If you’ve ever wondered How Canadians are REALLY doing, you’re in the
right place. A newly released report shows that: even in good economic times the
lion’s share of benefits go to the wealthy while the poor stay poor and the
shrinking middle class muddles through; Canadians are living longer but not
healthier – health among teenagers is especially worrying; but crime is down and
social relationships in our communities are stronger. The report also shows that
cuts or lack of improvements to government programs like welfare, Employment
Insurance and publicly funded medical services are hurting Canadians.
Abstract
This paper, which represents the living standards domain of the new Canadian Index of
Wellbeing, provides a comprehensive overview of trends in a number of indicators of living
standards over the 1981-2008 period in Canada. Part one examines trends in average and
median income and wealth indicators in Canada. Part two looks at the distribution of the
income and wealth of Canadians over time, including trends in poverty. Part three discusses
trends in income fluctuations or volatility. Part four analyzes trends in the economic security of
Canadians, including labour market security, food security, housing security, and the security
provided by the social safety net. The report also presents a synthesis of overall trends in living
standards, discusses living standard measurement issues, and puts forward a set of headline
indicators to capture the essentials of what has been happening to the living standards of
Canadians. Finally, the report comments on the sustainability of current levels of living
standards. [...] [Read More]
Poverty Reduction Initiatives in Canada Taking Action Together: CDPAC Third National Conference, Poverty and Action in Canada. Canadian Council on Social Development (25.11.08)
Food Banks Canada Food Banks Canada is the national charitable organization representing the food bank community across Canada.
Our Members, Affiliate Member food banks, and their respective agencies serve approximately 85% of people accessing emergency food programs nationwide.
We continue to work to find short term and long term solutions for the close to 800,000 hungry Canadians who are assisted by a food bank every month.
• Members of FBC
On 6 December 2006, the Ontario Association of Food Banks released Hungry for Change: A New Vision for Reducing Hunger and Poverty in Ontario, a
182-page collection of three discussion papers providing an in-depth examination of those hardest hit by hunger – including Ontario’s
children, Ontarians with disabilities, and working Ontarians – and presenting long-term solutions to reduce hunger and poverty for these Ontarians.
This fourth section in our Poverty and Homelessness pages presents selected statistics, news and resources on poverty and child poverty in Canada.
This page includes a range of subjects, including the definition of poverty, Low Income Cut Offs (LICOs) and other measures of poverty, minimum wage across Canada, welfare incomes across Canada, legal aid and public
legal education resources, provincial and community anti-poverty strategies, national and provincial Campaign 2000 poverty report cards, etc.
A comprehensive strategy for poverty eradication from the Winnipeg Roundtable, composed of representatives from business, labour, faith groups, and civil society groups.
Report on Canada's progress in implementing priority recommendations made by the United Nations Committee on the
Elimination of Discrimination against Women in 2008. FAFIA (Feb 2010)
Poverty expands healthcare costs, policing burdens and diminished educational outcomes. This in turn depresses productivity, labour force flexibility, life spans
and economic expansion and social progress, all of which takes place at huge cost to taxpayers, federal and provincial treasuries and the robust potential of the
Canadian consumer economy. [...]
We believe that eradicating poverty and homelessness is not only the humane and decent priority of a civilized democracy, but absolutely essential to a productive and
expanding economy benefitting from the strengths and abilities of all its people. [...]
Source:Income of Canadians
The Daily, Statistics Canada (17.06.10) Emphasis added.
In 2008, the 20% of persons with the highest family after-tax income had, on average, 5.4 times the family after-tax income as those in the lowest 20%. This ratio has been
virtually unchanged since 2000.
Just over 3 million Canadians lived in a low-income situation in 2008, virtually unchanged from 2007, using the after-tax low income cut-offs. This represents 9.4% of the population.
The Conservative Government has proven itself to be willing to fast-track policies that meet its agenda. It is clear, focused and resolute in getting its version of government rapidly through Parliament. A Basic
Income Program meets current Harper Government requirements: reduced government bureaucracy, simplicity, ease of implementation, quick to apply and take effect, economic savings, and a guaranteed vote-getter
from those who presently do not bother to vote.
Elizabeth May, Leader of the Green Party of Canada, tosses the gauntlet to Mr. Harper and Mr. Flaherty, "Here is a policy, long overdue, that can be implemented easily and quickly, namely, a Universal Basic Income
Program." One of the best-known champions of this type of program in North America was Milton Friedman, the free-market economist.
Poverty is consistently linked to poor health, lower literacy, poor school performance for children, more crime, and greater stress for family members. It is society as a whole that bears the costs
of poverty, through higher public health care costs, increased policing and crime costs, lost productivity, and foregone economic activity.
Viewed in the context of recent decisions delivered to the Premiers by the Harper government, this type of program provides a logical alternative to continued rapid increases in health care costs. Poverty is directly
related to the increased cost of health care. Providing basic income would also benefit all Canadians in reduced costs for education, criminal justice, and social services.
In 2007, it would have taken $12.6 billion to give the 3.5 million Canadians living in poverty enough income to live above the poverty line. And yet, that year, Canadians spent at least double that amount
treating the consequences of poverty, says the National Council of Welfare [...] in its report, The Dollars and Sense of
Solving Poverty[Autumn 2011; for details, see Poverty in Canada: News & Reports].
"We're hoping Canadians will talk to their politicians and say: 'Look, this makes sense. Let's shift our thinking to an investment-based approach. Let's save dollars. Let's make sure everyone is better off,"
said the Chair of the National Council of Welfare, John Rook. The Council is a federally-appointed advisory body to the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development.
There is more and more evidence that we cannot afford poverty. For example, 80% of incarcerated Canadian women are there for poverty-related crimes; 39% for failure to pay a fine. Corrections Canada estimates it
costs, on average, $175,000 per year to keep a woman in jail; this increases to over $250,000 for those who spend time in the segregated maximum security units, often a result of mental illness. As the Organization
for Economic Co-operation and Development reported on Dec. 5, the wage gap in Canada is widening, with the top 10% in 2008 earning $103,500 on average, 10 times higher than the bottom 10%, who made on average $10,260.
Canada already pursues basic income-like policies through the guaranteed income supplement (GIS) for low-income seniors and tax benefits for families with children.
In a commentary published [15 December 2011], Glen Hodgson, Senior Vice-President and Chief Economist
at the Conference Board of Canada, said the prospect of both economic and social gains make it the right time to reconsider this "big idea".
The Green Party of Canada shares this view and is keen to support a program that is so vital to the health and vitality of the Canadian economy. "Poverty is not a partisan issue, nor a political one – it is
about people. The Basic Income Program is one that the Conservative government can surely support," said May.
17th Canada ranks 17 out of 24 OECD nations on children’s material well-being. (Source)
1 in 10 Canadian children live in poverty. 1 in 4 Aboriginal children live in poverty. (Source)
A solution Shifting 1% of Canadians’ collective after-tax income to the 1 in 10 Canadians living in low income would eliminate poverty in Canada. (Source)
Toronto – The NDP has shown that it understands how poverty is a drag on the economy as well as the root cause of health, social and justice problems, thus affecting all Canadians. Campaign 2000 is extremely pleased
to read the commitment to legislation that will firmly secure poverty reduction on Canada’s priority agenda. This set of proposals is comprehensive and practical in addressing the multiple dimensions of poverty. The
specific commitments to increasing the child tax benefit by $700. per child, to more community-based child care services in the first year and to increase the Guaranteed Income Supplement for seniors in the first budget
lifting every senior out of poverty will make a concrete and significant difference in the daily lives of many families in Canada. Along with improvements to Employment Insurance and additional funds for affordable housing,
these are all key strategies to reduce child and family poverty and improve the quality of life for all of us.
"With more than 3 million people living in poverty, including one in ten children and their families, it is imperative that Canada’s leaders address this pressing issue. This platform is the only one to recommend an
increase to the child tax benefit, the most powerful lever that we have to reduce the number of children and families in poverty and to reduce the depth of poverty for tens of thousands of families across Canada. The
Job Creation Tax Credit along with the re-introduction of the federal minimum wage will send a very important signal to Canadians, to small businesses and to the provinces and territories about the importance
of good jobs with decent wages. The recommended improvements to EI, including elimination of the two week waiting period, revising the qualifying period and raising the rate of benefits to 60 percent would make
a tremendous difference for people who struggle to pay the rent and feed their children," said Laurel Rothman, National Coordinator of Campaign 2000.
