Canada's Got an Inequality Problem

[Buddhas Hand]

^ Canada leads the world in terms of upward mobility. If a person can't make it in this country, as empathetic as I am, it is certainly not the fault of rich people.

You are it seems incorrect , there seems to be little information/data out there in relation to "upward mobility" but what i could acceess shows that on the legatum prosperity index canada ranks behind Aus , NZ and above them the scandinavian countries

Prosperity & Upward Mobility: US and other Countries by Ben Lorica (last updated Nov/2011)

Prosperity by Country

The Legatum Prosperity Index is an attempt to measure well-being by going beyond simple economic metrics, like average income or GDP per capita. Legatum's Prosperity Index takes economic metrics into account, but also factors entrepreneurial opportunities and a host of other factors around quality of life and well-being.The purpose of the Prosperity Index is to encourage policymakers, scholars, the media, and the interested public to take a holistic view of prosperity and to understand how it is created. Prosperity extends beyond just material wealth. It includes factors such as social capital, effective governance, human rights and liberties, health, opportunity, security, and overall quality of life.

In the dot plots below, I compare countries on their overall rank based on their composite Legatum Prosperity score, as well as their rankings using Legatums metrics for the state of their Economies and Entrepreneurship opportunities. It might surprise Americans that Sweden, Denmark, and Finland outrank the US on dimensions (Economy and Entrepreneurship) that less dynamic social welfare states aren't supposed to be good at. But even within these dimensions, Legatum's models employ a variety of metrics, including those that measure satisfaction and expectation.

• OVERALL Prosperity Index: Besides scores for their economies and entrepreneurship opportunities, countries are rated on factors pertaining to social capital, effective governance, human rights and liberties, health, and security. The U.S. ranks 10th, behind the Scandinavian countries, Austalia/NZ, and Canada.
• ECONOMY: Rates countries across 17 factors including gross domestic savings, unemployment, inlfation, non-performing loans, and respondents satisfaction with standard of living and employment opporunities. The U.S. ranks 18th.
• ENTREPRENEURSHIP Opportunities: Rates countries across 14 factors including business startup costs, R&D expenditure, and respondents perception that "Working Hard Gets You Ahead". The U.S. ranks 5th, behind Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and the U.K.

Intergenerational Upward Mobility: U.S. and other countries

Governor Mitch Daniels of Indiana recently noted that "upward mobility from the bottom is the crux of the American promise." In early 2009, the Economist noted that "71% still agreed that hard work and personal skill are the main ingredients for success." Americans particularly care about intergenerational opportunities. They believe that their economic system allows hardworking children of working class citizens the chance to move up the income ladder. In fact many successful politicians frequently cite their working class upbringing as evidence that the US is "greatest" country in the world.

Optimism has declined since the financial crisis of 2008. News reports cite curveys that indicate Americans are much more pessimistic about their near and long-term economic futures. The notion that the next generation will be better off is no longer assumed.

When it comes to (intergenerational) upward mobility, how does the US stack up against other countries? Among conservatives the answer is clear: Scandinavian countries are less dynamic, and thus upward mobility pales in comparison to the US. But as we've seen above, when entrepreneurial opportunities are measured using a range of metrics, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland compare favorably with the US.

In a 2006 study, German researchers studied Intergenerational Earnings Mobility in several countries including the US. Since there aren't any long-term longitudinal survey data sets that cut across all the countries in their study, the researchers chose well-known survey data for each of the countries¹. Intergenerational mobility is measured by looking at the probability that offsprings move up to higher-income groups.

It turns out that compared to the equivalent set of parent-offspring pairs in Scandinavian countries, sons whose Fathers are in the bottom 20% are much less² upwardly mobile in the US. Throw in the fact that compared to the US, there is much less concentration of wealth and income in Sweden, Finland, and Denmark, you begin to wonder why other countries aren't emulating at least some features of these 3 economies. (A good place to start is for countries to consider Sweden's approach to financial sector regulation!)

Here are the results of the multi-nation study on Intergenerational Upward Mobility:

• Estimated quintile group mobility: Assuming a Father is in the bottom 20% of all earners, what is the probability³ that his offspring will be in the same income group? Perfect Mobility implies that offsprings of a parent in the bottom (or top) 20% income group, are equally distributed across each of the five income quintiles.
• Father is in the BOTTOM 20%: The upward mobility of sons is much less likely in the US. In the US, 42% of sons stay in the bottom 20%. Moreover 66% (or two-thirds) of all sons remain within the bottom 40% of all earners. Outside the US the comparable proportion who remain in the bottom 40% of all earners are: UK (53%), Sweden (50%), Norway (51%), Finland (51%), and Denmark (47%). Put another way, in the US a son whose father was in the bottom 20% of all earners has only a 1 in 3 chance of ending up in the top 60%. His odds of ending up in the top 60% would be much higher in Sweden (1 in 2).
• On the other hand, intergenerational upward mobility for daughters whose Fathers were in the BOTTOM 20%, is only marginally worse in the US.

