Posts Tagged ‘featured’
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Trudeau just green lit a ‘basic income’ for Canadians
Friday, April 3rd, 2020
… a basic income will cost $43 billion annually to implement across Canada. If we factor in provincial income assistance – and get rid of this inadequate cluster of systems – we’re down to $23 billion dollars a year… Incidentally, that’s what we pay every year to make the Canada Child Benefit happen – and not quite half the cost of both the OAS and GIS… let this pandemic be a catalyst for permanent action to stabilize the lives of millions of Canadians and create a healthier, more equitable Canada.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Debates | No Comments »
They’re World War deficit levels, but not the biggest or the baddest yet
Wednesday, April 1st, 2020
The deficits being projected now look to be roughly 5 to 8 per cent of GDP… The 1984 deficit was 8.1 per cent of GDP, when the economy was recovering from the 1982 recession and interest rates paid on the national debt were high. But in those terms, the deficits are not on the scale of the Second World War, when military production and defence spending pushed the annual deficit to 23 per cent of GDP in 1943. A comparable deficit in 2020 would be nearly $500-billion… Canada has seen worse.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology
Posted in History | No Comments »
The Moral Imperative for Policy Advocacy
Tuesday, March 31st, 2020
… if charities do not make governments uncomfortable, they are not delivering on their charitable mission…. charitable status conveys a moral responsibility to be an active agent within civil society, that charities must be more than the sum of their government contracts and charitable receipts. At a fundamental level, charitable status implies not only the power to row but also the obligation to steer, to be thought leaders in the arena of ideas.
Tags: featured, ideology, participation, philanthropy, standard of living, tax
Posted in Inclusion Debates | No Comments »
Keep it quiet, but universal basic income is coming
Friday, March 27th, 2020
The rise of fascism and the Second World War required the creation of the full welfare state (which was previously restricted to meagre old age pensions) to avoid a replay the next time the economy tanked. The current emergency may be fostering the rise of ideas previously seen as too radical to contemplate, but nobody is saying “universal basic income” yet.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, participation, poverty, standard of living
Posted in History | No Comments »
Basic income is the answer to a COVID-stricken economy
Wednesday, March 25th, 2020
Let’s choose universal payments that can be in the mail next week rather than applying complex new formulas to an already dysfunctional system. It’s time for an emergency basic income to ensure hundreds of thousands of Canadians don’t fall through the cracks. Perhaps, like other plans that are drawn up in a crisis, we’ll discover that it makes sense to keep a basic income once this particular emergency is over. Because COVID-19 won’t be the last major setback to the Canadian economy.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
To address the needs of Canadians during the COVID-19 crisis, we need a targeted basic income
Tuesday, March 24th, 2020
A targeted income maintenance approach that is conditional on income — what we refer to as a “targeted basic income” — meets the urgency of the current crisis. And, because seniors and children already have a guaranteed annual income through the Old Age Security, Guaranteed Income Supplement and CCB programs, the major remaining gap in social policy must address the needs of low-income working-age people — particularly those without children.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Coronavirus shows it’s time to mend the safety net
Friday, March 20th, 2020
Having now accepted that better job protections and income supports are necessary in this crisis, how can we go back to pretending they’re not needed all the time? … This should be a learning experience that guides better policies for the long-term — not simply one-offs that will disappear when the crisis passes.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, poverty
Posted in Social Security Debates | No Comments »
Our tax system is too costly for the poorest Canadians
Sunday, March 15th, 2020
… a lack of financial literacy – or even general literacy – has an impact. Insufficient computer skills and lack of access to accounting resources also play a role. Yet, the predominant cause remains the mind-boggling and growing complexity of our tax system… Even chartered professional accountants think that the current system of tax deductions and credits is too complex… tax credits and exemptions targeting middle and higher-income Canadians should be abolished and replaced by broad-based tax cuts.
Tags: featured, ideology, participation, poverty, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Ottawa commits billions to help people hit by the economic fallout of COVID-19
Saturday, March 14th, 2020
The federal government will open the spending taps to throw an economic lifeline to Canadians and businesses as the spread of COVID-19 exacts a growing financial toll, from empty restaurants and theatres to a gutted travel sector… Friday’s rate cut and the government’s promise of aggressive stimulus spending underscores how quickly the crisis is moving and how seriously federal officials view the threat to the economy.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, globalization, Health, ideology, participation, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
The public lab that could have helped fight COVID-19 pandemic
Thursday, March 12th, 2020
… our willingness to go along with the privatization cult in recent decades has left us weaker and less protected than we could be. Not only do we no longer have Connaught Labs, but Canada spends $1 billion a year funding basic medical research at Canadian universities, yet relies on the private marketplace to produce, control — and profit from — the resulting medical innovations… With a surge in future global pandemics expected, it might well be time to rethink Canada’s foolhardy attachment to the notion “the private sector always does things better.”
Tags: featured, Health, ideology, pharmaceutical, privatization, standard of living
Posted in Health History | No Comments »
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