"These proposals also provide hope and encouragement to those struggling to lift themselves out of poverty and to those who are one pay cheque away from poverty. The proposal to create a designated transfer of
$800 million to provinces and territories to reduce tuition and the $200 million to expand student grants will make a big difference to low- and modest-income students aiming to attend post-secondary education and not
able to take on unmanageable debt loads. I’m glad to see specific commitments on child care and affordable housing also. Those are the two biggest expenses that young families have to balance and far too many
families have to resort to food banks to be able to balance their budgets at the end of the month," added Rothman.
The NDP platform employs legislation as a key vehicle to ensure that these priorities on poverty reduction, income security for children and seniors, affordable housing and early learning and child care are central
items on the public agenda.
Campaign 2000 is a non partisan cross-Canada coalition of over 120 organizations committed to ending
child and family poverty in Canada. www.campaign2000.ca
OTTAWA – Canadians on welfare are stuck in a poverty trap because they're forced to give up their assets before they can get social assistance, then limited on how much they can earn once
they find work, a new national report says.
People who get welfare can work, but their income is clawed back and they often lose other welfare benefits like dental care and housing support, the National Council of Welfare says in a report released Monday.
"Low asset limits, low-earning exemptions and low welfare rates create the perfect trap, especially for single people," said John Rook, the council's chairperson.
The rules vary by province, but generally people looking for welfare have to spend their retirement savings before they qualify. Only six provinces have programs where people can enrol to keep some savings.
"Existing policies can be counter-productive when they expect households to spend it all now," said Barbara Gosse, spokeswoman for the Social and Enterprise Development Innovations, a non-profit
organization that works on financial literacy.
"Welfare policy needs to be amended so it does not strip applicants of the same productive financial assets they will need to become self-sufficient and leave and stay off welfare later on," she said. "These
assets act as a trampoline, not just a social safety net."
The report says the federal Working Income Tax Benefit, which allows workers on welfare to keep more of what they make, is a good program but needs to be increased.
Manitoba has a program under which families can keep up to $16,000 in savings, which the council says is a good example for other provinces.
The Winnipeg Roundtable participants included representatives from business, labour, faith groups, and civil society groups. Members of Parliament from
the Liberal, NDP and Bloc Québécois took up an all-party invitation to attend.
The Winnipeg Statement is a comprehensive strategy for poverty eradication and calls for
government leaders to demonstrate commitment and to work together to eradicate poverty in Canada during the next decade. Read more about the event.
On Wednesday, June 16, 2010, the Member of Parliament for Sault Ste. Marie, Tony Martin (NDP), seconded by the Member of Parliament for
Chambly-Borduas, Yves Lessard (Bloc Québécois), rose in the House of
Commons to introduce Bill C-545 – "An Act to Eliminate Poverty in Canada".
This private member’s bill, if passed into law in its current form, would provide a foundation for federal engagement, leadership and accountability for eliminating poverty in Canada.
Key provisions of the bill include the following:
Recognition of poverty as a "condition of a human being who does not
have the resources, means, choices and power necessary to acquire and maintain
economic self-reliance and to facilitate their integration into and
participation in society"
Recognition of poverty as a human rights issue and anchoring the
federal response to poverty in a human rights framework;
Imposing on the federal government "the obligation to eliminate poverty
and promote social inclusion by establishing and implementing a strategy for
poverty elimination in consultation with the provincial, territorial, municipal
and Aboriginal governments and with civil society organizations"
Requiring the federal strategy to have short, medium and long term targets
to eliminate poverty;
Establishing the "Office of the Poverty Elimination Commissioner",
independent of government and to help hold the federal government to account for
progress in addressing poverty; and
Amend the Canadian Human Rights Act to include "social condition" as a prohibited ground of discrimination.
Bill C-545 aligns with the second goal of Dignity for All: The Campaign for a Poverty-free Canada, which calls for "a federal anti-poverty Act
that ensures enduring federal commitment and accountability for results." Over the summer, it is expected that individuals and organizations behind the
campaign and/or with related efforts will be encouraging all Members of Parliament to support the bill and ensure its passage into history-making law.
Canada Without Poverty and the CWP Advocacy Network congratulate Mr. Martin and Mr. Lessard for helping introduce Bill C-545 into the House. We hope
all Members of Parliament and Senators will now work to ensure its passage into law.
The Social Determinants of Health: The Canadian Facts
The World Health Organization describes the social determinants of health as "the conditions in
which people are born, grow, live, work and age, including the health system." Social determinants of health include, for example, the circumstances of early childhood, parenting, the
availability of adequate nutrition, education, the effects of poverty, working conditions, unemployment, social support, access to medical care, affordable housing, and so on
(Wilkinson and Marmot 2003). A growing body of research makes evident the fact that social inequities and exclusivity have dramatically adverse effects upon human health. Economic and
social disparities are perpetuated and exacerbated by poorly conceived, ideologically based policies which fail to apprehend the significance of these determinants in holistic terms.
The issues are complex, to be sure, and they are not commonly known, but an understanding of the social determinants that affect health and
well-being is of crucial importance in Canadian society. It is something we owe ourselves, and one another.
The following excerpts describe a new report — the only one of its kind in Canada — by Juha Mikkonen and Dennis Raphael. This report explores the key social determinants that affect
Canadians, examines their ramifications, and suggests specific economic and social policy strategies to remediate factors which negatively affect our health and longevity. Written in
plain English, the report is a lucid, well-referenced and finely illustrated quick read that provides invaluable perspective on the Canadian social matrix. Highly recommended.
TORONTO, April 28, 2010 – A report released today by York University health researchers offers Canadians the opportunity to learn how their living conditions will determine whether they stay healthy or become ill.
Social Determinants of Health: The Canadian Facts shows why these factors are so important for health and documents the state of these living conditions in Canada in an accessible manner for the Canadian public.
"Our key message is that the health of Canadians is much less determined by the health care system than we typically think. Much more important are public policies that influence our living
conditions," says Dennis Raphael, Professor in York’s School of Health Policy & Management and the report’s co-author.
Raphael and visiting scholar Juha Mikkonen explain in everyday language and with compelling graphics how Canadians’ health is shaped by how much income and wealth they have,
whether or not they are employed and if so, the working conditions they experience. They pull together a wide range of research to show how health is powerfully influenced by Canadians’
ability to obtain quality education, food and housing, among other factors.
The report finds these conditions are declining with serious ramifications for the quality and longevity of Canadians’ lives, and outlines specific ways that the situation can be improved. [...]
This report is free to the public. Click the image at left to download the PDF (4.11 MB).
A bound high-resolution color copy may be ordered in Canada for $30 CAD ($25 + $5 shipping);
and in the United States for $35 USD ($25 + $10 shipping). Details.
Mikkonen J, Raphael D. Social Determinants of Health: The Canadian Facts.
Toronto: York University School of Health Policy and Management. May 2010: 62pp.
ISBN 978-0-9683484-1-3
The primary factors that shape the health of Canadians are not medical treatments or lifestyle choices but rather the living conditions they
experience. These conditions have come to be known as the social determinants of health. This information – based on decades of research and hundreds of studies
in Canada and elsewhere – is unfamiliar to most Canadians. Canadians are largely unaware that our health is shaped by how income and wealth is distributed,
whether or not we are employed and if so, the working conditions we experience.
Our health is also determined by the health and social services we receive, and our ability to obtain quality education, food and
housing, among other factors. And contrary to the assumption that Canadians have personal control over these factors, in most cases these living conditions are –
for better or worse – imposed upon us by the quality of the communities, housing situations, work settings, health and social service agencies, and educational
institutions with which we interact.
Improving the health of Canadians requires we think about health and its determinants in a more sophisticated manner than has been the case to date.