It seems that the scandinavian countries lead the world in "upward mobility".

[Gross-Misconduct]

*note to self* No longer click anymore OPs posts.

[kyledude]

You are it seems incorrect , there seems to be little information/data out there in relation to "upward mobility" but what i could acceess shows that on the legatum prosperity index canada ranks behind Aus , NZ and above them the scandinavian countries

What's your point? Does our 5th place global ranking, based on your own source, somehow refute my argument?

When you consider the relative size of our economy, we are a freaking powerhouse with endless opportunity.

[Jaimito]

Canada is one of best countries that take care of the poor, social security safety nets what not. We all pay more taxes to support it.

The society can never be equal, but all people are not equal or even created equal, unfortunately. It will be nice, but reality says otherwise. It is up to the able people to take care of the unable, but many able people don't and they use the system like parasites.

Capitalism inherently makes people unequally rich. Communism makes everyone equally poor, except for the party leaders. Pick your poison.

[freebuddy]

A Canadian City Once Eliminated Poverty And Nearly Everyone Forgot About It

Zi-Ann Lum

12/23/14 09:38 AM ET

On a December afternoon, Frances Amy Richardson took a break from her quilting class to reflect on a groundbreaking experiment she took part in 40 years earlier.

Well, that was quite a few years ago, she said. There was a lot of people that really benefitted from it.

Between 1974 and 1979, residents of a small Manitoba city were selected to be subjects in a project that ensured basic annual incomes for everyone. For five years, monthly cheques were delivered to the poorest residents of Dauphin, Man. no strings attached.

And for five years, poverty was completely eliminated.

The program was dubbed Mincome a neologism of minimum income and it was the first of its kind in North America. It stood out from similar American projects at the time because it didnt shut out seniors and the disabled from qualification.

The projects original intent was to evaluate if giving cheques to the working poor, enough to top-up their incomes to a living wage, would kill peoples motivation to work. It didnt.

But the Conservative government that took power provincially in 1977 and federally in 1979 had no interest in implementing the project more widely. Researchers were told to pack up the projects records into 1,800 boxes and place them in storage.

A final report was never released.

Richardson is now 87 and still lives in Dauphin. She says only three or four of the citys original Mincome recipients remain among the prairie communitys 8,251 residents.

During the programs heyday in the mid-1970s, Richardson was a mother of six three of her children lived at home.

To earn money, she ran a small salon out of her home called Fifth Avenue Beauty Chalet. Whatever cash she could make styling hair contributed one stream of the familys income; her husband Gordon provided the other with his job at the local telephone company.

Her ailing mother also lived in the house at the time. She remembers Mincome researchers visiting the home regularly to calculate how much money the family was qualified for.

We kept track of everything and somebody would come once a month, she explained. I kept track of what I made and they would pay the difference to what they figured that cost many people to live.

Mincome provided the Richardsons with financial predictability and a sense of stability. There was always food on the table. The bills were paid. The kids stayed in school.

And when Gordons health took a turn for the worse mid-way through the pilot project, the family still made ends meet.

It was a lot of good, but see, the Manitoba government and the federal government both went out of power that year and they ran out of money so it was just dropped, Richardson said.

It was done.

An extraordinary program for ordinary people

In five years, Mincome helped one thousand Dauphin families who fell below the poverty line earn a livable income. When the project ended, locals didnt make a fuss because they knew the cheques were temporary anyway.

Some people thought it was like charity, Richardson said about Mincome. It wasnt really charity, it was need.

So in 1979, it was business as usual again. After Mincome folded, people tapped into their prairie work ethic and looked to make do however they could. The Richardson family went back to scraping by, the same way they had before the project began. The kids found jobs: one sold gas at the local garage, another landed entry-level work in insurance.

Richardson continued to bake bread and can her own preserves at home. Its a cash-saving skill born out of hard times some food bank-dependent families have lost today, she suggested.

I think if we had a Mincome where they were helped a little, she added. That might be better.

* * *

Why Dauphin? How did a farming community play host to such a landmark social assistance program?

