Are we serious about poverty or not?

The NDP's platform released Monday calls the other parties' bluff on poverty.

Two things about poverty:

1. Eighteen years ago, Parliament voted unanimously to eradicate child poverty. Today, close to 900,000 Canadian children live below the poverty line.
2. Eradicating poverty isn't a "spending program." It's an investment in lower crime rates, a more literate and scientifically-skilled populace, a reduction in social costs associated with poverty (malnutrition; TB, AIDS and other communicable diseases; under-weight babies, teenage pregnancies, incarceration, spousal, child and substance abuse, to name just a few), and the foundation for a more globally competitive nation with a higher standard of living.

In business, the maxim is that if you can't measure it, you can't achieve it. One of the knocks on Layton's goal of cutting child poverty by more than 50 per cent and the overall poverty rate by more than 35 per cent in his first, five-year mandate is that the timeframe is unrealistic. But CEOs are hired to set and strive to meet ambitious goals. The lingering shame dating from the well-meaning 1990 Parliamentary vote arises from a lack of goals, ambitious or otherwise.

Layton is asking Canadians about their priorities. Would they prefer the $40 billion in income-tax cuts the Grits expect to finance with their proposed Green Shift carbon-tax program to fund? A corporate tax rate that Harper plans to cut from 22.12 per cent to 19 per cent? (John McCain complained in his debate with Barack Obama last Friday that America suffers the world's second-highest corporate tax rate, at 36 per cent. It's not like the Dippers aim to chase away corporate investment, even if Dion sides with Harper than the Canadian corporate tax rate apprently needs to be cut.) Or eradicating the cycle of poverty by which we keep producing new generations of impoverished Canadians?

And it's not as though the Dippers' total platform costs - proposed spending and tax cuts - are out of line with the competition. The NDP costs its platform at $51.6 billion, the Grits platform rings in at $55 billion, and the yet-to-be-released Tory platform is predicted to be $48 billion, although that figure is expected to rise.

A widening disparity between rich and poor is a cancer on any society, no matter how ostensibly affluent, because it nurtures an "underclass" of alienated folks who in time lose a sense of hope and, with it, of social responsibility. It's a largely unseen burden on society because we don't calculate its total cost. But like gravity, widespread deprivation is there all the same, weighing us all down.

Comments

[Ron McAllister]

Jonathan Swift’s, biting satire; “A modest proposal” was written in response to abject poverty and starvation in England in the 18th century. His was a modest proposal but what we are offered by Harper’s Theo-Cons is a much more sinister one. Bill C-26 mandates minimum sentencing. The bill would lead to an increase of Canada’s prison population by between 50 to 100 percent, according to Neil Boyd, one of Canada’s leading criminologists at Simon Fraser University. “The changes could easily cost the larger provinces in excess of $1billion dollars annually. The ending of the conditional sentencing would again increase provincial jail populations.”
So while poverty is a central issue to the lives of millions of Canada’s poor, all Harper has to offer the public is increased spending on prisons. Surely if we can find the money to increase the number of our prisons we can find the money to prevent people from falling through the economic cracks that often lead to lives of desperation. Spending money on fighting poverty should be the first line of attack. It is a moral failing to support the punishment of people and not the aid to prevent poverty in the first place. Let’s treat the cause and not the symptom would be my modest proposal.

Sincerely,

Ron McAllister
2A Blaketon Road
Toronto, ON
416-695-4761
647-505-4759

[jenn]

Amen David. Now can you please talk to your editorial board before they do their regular condescending endorsement editorial - yes the dippers have good ideas but we will back the useless do nothing Liberals because we prefer to be pandered to than to risk a conservative government.

I do, in large part blame the Toronto Star for Ontario's complete inability to recognize that reward sometimes requires risk. I blame the Toronto Star for helping to make voters more cynical. Each time they endorse the Liberal Party (particularly federally) while knowing that the public will have to suffer through inaction, delay, and constant re-announcements of platform planks from 15 years before (sigh) they re-confirm for the voter that government really isn't good for anything. That would seem to be counter-intuitive to the Stars stated mandate.

Oh well. I no longer purchase the Star because of this approach. I read and comment on line instead (as do many of my dipper friends who used to be subscribers).

The last provincial election was the final straw for me, when the Star allowed it to become a month long discussion of religious school funding. That was it. So many other issues (expansion of nuclear power, declining manufacturing sector, impending potential teachers strike, etc.) and you guys did the job of the Liberal war room. That was it for me.

[catherine]

Mr. Olive, you really need to do some research because your whole premise is wrong. Read, for example, the documents under "environment" on the website of the US Congressional Budget Office which discuss carbon pricing and how best to alleviate the regressive nature of it. For the same achievement in reduction of carbon emissions, cap and trade with fixed caps (the NDP) plan, is the most costly and puts the greatest strain on poor and low-income families. The CBO says research shows that the cost can be FIVE times greater than for a carbon tax. Using their numbers, I estimate a family of four living on $20,000 a year, will see their costs increase by a whopping $3000 or more under the NDP cap and trade.

Layton doesn't even factor in these increased costs into his plan. So, first his carbon pricing, will put a million or more Canadians below or closer to the poverty line, and then he will have to work to undo this as well as existing poverty. Meanwhile, the Green Shift recognizes the regressive nature of carbon pricing and compensates for this by shifting more tax credits and cuts to low income. Since the costs are less for a carbon tax, these do not need to be as deep as Layton's do to protect low income.

Please research the regressiveness of cap and trade, the comparisons of the costs to a carbon tax. You will this see that your entire post is built on falsehoods. Likely Layton misled you, because his slogan "carbon tax hurts families, cap and trade hurts big polluters" is absolutely wrong and Pembina Insitute and the Suzuki Foundation have already issued press releases stating that Layton's messaging is wrong.

[Phillip Huggan]

I've accounted the societally high ROI 3 year expenditures of all 5 parties; positive externalities like environmental capital costing, R+D, daycare, foreign aid, and mental health + affordable housing programmes to fight homelessness. Rankings are: 1st Greens $172B, 2nd Libs $45B, 3rd NDP $45B, 4th Bloc $15B, 5th Cons $8B.
Ignoring off-the-chart Greens, Liberals have highest environment and R+D totals, NDP best childcare and highest sindustry penalty, and Bloc the best anti-homelessness strategies: http://externalityaccounting.blogspot.com/