Social Determinants of Health: The Canadian Facts considers 14 social determinants of health:
Income and Income Distribution
Education
Unemployment and Job Security
Employment and Working Conditions
Early Childhood Development
Food Insecurity
Housing
Social Exclusion
Social Safety Network
Health Services
Aboriginal Status
Gender
Race
Disability
The publication outlines why they are important; how Canada is doing in
addressing them; and what can be done to improve their quality. The purpose of
the document is to [...] promote greater awareness of the social determinants
of health and the development and implementation of public policies that improve
their quality. [...]
Sobering statistics cited by the report include:
15 per cent of Canadian children are living in poverty, putting Canada at a rank of 20th out of 30 of the world’s wealthiest nations as defined by the Organisation for Economic
Co-operation and Development (OECD).
Only 17 percent of Canadian families have access to regulated child care. Canada ranked last among 25 wealthy developed nations in meeting various early childhood development objectives.
Canada is amongst the lowest in its coverage of total health care costs. Medicare covers only 70 per cent of total health care costs, giving Canada a rank of 22nd of 30 OECD nations for
public coverage of health care costs.
Canada is among the nations with the greatest gap between men’s and Women’s earnings. Canada ranks 19th of 22 OECD nations in reducing the earnings gap between men and women.
Over 40 per cent of Canadians with disabilities are not in the labour force, forcing many of them to rely upon social assistance benefits. Canada ranks 27th of 29 in public spending on
disability-related issues.
A British Columbia city council adopted the first municipal living wage policy in Canada last night – a move that will hopefully become a standard for cities across the country.
The New Westminster City Council voted unanimously yesterday for a living wage bylaw based on a calculation of the hourly wage required to keep a family with two children and two
working parents above the poverty line.
"This is a great example of the important role municipal governments can play in reducing poverty in their communities and across Canada," said Paul Moist, national president of the
Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE).
New Westminster’s living wage policy will apply to both full-time and part-time employees, and will apply to both direct staff and to contractors performing physical work on City properties.
To raise awareness in the Vancouver area, the union has partnered with the Metro Vancouver Living Wage for Families Campaign. The New Westminster decision is a great win for the
coalition of community organizations.
"Raising the incomes of poor families creates stronger communities, both socially and economically," said Moist. "New Westminster has set a strong example for cities across the country."
What is a Living Wage?
At $16.74 per hour for Metro Vancouver — or $30,467 annually for each parent working full-time — the living wage covers only bare bones expenses. The living wage for BC’s Capital Region
is $16.39 per hour, due to minor variations in the expenses based on actual costs of living in the Capital Region.
This living wage calculation does not cover:
credit card, loan, or other debt/interest payments
savings for retirement or for children’s future education
owning a home
anything beyond minimal recreation, entertainment, or holiday costs
costs of caring for a disabled, seriously ill, or elderly family member
The Living wage is different from the minimum wage, which is the legislated minimum set by the provincial government. The living wage calls on employers to meet
a higher standard for both their direct staff and major contractors – it reflects what people need to support their families based on the actual costs of living in a specific community.
If you are interested in becoming a Living Wage Employer or just want to find out more about what is involved, email your contact details to
info@livingwageforfamilies.ca. All queries will be treated in the strictest confidence.
"No Action, No Progress" for Women and Children in Need
Source:No Action: No Progress
Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action Report on Canada's Progress in Implementing Priority Recommendations made by the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of
Discrimination against Women in 2008. FAFIA (February 2010) Pages 8, 11-14. Emphasis in original and
emphasis added.
[...]
Canada was asked to report back within one year to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) on steps it has taken to implement two
recommendations made by the Committee after its review of Canada in 2008.
The two recommendations of the CEDAW Committee are that the Government of Canada take concrete steps to address:
women’s poverty and inadequate social assistance rates; and
police and government failure to prevent, or investigate promptly and thoroughly, violence against Aboriginal women and girls.
The request that Canada report back to the CEDAW Committee in one year, rather than in the usual four years, indicates the seriousness of these issues.
Canada has taken no steps to effectively implement these recommendations in the past year. [...]
Cuts to welfare rates and erosion of the value of benefits through inflation have had a harsh impact on women who are in need. Women who are more likely to
have to turn to welfare, including single mothers and Aboriginal women must now rely on welfare incomes so low that the National Council of Welfare Chairperson
recently called them "shameful and morally unsustainable in a rich country." 7
[...]
The current government of Canada describes its position on federal-provincial relations as "open federalism". It cleaves to a "bright-line" view of the constitutional divisions of
powers between the federal and provincial governments, and treats its own spending power with suspicion. In effect, this position permits the federal government to simply wash its
hands of the problems of poor women, on the grounds that they are the responsibility of the provincial and territorial governments. This policy ignores the long history of the federal
government’s involvement in the development of social policy and programs. It ignores the federal government’s responsibilities under s. 36 of the Constitution to work with the
legislatures and governments of the provinces to provide "essential public services of reasonable quality to all Canadians". Further, it ignores the overarching character of women’s
human rights and the federal government’s leadership role in the implementation of Canada’s international human rights obligations.
In 2007, the National Council of Welfare reviewed anti-poverty strategies in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Sweden, New Zealand and other countries and concluded that if Canada
continues to have no long-term vision, no plan, no accountability, and no resources assigned – which is the current situation – the most disadvantaged Canadians will continue
to be mired in poverty for years to come.
On November 24, 2009, the Parliament of Canada passed a resolution referred to it by the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities:
That, with November 24th, 2009 marking the 20th anniversary of the 1989 unanimous resolution of this House to eliminate poverty among Canadian children by the year 2000, and not having achieved
that goal, be it resolved that the Government of Canada, taking into consideration the Committee’s work in this regard, and respecting provincial and territorial jurisdiction, develop an immediate
plan to eliminate poverty in Canada for all. 11
Because the current Government of Canada governs as a minority, this resolution represents the will of the majority of Members of Parliament, but not the will of the Government.
In short, the federal government has not acted during this period to set standards or reconfigure federal-provincial fiscal arrangements in order to give stability, adequacy and consistency
to social assistance rates across the country.
Nor have provincial and territorial governments acted independently to increase rates to make them adequate. [...]
New Poverty Series by Michael Enright, CBC Sunday Edition
With a timely set of interviews, CBC Sunday Edition host Michael Enright launched a new Poverty Series on 18 October 2009. He spoke with Conservative Senator Hugh Segal, whose take on the issue is both
informed and pragmatic; Segal explores the backward thinking and Victorian attitudes that prevent real progress on this front, and offers real solutions. His approach is truly enlightening.
The second interviews, with Ron Hikel and Evelyn Forget, provide important information with respect to MINCOME, a successful guaranteed annual income experiment conducted in Dauphin, Manitoba,
between 1974 and 1978.
The Sunday Edition Podcast, CBC: Poverty Series Launch
18 October 2009
Poverty segment begins at the 00:07:55 mark.
It's a problem that may never go away. "The poor," or so the Bible tells us, "will be with us always." But the idea that poverty itself is an intractable issue does not excuse governments
from trying to address it. And for decades, politicians and policy makers have tried in many different ways to reduce if not eliminate it.
Over the course of this season at the Sunday Edition, we want to talk about poverty — why does it exist in one of the richest countries on earth, how big a problem is it,
and what can be done about it? But poverty is a problem that's increasingly difficult to define. In this country, we can't even agree on how to measure it.
Statistics Canada can tell us the unemployment rate, the gross domestic product and the consumer price index. But what Stats Canada won't — and can't — enumerate is a poverty rate.
And that's because the politicians haven't agreed on exactly what poverty is. Senator Hugh Segal is expending much of his political capital on keeping poverty on the national agenda.
And he's not only one of the few national figures devoted to this issue — he's one of the even fewer Conservatives to take up the fight. Senator Segal joined us from a studio in Kingston.
Poverty: MINCOME Duration: 00:19:52
That's Senator Hugh Segal. He's one of the politicians that's doing what he can to try to reduce poverty in this country. As the Senator mentioned - back in the 1970s, an ambitious
experiment in social engineering was conducted in the province of Manitoba. It was called MINCOME — as in minimum guaranteed income.