Good political timing didnt hurt.

In 1969, the left-leaning provincial NDP led by Edward Schreyer swept into power for the first time. The transition injected new rural sensitivities and democratic socialist influences into politics.

On the federal level, Pierre Elliott Trudeau was prime minister. The two men worked swiftly to set up conditions for a basic income experiment.

In 1973, Manitoba and the federal government signed a cost-sharing agreement: 75 per cent of the $17-million budget would be paid for by the feds; the rest by the province.

The project rolled out the next year.

All Dauphinites were automatically considered for benefits. One-third of residents qualified for Mincome cheques.

How Mincome cheques were calculated:

1. Everyone was given the same base amount: 60 per cent of Statistics Canadas low-income cut-off. The cut-off varied, depending on family size and where they lived. But in 1975, a single Canadian who was considered low-income earned $3,386 on average.

1975 2014 dollars

Individual $3,386 $16,094

Family of two $4,907 $20,443

2. Base amount was modified: 50 cents was subtracted from every dollar earned from other income sources

It was sort of something new and utopian. It was completely different, said Dauphins current mayor Eric Irwin. It was an attempt to define social services in a different way.

A gap in the system ignored

Dr. Evelyn Forget is the researcher at University of Manitoba credited for tracking down those 1,800 dusty boxes of Mincome raw data that sat forgotten for 30 years.

She first heard about the project in an undergraduate economics class at the University of Toronto in the 70s. Mincome cheques were still being delivered when her professors praised the experiment as really important, saying it was going to revolutionize the delivery of social programs. It stuck with her.

In 2005, she began looking for the Mincome data. After a strenuous search, she located the records at the provincial archives in Winnipeg. She was the first to look at them since they were packed up in 1979.

[Archivists] were in the process of wondering whether, in fact, they could throw them out because they took up a lot of space and nobody seemed interested in it, said Forget.

It didnt take her long to realize the plethora of files could never be funneled into any sort of statistical analysis. There were questionnaires with circled answers. And data on one family could be scattered between countless boxes.

It also didnt help that there were no labels or index.

Because of an ethics board policy, Forget couldnt directly contact the people whose data she was now in possession of the participants had consented to speak to the original researchers only. Instead, she used a guest spot on a local radio station to invite Mincome recipients to call her.

One woman called to say she remembered the Mincome project. In the early 1970s, she was a single mother raising two girls on welfare then called Mothers Allowance. She said she had always been treated respectfully, but there was one thing case workers said that bothered her.

She said she wanted to get some job training. They told her to go home and take care of her kids and they would take care of her, explained Forget.

When the opportunity to transfer from Mothers Allowance to Mincome came along, the woman took it. With no restrictions on how she could spend the money she was given, she signed up for training and got a part-time job at the local library which eventually became a full-time career.

So when I talked to her, she was incredibly proud of having modelled a different kind of life for her daughters, Forget said. The retired librarian invited Forget to visit her home. Inside, she was shown pictures from her two girls graduations, mother beaming with pride.

In 2011, Forget released a paper distilling how Mincome affected peoples health using census data. She found overall hospitalization rates (for accidents, injuries, and mental health diagnoses) dropped in the group who received basic income supplements.

By giving a communitys poorest residents enough to lift their incomes above the poverty line, there was a measurable impact on the health care system. Its this kind of logic that Forget hopes will propel the idea of basic income forward, four decades later.

Im enough of an optimist to believe that eventually were going to end up there. I think we already have part of the program in place, said Forget, referring to existing supplements including the Guaranteed Income Supplement for seniors and the National Child Benefit.

The one gap in the system right now is the working poor: people working in insecure and precarious jobs.

* * *

A classic Ottawa initiative

Two years before the Harper government shut down its operations, the National Council of Welfare released a damning report criticizing how welfare rules are trapping people in poverty.

Canadas welfare system is a box with a tight lid. Those in need must essentially first become destitute before they qualify for temporary assistance, said TD Banks former chief economist Don Drummond after the social agencys report was released in 2010.

But the record shows once you become destitute you tend to stay in that state. You have no means to absorb setbacks in income or unexpected costs. You cant afford to move to where jobs might be or upgrade your skills.

Former Conservative senator Hugh Segal is a longtime proponent of a guaranteed annual income policy. He believes the program could save provinces millions in social assistance spending on programs like welfare.

Instead of being forced through the welfare system, peoples eligibility would be assessed and reassessed with every income tax filing. Those who dont make above the low-income cut-off in their area would be automatically topped up, similar to Mincome in Dauphin.

