone has access to the care that they need, we build healthier communities, and that’s what actually makes Canada strong.”
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, immigration, standard of living
Posted in Health Debates | 2 Comments »
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