The study involved some residents of the city of Winnipeg - but what made MINCOME so audacious was what happened in a small farming town about 300 kilometers northwest. From 1974 through
1978, Dauphin, Manitoba was a town with no poverty. Every one of the nearly 13,000 residents of Dauphin and the surrounding area was eligible to receive a guaranteed annual income. The
information gathered throughout the project was supposed to help policy makers evaluate the plan to see if the program should be expanded. But when the funding dried up, the project ended.
And the data remained unexamined — in hundreds of boxes which were put into storage. Nearly thirty years went by before anyone started to analyze MINCOME.
Ron Hikel was the Executive Director of MINCOME. He now works for US Congressman Eric Massa and was in our studio in Washington, DC. Evelyn Forget is a professor in the Community Health
Sciences Department at the University of Manitoba. She's the one who tracked down the MINCOME papers, decades after the conclusion of the study. And she's completed her first analysis
of the data. She's was in our Winnipeg studio.
Inequality...
On 27 December 2009, Michael featured a discussion with Ed Broadbent, former leader of the NDP, and Kate Pickett PhD,
Senior Lecturer at the University of York and co-author (with RG Wilkinson, social epidemiologist) of The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better (2009).
Inequality breeds stress across the full spectrum of society, not just among down trodden. Indeed, while subject to stress, individuals become far more susceptible to syndromes like depression,
phobias of divers sorts, and basic anxiety. This fact renders the individual far more likely to develop one of a range of physical, potentially perilous conditions such as obesity, accompanying
heart disease, addictions, immune deficiency as well as premature ageing. The super-rich thus become demons, a drain and a plague on society rather than a super-hero class of noble, society-saving
investors, or the like.1
The level of poverty is much less important than the level of inequality, which has tremendously negative consequences. The reality, summarises Broadbent, is that equality works, and inequality
is dysfunctional. Pickett and Broadbent explore strategies for achieving greater equality.
Introduction, p.4ff; Measuring Poverty
How does one measure poverty? What factors should be considered? What degree of deprivation makes the cut? Measures and definitions are often quite controversial precisely
because they are so subjective. “Choosing a poverty line depends on how high or how low we set our sights for the well-being of the materially disadvantaged in our society”
(deGroot-Magetti, 2002, p. 16).
It comes as no surprise, then, that in Canada there is no official poverty line. Instead, there are several different measures that provide slightly different information about those living on low-income,
most notably the Low-Income Measure (LIM), the Market Basket Measure (MBM), and the Low-Income Cut-Off (LICO). [...] The measures have different uses, advantages and disadvantages, and as emphasized by
Statistics Canada (2011a), the three measures “cumulatively ... provide a better understanding of the phenomenon of low income as a whole”. When compared side-by-side over time, however, they
provide similar trends, thereby bolstering each other’s reliability as measures of low-income.
The income level represented by the LIM is 50% of the median income in a given geographical area, and is commonly used for international comparisons, with the assumption that “being poor is relative to a
nation’s standard of living” (Shillington & Stapleton, 2010, p.7). Its major drawback is that it does not provide an indication of a family’s purchasing power – and inferred quality of life – at that income.
The MBM, on the other hand, defines “low-income” precisely by purchasing power. It determines the cost of a basket of goods – the contents of which is determined by Human Resources and Skills Development
Canada (HRSDC) – which varies depending on where you live. The cost of the basket of goods is then compared to disposable income to determine low-income figure. The benefit of this measure is that it
is geographically sensitive; however, the validity of the goods included in the basket has been criticized. While Statistics Canada and the HRSDC state that the MBM represents “a standard of living
that is a compromise between subsistence and social inclusion”, Shillington and Stapleton (2010) challenge this. They note, for example, that the MBM includes “five pairs of long
underwear, but no computer access” (p.7). This brings us to the question of what people need to live out of poverty in Canada, which will be addressed in more detail later in the
paper. Having a computer, for example, might be deemed crucial to social inclusion, and social inclusion crucial to finding a good job with a decent income. The Low-Income Cut-Off is the oldest and most
established measure of low-income, dating back to 1967. It represents a threshold “below which families devote a larger share of income to the necessities of food, shelter and clothing than the average
family would” (Statistics Canada, 2011). The benefit of LICO, on top of its wealth of historical data, is that it is more up-to-date than the other two measures, using annually released
Consumer Price Index data. The MBM and LIM, on the other hand, are typically available 16-18 months after the end of the reference year. LICO has been criticized, however, for its lack of geographic sensitivity, in
contrast with the MBM, and for its assumptions around spending patterns – which date back to 1992. Statistics Canada no longer collects the data necessary to update these spending patterns (Shillington & Stapleton, 2010).
Settling on a statistical measure of poverty is challenging. [...] [Read More]
1.1 Defining and Measuring Poverty in Canada
In order to report on poverty rates and trends in Canada, it is necessary to first discuss the challenges involved in defining and measuring poverty. The conceptualisation
and measurement of poverty is complex and continues to be a source of debate among poverty reduction advocates, social policy analysts and policy-makers. In general, poverty
is defined either in absolute terms — inability to obtain the basic necessities of life — or in relative terms — being at a relative disadvantage economically and socially in comparison
to others living in the same community. Internationally, multiple measures of poverty have been developed on the basis of these definitions.
In the context of developed nations such as Canada, poverty is usually defined in relative terms. A definition of poverty in the modern welfare state written by the late
Peter Townsend, a British sociologist, researcher and social activist, is commonly used as a basis to establish measures of poverty and inequality.
Individuals, families and groups in the population can be said to be in poverty when they lack the resources to obtain the types of diet, participate in the activities and have the
living conditions and amenities which are customary, or at least widely encouraged, or approved, in the societies to which they belong. Their resources are so seriously below
those commanded by the average individual or family that they are, in effect, excluded from ordinary living patterns, customs and activities.
Peter Townsend, Poverty in the United Kingdom: A Survey of Household Resources and Standards of Living, University of California Press, Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1979, p. 31.
The implied poverty line or threshold in Townsend’s definition is relative and draws attention to concepts of deprivation and social exclusion. To determine who is at a relative
disadvantage compared to others, a minimum acceptable standard of living must first be established for a particular community. This standard can be established using a
deprivation index—which can provide information on the quality of housing, clothing, nutrition, healthcare and social engagement, and/or measures of consumption
expenditure—as the amount spent by a household on consumer goods and services. Today, social policy analysts tend to agree that in order to paint a complete picture of poverty, measures
of low income must be supplemented with measures of deprivation.
The Government of Canada has yet to adopt an official definition or measure of poverty. In the absence of an official directive from the federal government, social policy
analysts in Canada commonly use national statistics on low income as thresholds to measure the incidence of poverty, the depth of poverty (i.e., the gap between a
household’s or individual’s income and the low income thresholds) and the persistence of poverty for households and individuals over time. These statistics are typically based on
the Low Income Cut-offs (LICOs), released annually by Statistics Canada. The LICOs provide a relative measure of low income by calculating the income level at which
households spend at least 20 percentage points more of their income than the average household on food, clothing and shelter. The number and proportion of households whose
incomes fall below this threshold, and who are therefore considered to be living on low income, can then be determined. The LICOs vary according to family and community size
and are calculated on a before- and after-tax basis (see Table 1.1).
Table 1.1 Low Income Cut-offs (1992 base) After Tax, 2008
Size of Family Unit
Community Size
Rural Areas
Urban Areas
Less than 30,000
30,000 to 99,999
100,000 to 499,999
500,000 and over
1 person
$12,019
$13,754
$15,344
$15,538
$18,373
2 persons
$14,628
$16,741
$18,676
$18,911
$22,361
3 persons
$18,215
$20,845
$23,255
$23,548
$27,844
4 persons
$22,724
$26,007
$29,013
$29,378
$34,738
5 persons
$25,876
$29,614
$33,037
$33,453
$39,556
6 persons
$28,698
$32,843
$36,640
$37,100
$43,869
7 or more persons
$31,519
$36,072
$40,241
$40,747
$48,181
Source: Statistics Canada, Low Income Lines, 2008-2009, Income Research Paper Series,
June 2010, Table 1, p. 19, PDF.
LICOs for 2008 are presented in this table to ensure consistency with the Low Income Measures (LIMs) presented in this report. Although LICOs for 2009 are available, LIMs for this year has not
yet been released by Statistics Canada.