How guaranteed annual income could work today:

Distributed as a federal Negative Income Tax Top-ups are calculated automatically and delivered after income tax filings Top-ups would render people ineligible for provincial welfare Provincial welfare money gets reallocated to other priorities (i.e. elder care, expanded early childcare programs)

But the idea never took off in Canada. The lessons of Mincome never spread. Simply put: The Mincome experiment discontinued because the governments changed.

Segal says what happened in Dauphin was a classic Ottawa initiative, with a lot of money spent putting a program in place, but without adequate investment to evaluate if it was effective or not.

Basic income not a silver bullet

Renewed energy in European campaigns for basic income have attracted more reporters and researchers to Dauphin. This summer, a Netherlands TV crew brought some excitement to town while on location to film a documentary about Mincome.

This started about a year ago with the press fooling around, starting to ask questions, Irwin said.

While the idea of basic income has gained traction in countries including Scotland, Switzerland, Namibia, Uganda, and India, others are skeptical. Im not convinced its a silver bullet, explains Leilani Farha, executive director of Canada Without Poverty and acting United Nations special rapporteur on adequate housing. Its not just about money. Its about so many other things.

Poverty is also about stigmatization and discrimination. You know, basic income is not going to address that. No single policy is going to address that, she said, criticizing the existing social assistance system as one that hands out paltry, paltry amounts of money.

The problem is that nothing is going on, said Farha referring to government momentum. Theres no leadership on these issues.

Currents changing in Canada

During his nine years in the Senate, Segal advocated strongly for basic income for Canadians. But in his time as a member of the Conservative caucus, he didnt see the tiniest indication of interest on the part of the government in another test site or implementation.

Thats because the current government shares the Mulroney administration view that the best social policy is a job, he said.

The one exception was late finance minister Jim Flaherty who established the working income tax benefit to aid working Canadians living in poverty. He was the only one to engage constructively, Segal says.

Segal said he doesnt expect the concept to gain traction again among the Harper Conservatives.

I would think its fair to say ideologically, the present government would eye the notion that this is some kooky left-wing scheme without addressing the fact that really strong social and economic conservatives like Milton Friedman argued in favour of a negative income tax, he said.

In Canada, the idea of an universal basic income was first presented at a Progressive Conservative policy convention in October of 1969. Then-leader Robert Stanfield argued the idea would consolidate overlapping security programs and reduce bureaucracy.

But in the last two elections, Segal says poverty did not come up in television debates between party leaders once. Its something he doesnt want to see repeated.

I think its an abomination that we wouldnt discuss it when we have close to 10 per cent of the population living beneath the poverty line.

Yet he remains more optimistic in this decade than the last because of signs of interest from the federal Liberal and Green parties.

One begins to sense, not that the ice is breaking, but the currents underneath the ice are beginning to move more quickly, he said.

http://m.huffpost.com/ca/entry/6335682

[freebuddy]

Got any thoughts on this Free Buddy? If it doesn't incite a reaction/response from you chances are it's not worth posting?

Doesn't almost anything I post that the right wing knee jerkers don't like do that, unless it's the Koch Brothers or Bengazi, that they apparently don't want to call attention to, so they have NOTHING to say about those subjects, if you happened to notice. As far as this subject, I sincerely hope people get their heads out of their asses and elect a non-Tory government that would pay attention and remedy this problem.

[Lockout Casualty]

Doesn't almost anything I post that the right wing knee jerkers don't like do that, unless it's the Koch Brothers or Bengazi, that they apparently don't want to call attention to, so they have NOTHING to say about those subjects, if you happened to notice. As far as this subject, I sincerely hope people get their heads out of their asses and elect a non-Tory government that would pay attention and remedy this problem.

You should really post commentary with your articles. It'd neuter at least 75% of the criticism about your posts and allow you advance your narrative on your terms. Otherwise, your posts are just a rush to point out how you don't post your opinion and get some jabs at you.

[taxi]

Doesn't almost anything I post that the right wing knee jerkers don't like do that, unless it's the Koch Brothers or Bengazi, that they apparently don't want to call attention to, so they have NOTHING to say about those subjects, if you happened to notice. As far as this subject, I sincerely hope people get their heads out of their asses and elect a non-Tory government that would pay attention and remedy this problem.

Your forum etiquette is just awful.

Post the link. Post the most important paragraph from that link. Post your own commentary on why the link is important.

Do not just post the entire article as a huge wall of text.

I'm scrolling through on a smart phone and every time you post an entire article it just makes the whole thread difficult to read.

