Poverty, inequality & welfare

Slim pickin’s for BC’s children and youth in budget

Mar 2, 2012
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Just in case anyone missed just how bad BC’s new budget is for the province’s children and youth, I thought I’d post First Call’s reaction from our news release:  CHILDREN AND YOUTH GET SLIM PICKINGS IN BUDGET 2012 It notes that Finance Minister Falcon talks of fiscal prudence, but the budget’s failure to invest in the… View Article

Local living wage employer wins best employer award

Feb 29, 2012
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Hats off to Eclipse Awards, a local small business that was one of the first to seek certification as an official Living Wage Employer. At an awards ceremony last night, Eclipse won the Best Employer award from Small Business BC. Their status as a living wage employer played an important role. Here’s a news release… View Article

How to Destroy a Good Poverty Line

Feb 17, 2012
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[The following piece was authored by Michael Goldberg, Steve Kerstetter and Seth Klein] More than a decade ago, the federal and provincial governments started work on a new poverty line – the Market Basket Measure (MBM). After decades of distracting and divisive debates about poverty lines, Human Resources and Skills Development Canada crafted a methodology… View Article

BC dead last on inequality: BC Stats

Jan 30, 2012
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Last Friday BC Stats, the BC government’s statistical agency, weighed in on the topic of income inequality.  The CCPA has talked about this subject for years and it is nice to see that BC Stats has not only acknowledged the problem but says that: Compared to other provinces, BC ranked dead last in 2009, with… View Article

Top 10 Reasons for Upper-Income Tax Increases

Jan 17, 2012
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Some feel we shouldn’t increase taxes on upper-income folks. After all, people know best how to spend their money, whereas the government will only waste it on needless activities. Well then, I humbly submit the following Top 10 list of reasons for upper-income tax increases (in descending order). #10: Ridiculous real estate. Check out Vancouver’s… View Article

Tackling inequality means rethinking upper-income tax rates

Dec 23, 2011
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2011 was the year rising inequality finally exploded into the mainstream discourse. A few year-end reading recommendations: Victoria Times-Colonist editorial writer Paul Willcocks wrote a terrific piece on the subject (you can find it here); and similarly, a group of UBC economists (including CCPA research associate David Green) authored a series on inequality for the… View Article