Another measure released by Statistics Canada, the Low Income Measure (LIM), is
set at half the median family income (see Table 1.2). The LIM is adjusted for different
household types and calculated on the basis of market income, before-tax income and
after-tax income. It is most often used for international comparisons (many countries set
their low-income measure at 50% or 60% of the median family income).
Table 1.2 Low Income Measures After Tax, 2008
Household size
Low Income Measure
1 person
18 582 $
2 persons
26 279 $
3 persons
32 185 $
4 persons
37 164 $
5 persons
41 551 $
6 persons
45 516 $
7 persons
49 163 $
Source: Statistics Canada, Low Income Lines, 2008-2009, Income Research Paper Series,
June 2010, Table 3, p. 26, PDF.
LIMs used to be calculated according to the number of adults and children in the economic family. Since 2010, they are calculated by number of individuals in the household. For more details, see
Statistics Canada, p. 10.
The use of the low-income thresholds established by the LICOs and LIM as substitutes for measures of poverty has raised a number of concerns. Among these is the
concern that low-income measures are not valid indicators of material or social deprivation. Studies have shown that household income, even when adjusted for
household size and composition, is not an indicator of actual living standards. Low-income measures fail to take into account personal assets, fringe benefits, the value of free or
subsidized services and other community supports that may improve the living standard of some people whose income is below the low-income thresholds. Unreported income can
also undermine the reliability of these measures. Nonetheless, data on household income remains the best data currently available on the financial resources of individuals.
Poverty thresholds can also be established based on the cost of a specific basket of goods deemed essential to meet particular community standards of expenditure.
To complement the two low-income measures compiled by Statistics Canada, in 1997, Human Resources and Skills Development Canada (HRSDC) (then Human Resources
Development Canada) in collaboration with a Federal-Provincial-Territorial Working Group of Officials on Social Development Research and Information developed a measure
known as the Market Basket Measure (MBM). The MBM is a measure of the disposable income (total income less income/payroll taxes, payroll deductions and child
support/alimony payments) a household needs to purchase a specific basket of goods and services. The basket includes food, clothing and footwear, shelter, transportation, and
other goods and services (e.g., basic telephone service, school supplies, household needs, personal care products, etc.). The cost of this basket is calculated for 48 different
regions across Canada. It should be noted that some provinces have adapted the MBM to meet their particular monitoring needs. The MBM thresholds are adjusted for family size
and composition. MBM thresholds have been available since 2000 on the same base. That base was revised in 2008 [see First Comprehensive Review
of the Market Basket Measure of Low Income, June 2010]. Table 1.3 presents a sample of MBM thresholds for selected Canadian cities in 2007 (2008 base).
Table 1.3 Market Basket Measure Thresholds for Family of Two Adults and Two Children in Various Cities, 2007 (2008 base)
City
MBM Threshold
St. John’s, Newfoundland
$28,245
Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island
$30,301
Halifax, Nova Scotia
$28,756
Saint John, New Brunswick
$27,109
Montréal, Québec
$26,537
Toronto, Ontario
$29,509
Winnipeg, Manitoba
$26,126
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
$26,750
Calgary, Alberta
$29,281
Vancouver, British Columbia
$28,418
Source: Human Resources and Skills Development Canada, First Comprehensive Review of the Market Basket Measure of Low Income, Report SP-953-06-10E, June 2010, p. 75, PDF.
The Basic Needs Poverty Line (BNL) is another measure that establishes poverty lines based on a basket of goods and services. The BNL was developed by Chris Sarlo,
an Associate Professor of Economics and Director of the School of Business and Economics at Nipissing University in North Bay, Ontario, and an adjunct scholar with the
Fraser Institute, who for many years has been raising concerns over the use of the LICOs as thresholds to measure poverty in Canada. The BNL is considered to be a measure of
"real deprivation" or a lack of basic necessities. It is based on a basket of goods and services needed to maintain the long-term physical well-being of an individual according to
a minimum acceptable standard within the community in which that person resides. Although Sarlo argues that the BNL is a more realistic and credible measure of poverty
than the LICOs, he advocated for the use of both relative and absolute measures of poverty in his testimony before the Committee. [...]
Table 1.4 Basic Needs Poverty Lines by Household Size, 2007
Household Size
Basic Needs Poverty Line
1 person
$10,520
2 persons
$16,508
3 persons
$20,064
4 persons
$23,307
5 persons
$26,323
6 persons
$29,163
Source: Chris Sarlo, What is Poverty? Providing Clarity for Canada, Fraser Institute, May 2008,
Table 1, p. 8, PDF.
Because the BNL is based on a fairly strict market basket of goods, it calculates
significantly lower poverty thresholds, rates and trends than those calculated using the
LICOs and the LIM. The BNL also calculates poverty lines that are lower than the
thresholds set under the MBM as the goods and services included in the MBM’s basket go
beyond a subsistence standard. Table 1.4 presents the basic needs poverty lines for 2007. [...] → Get the full report.
The best way is to get money into the hands of low-income people and adopt other practical and effective measures, such as affordable housing, education and training and so on.
The other way is to define poverty out of existence by statistical sleight of hand: Tell the poor, and everyone else, that the poor aren’t really poor, and hope that they just go away.
The Fraser Institute, the private-market-obsessed policy institute, opted for numerical dexterity as it published its latest research paper on poverty in Canada. Author Christopher Sarlo
makes the astonishing claim that poverty in Canada has shrunk to a statistically tiny level in recent years.
[...] First, COMPLEXITY. "No single indicator or group of indicators can possibly capture the full complexity of income poverty in the UK." Those are the opening words of an
excellent overview of the tricky and politically-charged task of developing reliable poverty indicators by the UK’s
New Policy Institute. Unlike Europe, Canada doesn’t
have an officially-approved poverty indicator or indicators. Instead, we have two widely-accepted measures called the Low Income Cut-off (LICO) and the Low Income Measure
(LIM) which measure relative poverty, or income inequality. And we have a whole variety of "market baskets" which measure absolute poverty by adding up a list of necessities
to create a basic income required for meagre existence. Sarlo exploits the lack of consensus in Canada to dance around the methodological questions and create his very own
definition of poverty.[...]
"Poverty" is a very old term, whose common language usage has long been "deprivation of necessities1." However, both the generic concept of poverty and its more specific aspects
(e.g. "inadequate clothing") are somewhat ambiguous, and capable of differing interpretations. Furthermore, the social reality of poverty has changed over time and differs across
societies. Nonetheless, statistical agencies are sometimes asked for an answer to the question: "How much poverty is there?" because there is a need for a social diagnostic – a ‘macro’
indicator – to assist public policy discussions and decisions.
The purpose of poverty measurement is, therefore, to compare actual or hypothetical social states – in a way which is potentially relevant for public policy. To answer the
question of how much poverty there is in a given social state, a specific measure of poverty is needed which identifies the number of people2 who are deprived and aggregates
the extent of their deprivation. This essay discusses the evolution of the measurement of poverty over the last thirty years and its links to the evolving debates on human
rights and social exclusion – with special reference to the Canadian debate.
Section 1 may primarily be of interest to Canadian readers. It summarizes briefly the state of the debate on poverty measurement in Canada thirty years ago – much of which
centered on the issue of how and where to draw "the poverty line income" to identify poor individuals – and discusses the subsequent evolution of Canadian estimates of "the
poverty line income". Section 2 then considers five other aspects of poverty measurement which have been prominent in the international literature:
axiomatic defensibility and the development of summary poverty statistics;
poverty over time – i.e. spell frequency, duration, recurrence and intergenerational impact;
The "capabilities" perspective, item deprivation and multi-dimensionality of poverty;
The ‘social exclusion’ discourse;
The links between ‘poverty’, ‘social exclusion’ and ‘basic human rights’.
Section 3 attempts a conclusion – recognizing that no single paper can pretend to summarize ‘poverty’ in its entirety, since the literature is
far too vast and wide-ranging. This paper focuses on measurement issues [...]
[...] When looking at actual incomes of Canadians, the gap has widened between the country's most vulnerable and the most affluent, [Michael Shapcott, a long-time poverty activist and
policy analyst at the Wellesley Institute in Toronto,] points out.