[Buddhas Hand]

What's your point? Does our 5th place global ranking, based on your own source, somehow refute my argument?

When you consider the relative size of our economy, we are a freaking powerhouse with endless opportunity.

My point is that canada does not lead the world in upward mobility as you claimed , the scandinavian countries do, you just made a claim with out any information to back that claim, if you have a some information to back your claim , provide it.

Endless opportunity ? , canada's current unemployment rate is 6.6% this is more than the US , Aus, UK in fact most of the G20 countries.

[Standing_Tall#37]

What's your point? Does our 5th place global ranking, based on your own source, somehow refute my argument?

When you consider the relative size of our economy, we are a freaking powerhouse with endless opportunity.

You're wasting your time on these communists. Every citizen could make 6 figures/year if they wanted to but many are afraid to shake the stat quo.

[Buddhas Hand]

You're wasting your time on these communists. Every citizen could make 6 figures/year if they wanted to but many are afraid to shake the stat quo.

I am a humanist but am proud of the fact that one of my biological granfathers was one of the founding members of the australian communist party , I have only recently found this out and it has challenged my views on nature versus nurture.

Every canadian citisen could make six figure salaries anually ?

Canada's GDP in 2013 was 1825.10 billion , Canadas population as of 2013 was 35,000,000 , 35,000,0000 X 100,000= 35,000,000,0000,0000

[Standing_Tall#37]

I am a humanist but am proud of the fact that one of my biological granfathers was one of the founding members of the australian communist party , I have only recently found this out and it has challenged my views on nature versus nurture.

Every canadian citisen could make six figure salaries anually ?

Canada's GDP in 2013 was 1825.10 billion , Canadas population as of 2013 was 35,000,000 , 35,000,0000 X 100,000= 35,000,000,0000,0000

Hey I make decent money/ year at my job+ roughly 10 grand profit in cattle sales(small time hobby farm) + roughly 5-10 grand/year paid by the government in "Bounty" for killing wolves. I don't even work OT. And I don't work in ft Mac, mackay, cold lake, high level, ft St. John, Dawson or ft Nelson, etc...where my trade can make as much as $74/hr and OT is unlimited....

[Buddhas Hand]

Hey I make decent money/ year at my job+ roughly 10 grand profit in cattle sales(small time hobby farm) + roughly 5-10 grand/year paid by the government in "Bounty" for killing wolves. I don't even work OT. And I don't work in ft Mac, mackay, cold lake, high level, ft St. John, Dawson or ft Nelson, etc...where my trade can make as much as $74/hr and OT is unlimited....

So i am guessing you have worked out that not all canadians can make six figure salaries anually

[Jester13]

You're wasting your time on these communists. Every citizen could make 6 figures/year if they wanted to but many are afraid to shake the stat quo.

Your "if I can do it then anyone can" mentality is flawed.

[taxi]

My point is that canada does not lead the world in upward mobility as you claimed , the scandinavian countries do, you just made a claim with out any information to back that claim, if you have a some information to back your claim , provide it.

Endless opportunity ? , canada's current unemployment rate is 6.6% this is more than the US , Aus, UK in fact most of the G20 countries.

Canada measures unemployment differently than other countries. Our figures are also skewed by our horrible treatment of our aboriginal people.

[Buddhas Hand]

Canada measures unemployment differently than other countries. Our figures are also skewed by our horrible treatment of our aboriginal people.

Can you explain the difference in measurement please

[taxi]

Can you explain the difference in measurement please

We have a large segment of our population that is horribly disadvantaged, and that skews our results. Scandinavian counties do not.

[Buddhas Hand]

We have a large segment of our population that is horribly disadvantaged, and that skews our results. Scandinavian counties do not.

So that equates to measuring your unemployment differently to other nations ?

This is an indictment on your society of its treatment of it's indigenous citisens and as a few of us have stated on this board before the scandinavian countries lead the way in their treatment of their own citisens and their quality of life

You are not alone australia also treat it's indigenous people horribly and they are also included in our unemployment figures

[Standing_Tall#37]

So i am guessing you have worked out that not all canadians can make six figure salaries anually

Not everyone I guess but this country is willing to wipe anyone's ass. Theres subsidies, grants, assistance to get a better education. If people are willing to go to northern bc, Alberta & Saskatchewan, there's countless opportunity. Anyone can do it. But ya I guess in theory not everyone can in theory.

[KING ALBERTS]

I blame all the hippies in Vancouver, with their bachelor of arts, minimum wage job, huge student loans and no marketable skills.