In 1980, the disparity between the top income-earning category and the lowest was $83,000, according to Statistics Canada. By 2005, that gap had reached $105,400.
Take a closer look, and it's only the top 20 per cent of income earners who saw their salaries rise, he says.
"The story is that yes, lots of people got dumped off of welfare because of tightened eligibility rules. But they haven't suddenly gotten a wealth of prosperity."
In fact, he says, there are indicators that suggest the situation is far more dire than the statistics indicate, including record numbers of tenants being evicted from
their homes and a rising dependency on food banks.
"In Canada, we have these endless discussions over what the numbers are and what do they tell us? And we really should be focusing on the reality."
A Statistical Profile of Poverty in Canada
Collin C, Jensen H. PRB 09-17E (20.09.09)
Social Affairs Division, Parliamentary Information and Research Service, Library of Parliament
[...] there is still no internationally-accepted definition of poverty - unlike measures such as employment,
unemployment, gross domestic product, consumer prices, international trade and so on. This is not surprising, perhaps,
given the absence of an international consensus on what poverty is and how it should be measured. Such
consensus preceded the development of all other international standards.
The lack of an internationally-accepted definition has also reflected indecision as to whether an international standard definition should allow comparisons of well-being
across countries compared to some international norm, or whether poverty lines should be established according to the norms within each country.
The proposed poverty lines have included, among others, relative measures (you are poor if your means are small compared to others in your population) and absolute
measures (you are poor if you lack the means to buy a specified basket of goods and services designated as essential). Both approaches involve judgmental and, hence,
ultimately arbitrary choices. [...]
In Canada, the Federal/Provincial/Territorial Working Group on Social Development Research and Information was established to create a method of defining and measuring
poverty. This group, created by Human Resources Development Canada and social services ministers in the various jurisdictions, has proposed a preliminary market basket
measure of poverty - a basket of market-priced goods and services. The poverty line would be based on the income needed to purchase the items in the basket.
Once governments establish a definition, Statistics Canada will endeavour to estimate the number of people who are poor according to that definition. Certainly that is a
task in line with its mandate and its objective approach. In the meantime, Statistics Canada does not and cannot measure the level of "poverty" in Canada. [...]
In the absence of politically-sanctioned social consensus on who should be regarded as "poor", some people and groups have been using the Statistics Canada low-income
lines as a de facto definition of poverty. As long as that represents their own considered opinion of how poverty should be defined in Canada, we have no quarrel with
them: all of us are free to have our own views. But they certainly do not represent Statistics Canada's views about how poverty should be defined.
Low Income Lines, 2009-2010
Statistics Canada, Catalogue no. 75F0002M — No. 002.
Release Date: 15 June 2011. Emphasis added.
Abstract
In order to provide a holographic or complete picture of low income, Statistics Canada implements an approach that uses three complementary low income lines: the Low Income Cut-offs (LICOs), the Low
Income Measures (LIMs) and the Market Basket Measure (MBM). While the first two lines were developed by Statistics Canada, the MBM is based on concepts developed by Human Resources and Skills Development
Canada. Though these measures differ from one another, they give a generally consistent picture of low income status over time. None of these measures is the best. Each contributes its own perspective and
its own strengths to the study of low income, so that cumulatively, the three provide a better understanding of the phenomenon of low income as a whole. These measures are not
measures of poverty, but strictly measures of low income.
The LICOs are based on the relationship between the incomes and the consumption patterns of Canadian households as observed in 1992. The
LICOs have been very widely used in Canada since the 1970s. On the other hand, the LIM is based solely on the distribution
of household income across the Canadian population and is intended as a reference for international comparisons. Statistics Canada has been producing the LIMs since 1991
and they are aligned with latest international standard. Finally, the MBM defines low income in relation to the cost of a predefined set of goods and services. The
price of this "basket" of goods and services takes regional differences in the cost of living into account.
This publication incorporates a detailed description of the methods used to arrive at each of these measurements. It also explains how base years are defined and how LICOs
are updated using the Consumer Price Index. Because the LICOs only depend on the annual Consumer Price Index (CPI), they can be produced as soon as the
CPI is available (January following the reference year). The LIMs and the MBM depend
on other survey products that are available much later. Consequently, they can only be produced 16 to 18 months after the end of the reference year. For these reasons, this report contains
LICOs up to 2010, but LIMs and MBM up to 2009 only.
p.20
Low Income Lines, 2008-2009
Statistics Canada, Catalogue no. 75F0002M, no. 005. Release Date: 17 June 2010. Emphasis added.
Abstract
{...T]his report contains LICOs up to 2009, but LIMs and MBM up to 2008 only.
Table 2 Low income cut-offs (1992 base) before tax
Source:Low Income Lines, 2008-2009. Statistics Canada, Catalogue no. 75F0002M — No. 005. Release Date: 17 June 2010.
Last 3 years of table covering years 1992-2009, pp.13-24. Adapted, p.24.
Community size
Rural areas
Urban areas
Less than 30,0001
30,000 to 99,999
100,000 to 499,999
500,000 and over
Size of family unit
Current dollars
2007
1 person
14,914
16,968
18,544
18,659
21,666
2 persons
18,567
21,123
23,084
23,228
26,972
3 persons
22,826
25,968
28,379
28,556
33,159
4 persons
27,714
31,529
34,457
34,671
40,259
5 persons
31,432
35,760
39,081
39,322
45,662
6 persons
35,452
40,331
44,077
44,350
51,498
7 or more persons
39,470
44,903
49,073
49,377
57,336
2008
1 person
15,262
17,364
18,976
19,094
22,171
2 persons
19,000
21,615
23,623
23,769
27,601
3 persons
23,358
26,573
29,041
29,222
33,933
4 persons
28,361
32,264
35,261
35,480
41,198
5 persons
32,165
36,594
39,992
40,239
46,727
6 persons
36,278
41,272
45,105
45,385
52,699
7 or more persons
40,390
45,950
50,218
50,529
58,673
2009
1 person
15,302
17,409
19,026
19,144
22,229
2 persons
19,050
21,672
23,685
23,832
27,674
3 persons
23,419
26,643
29,118
29,299
34,022
4 persons
28,435
32,349
35,354
35,573
41,307
5 persons
32,250
36,690
40,097
40,345
46,850
6 persons
36,374
41,380
45,223
45,504
52,838
7 or more persons
40,496
46,071
50,350
50,661
58,827
1. Includes cities with a population between 15,000 and 30,000 and small urban areas (under 15,000).
Abstract
Low income cut-offs (LICOs) are income thresholds, determined by analysing family expenditure
data, below which families will devote a larger share of income to the necessities of food, shelter
and clothing than the average family would. To reflect differences in the costs of necessities
among different community and family sizes, LICOs are defined for five categories of community
size and seven of family size.
Low income measures (LIMs), on the other hand, are strictly relative measures of low income, set
at 50% of adjusted median family income. These measures are categorized according to the
number of adults and children present in families, reflecting the economies of scale inherent in
family size and composition. This publication incorporates a detailed description of the methods
used to arrive at both measurements. It also explains how base years are defined and how LICOs
are updated using the Consumer Price Index.
pp.7-8; footnotes not included. What are the LICOs?
The low income cut-offs (LICOs) are by far Statistics Canada’s most established and widely
recognized approach to estimating low income cut-offs. In short, a LICO is an income threshold
below which a family will likely devote a larger share of its income on the necessities of food,
shelter and clothing than the average family. The approach is essentially to estimate an income
threshold at which families are expected to spend 20 percentage points more than the average
family on food, shelter and clothing. The first set of published LICOs used the 1959 Family
Expenditure Survey to estimate five different cut-offs varying between families of size one to five.
These thresholds were then compared to family income from Statistics Canada’s major income
survey, the Survey of Consumer Finances (SCF), to produce low income rates.
Today, Statistics Canada continues to use precisely this approach to construct LICOs, with the
exception that cut-offs now vary by 7 family sizes and 5 different populations of the area of
residence. This additional variability is intended to capture differences in the cost of living
between rural and urban areas.
Figure 1: Calculation of an after-tax LICO
How are LICOs calculated?
[...] a LICO is an income threshold below which a family will likely devote a
larger share of its income to the necessities of food, shelter and clothing than an average family
would. According to the most recent base for LICOs, the 1992 Family Expenditures Survey, the
average family spent 43% of its after-tax income on food, shelter and clothing. Figure 1 [above] shows
the calculation of a LICO using the example of a family of four living in an urban community with a
population between 30,000 and 99,999. The 63% line represents the average proportion of aftertax
income that all families (regardless of size) spent on food, shelter and clothing in 1992 (i.e.
43%) plus the 20 percentage point margin. The dots on the chart show the actual observed
proportion of income spent by four-person families in medium-sized cities on necessities,
according to the 1992 Family Expenditure Survey. A regression line is fitted to this distribution
and the intersection of that curve and the 63% line gives the LICO—in this case, $21,359.
This process is carried out for seven family sizes8 and five community sizes and results in a table
of 35 cut-offs. This operation is done twice: once for before-tax cut-offs, once for after-tax cut-offs.
The average low income family is living on an annual income that is $9,000 to $11,000 below Statistics Canada's
before tax Low Income Cut-off. The average low income two parent family would need an additional $11,100 a
year to bring them up to the poverty line, and the average female lone parent low income family would need
$9,200 per year.
While Canada does not have an official "poverty line", Statistics Canada produces several measures of low income. The two sets of Low Income Cut Offs (LICO), the first based
on before-tax income including transfers and the second based on after-tax income, define the income level at which a family may be considered in straitened circumstances
because it has to spend a greater proportion of its income on necessities (food, clothing, shelter) than the average family does. Campaign 2000 uses both indicators to track
child poverty. There is about a 5 percentage point difference in child poverty rates between these two measures. The before-tax measure might be considered an indicator of
the adequacy of income flowing into the family and the after-tax measure an indicator of the adequacy of disposable income. The 2007 LICO After-Tax for 1 parent with 1 child
in a large urban centre=$21,851. It is important to note that the LICO is currently based on 1992 spending patterns and has not been adjusted since then. A recent analysis
maintains that it is very likely that poverty rates would be higher under a re-based LICO that reflected current consumption patterns.1
Canadian Council on Social Development - A very rich source of information from
a non-governmental, not-for-profit organization which "develops and promote progressive social policies inspired by social justice,
equality and the empowerment of individuals and communities".
Notes: This table uses the 1992 base. *Includes cities with a population between 15,000 and 30,000 and small urban
areas (under 15,000). Source: Prepared by the Canadian Council on Social Development using
Statistics Canada's Catalogue # 75-F0002MIE.
Notes: This table uses the 1992 base. Income refers to total pre-tax
household income.
*Includes cities with a population between 15,000 and 30,000 and small urban
areas (under 15,000).
Source: Prepared by the Canadian Council on Social Development using
Statistics Canada's Low Income Cut-Offs, from Low income cut-offs for 2005
and low income measures for 2004 Catalogue # 75F0002MIE.
Reading this table
Example: A family of four living in a very large Canadian city with a
before-tax income of less than $38,610 in 2005 would have been living below the
poverty line.
Notes: This table uses the 1992 base. Income refers to total pre-tax
household income.
*Includes cities with a population between 15,000 and 30,000 and small urban
areas (under 15,000).
Source: Prepared by the Canadian Council on Social Development using
Statistics Canada's Low Income Cut-Offs, from Low income cut-offs for 2004
and low income measures for 2002 Catalogue # 75F0002MIE2005003.
Reading this table
Example: A family of four living in a very large Canadian city with a
before-tax income of less than $37,791 in 2004 would have been living below the
poverty line.
Notes: This table uses the 1992 base. Income refers to total pre-tax
household income.
*Includes cities with a population between 15,000 and 30,000 and small urban
areas (under 15,000).
Source: Prepared by the Canadian Council on Social Development using
Statistics Canada's Low Income Cut-Offs, from Low income cut-offs from
1994-2003 and low income measures from 1992-2001 Catalogue # 75F0002MIE No.
002 March 2004.
Reading this table
Example: A family of four living in a very large Canadian city with an
before-tax income of less than $37,253 in 2003, would have been living below the
poverty line.
The minimum wage rate applicable in regard to employees under federal jurisdiction is the general adult minimum rate of the province or territory where the employee is usually employed.
On April 1 of each year, this rate increases by an amount corresponding to the annual increase for
the preceding year in the Consumer Price Index for the city of Whitehorse.
(1) In most jurisdictions, these rates also apply to young workers. More
information is available on special rates for young workers under "Current And
Forthcoming Minimum Wage Rates in Canada for Young Workers and Specific
Occupations".
(2) The federal jurisdiction includes labour market sectors coming under
federal authority by virtue of the Constitution, such as international and
interprovincial transportation, telecommunication and banking.
(3) There is a special minimum wage rate for inexperienced employees. See
"Current and Forthcoming Minimum Wage Rates in Canada for Young Workers and
Specific Occupations".
The 2009 total welfare incomes for single employable persons were compared with a number of low income measures, including
the after-tax Low-income cut-offs (AT LI CO) and the Market Basket Measure (MBM), as well as with the after tax median income and the after
tax average income.
Incomes for most Canadians on welfare in 2007 fell well short of the poverty line, says a report released Wednesday by a government advisory panel.
"Welfare recipients are among the poorest of the poor and have to subsist on incomes far below what most people would consider reasonable," says the
report by the National Council of Welfare. [...]
The faces behind the numbers
In reading the table below, the faces of the women, men and children forced to subsist on such impossibly low rates of assistance should be kept clearly in mind.
Executive Summary, pp.6-7
Working with data from food banks combined with data on numbers of welfare recipients, welfare benefit rates, housing rental costs, and employment
rates, we undertook economic analyses that establish a number of findings about what drives trends in food bank use.
Cuts to welfare systems in the mid to late 1990s resulted in substantial increases in food bank use. A 10 per cent cut in the
welfare caseload is associated with a 4.2 per cent increase in food bank use, suggesting that claims that reducing welfare
"dependency" would ultimately benefit potential welfare recipients are certainly not true for some set of disadvantaged
Canadians. Similarly, large reductions in the amount of welfare benefits had substantial impacts on food bank use. We
estimate that the equivalent of a 10 per cent cut in benefits would result a 14 per cent increase in food bank use.
Improvements in employment rates reduce food bank use, though their effects are not as large as those from cutting access
to welfare. It is the combination of these relatively small employment rate effects with substantial cuts to welfare systems
that explain why food bank use continued to rise in the late 1990s and early 2000’s, even though the economy was improving.
Put together, these findings imply that as we move into a recession and more Canadians have need of a welfare system
that has been drastically reduced, we should expect dramatic increases in food bank use and the food insecurity it reflects.
Implementing the following recommendations will help ensure that all residents have a right to adequate and appropriate food. Only then can
Canada and the provinces say that they are actively living up to their international obligations.
Recommendation 1 – Welfare as a right
Residents in all provinces must be able to readily access income support programs when in need.
Recommendation 2 – Setting income assistance thresholds
Each province should develop a mechanism for establishing the costs for basic goods and services. These needs should be met through provincial income assistance benefits.
Recommendation 3 – Immediately increasing income assistance rates
Income assistance rates should be raised immediately in every province, as the process in recommendation 2 will take some time.
Recommendation 4 – Indexing income assistance rates
Income Assistance benefits need to be increased annually by the cost of living if they are not to lose their purchasing power.
Recommendation 5 – Establishing an appropriate minimum wage
Use the before-tax low income cut off threshold
for the largest city in each province to set the
minimum wage and annually increase the wage
by the increase in the cost of living.
Recommendation 6 – Increasing the Canada Child Tax Benefit
Increase the Canada Child Tax Benefit to $5,100 as recommended by Campaign 2000.
Recommendation 7 – Developing quality, affordable child care
Developing quality affordable child care would be a prerequisite if parents are expected to seek and retain employment.
Recommendation 8 – Providing education and training to upgrade skills
Allow persons on income assistance to pursue high school completion and post secondary training and education while on assistance.
Recommendation 9 – Establishing appropriate financial allowances and support services for refugees and immigrants
Ensure that refugees have appropriate and sufficient financial support to complete their initial settlement and that refugees and immigrantshave access to affordable and appropriate levels of English/French Second Language services.
Recommendation 10 – Addressing Housing Affordability
Appropriate mechanisms need to be established to make rental housing more affordable.
Representatives from the Canadian Feminist Alliance for International Action (FAFIA) are making submissions today in Geneva to the United Nations Committee on the Elimination of
Discrimination against Women (UN CEDAW Committee). The alliance of seventy women’s organizations is presenting its report, Women’s Inequality in Canada at the beginning of the UN
CEDAW Committee’s 42nd Session.
"At Canada’s last review in 2003, this committee of international experts expressed serious concerns about the status of women in Canada and made 23 recommendations. Canada was
urged to increase its efforts to deal with the conditions of Aboriginal women, including the serious violence against them; to address the poverty of women, particularly of lone
mothers, Aboriginal, disabled, and racialized women; to improve child care and affordable housing; to design cash transfers to the provinces to ensure nation-wide standards for
social programs; and to improve access to legal aid for family law," said Shelagh Day, Chair of FAFIA’s Human Rights Committee. "These central issues remain outstanding. Despite
Canada’s desire to be seen as a human rights leader, Canadian governments have ignored the terms of the treaty they ratified in 1981 and failed to act on the recommendations of
the UN CEDAW Committee."
"In addition to a failure to move forward," said Bonnie Diamond, Co-Chair of FAFIA, "many monitoring organizations have noted that Canada has moved backwards on women’s equality
with the cancellation of the childcare agreements in early 2006, funding cuts and mandate changes to Status of Women Canada, and the elimination of the equality component of the
Court Challenges Programme, to name a few..." [...]
NOTE: Data in the following table are derived from Welfare Incomes 2005 (National Council
on Welfare, August 2008), which includes additional demographic groups and figures.
Welfare Rates for Lone Parents With One Child (81% women)
Province
Peak Year
Peak Amount
2005 Amount
% Change
Newfoundland and Labrador
1999
$16 894
$16 181
-4.2%
PEI
1992
$16 064
$13 707
-14.7%
Nova Scotia
1991
$15 458
$12 917
-16.4%
New Brunswick
1999
$14 191
$13 656
-3.8%
Quebec
1994
$16 345
$15 395
-5.8%
Ontario
1992
$21 039
$14 451
-31.3%
Manitoba
1992
$15 630
$13 282
-15.0%
Saskatchewan
1986
$15 980
$13 235
-17.2%
Alberta
1986
$16 071
$12 326
-23.3%
BC
1994
$17 050
$13 948
-18.2%
Yukon
2001
$21 562
$19 830
-8.0%
NWT
1993
$26 127
$22 648
-13.3%
Nunavut
1999
$32 421
$22 154
-31.7%
As a result of cuts to benefits, welfare incomes are grossly inadequate and now stand at their lowest level since the mid-1980s. None of the provinces have
welfare incomes that come anywhere close to Canada’s to the Statistic Canada’s Low Income Cut-offs (LICOs).
Measured as a percentage of Statistics Canada’s LICOs, in 2005, more than one-half of all households receiving welfare had incomes that were 50% of the poverty line or less.
In 2006, welfare incomes of single women averaged 40% of the poverty line, 61% for single women with a disability.
In 2006, welfare incomes of families with children averaged 70% of the poverty line. In Manitoba, the welfare income of a lone mother with one child was 67% of the poverty
line. In BC, the welfare income of a couple with two children is 58% of the poverty line.
International comparison of the post tax, post transfer poverty rate for lone mothers with young children places Canada (49.8%) behind both the US (42%) and the UK (40%).
Ross Finnie & Ian Irvine, The Welfare Enigma: Explaining The Dramatic Decline in Canadian’s Use of Social Assistance, 1993-2005. Toronto: C.D. Howe Institute.
ISBN 0-88806-748-8; ISSN 0824-8001 (print); ISSN 1703-0765 (online).
National Council on Welfare,
Welfare Incomes 2005,
online: NCW, (date accessed: 9 July 2008): 29-43.
Source: Welfare Incomes 2005 Report (Summer 2006) (Revised October 2006) Errata (October 2006) National Council of Welfare — The National Council of Welfare (NCW) is a citizens' advisory body to the Minister of
Human Resources and Social Development on matters of concern to low-income Canadians.
WELFARE INCOMES: PATTERNS AND TRENDS
Welfare Incomes 2005 estimates total welfare incomes for four types of households in each
province and territory, for a total of 52 scenarios. The four household types we use are a
single employable person, a single person with a disability, a lone-parent with a 2-year-old
child, and a two-parent family with two children aged 10 and 15. The National Council of
Welfare has published similar estimates since 1986.
WELFARE INCOMES IN 2005
Welfare incomes continued to decline in 2005, making life more difficult for the 1.7
million people—five percent of the population—forced to rely on welfare. Nearly half a
million of those on welfare were children.
New Brunswick and Alberta had the lowest welfare incomes in 2005 for the four
household types we looked at in each province and territory.
In New Brunswick, a single person received $3,427 and a couple with two children
received $17,567.
In Alberta, the welfare income of a single person with a disability was $7,851 [fn. Most
single persons with a disability in Alberta receive financial assistance through the Assured
Income for the Severely Handicapped (AISH) program. AISH rates are higher than those used in this
report.] and a lone parent with one child received $12,326.
TOTAL WELFARE INCOMES OVER TIME
For the first time, we looked at how total welfare incomes—provincial and territorial
welfare benefits, provincial and territorial child benefits, and provincial and federal tax
credits—have changed over time.
In 2005, welfare incomes were at their lowest point since 1986 in 20 scenarios.
Between 2004 and 2005, total welfare incomes decreased in 35 of our 52 scenarios.
Between 2000 and 2005, welfare incomes were at their lowest levels in 32 of our 52
scenarios. Further, five provinces—Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British
Columbia—recorded their lowest levels of welfare incomes for all four household types
during this five-year period.
The majority of welfare incomes, when adjusted for inflation, peaked in 1994 or earlier.
When the peak year welfare incomes were compared to 2005 welfare incomes, some of
the losses were staggering.
In Alberta, the income of a single person decreased by almost 50 percent.
In Ontario, a lone parent’s income decreased by almost $6,600 and a couple with two
children lost just over $8,700.
Across the provinces, one-third of households experienced losses of $3,000 or more.
The value of most provincial and territorial welfare
and related benefits continued to decline in 2004, adding further to the misery of the 1.7 million or so children, women and
men who were forced to rely on welfare.
Between 2003 and 2004, there were only seven increases in provincial or territorial
benefits among the 52 calculations done by the National Council of Welfare for the four
household types in the 13 jurisdictions. The other 45 calculations all showed declines in
benefits between 2003 and 2004.
The 2004 drops in support sent many provincial and territorial benefits down to their
lowest levels since the 1980s after adjusting for inflation. Of the 52 calculations, 36 were lows
for the period...(p.11)
...As we emphasized in a recent report entitled The Cost of Poverty, current health and
social policy research has made direct links between inadequate incomes, poor health
outcomes and increased health and economic costs. The health field provides a key example
of how reducing and preventing poverty in the first place is more cost-effective than paying
for its consequence.
In this day and age when Canada is struggling to manage soaring health care costs and to
integrate good social economic policies, unless governments can agree on reasonable levels of
funding for welfare and an end to the clawback of child benefits, we will continue to see an
erosion of the quality of life for all people in Canada...(pp.100-101) [Read more]
Source: Poverty Reduction Policies and Programs
Social Development Report Series, 2009.
Series Editor: Katherine Scott, Canadian Council on Social Development
Persistent poverty and growing inequality are the most significant and intractable challenges facing Canada today, diminishing the
lives of thousands of individuals and families. Poverty Reduction Policies and Programs provides the context and insight to understand
and act in the fight against poverty in Canada.
This first collection of reports – Poverty Reduction Policies and Programs – identifies current federal, provincial, and
territorial approaches to poverty reduction, alleviation and eradication, profiles the ideas, interests and institutions that have shaped the evolution of
that work, and identifies critical issues for each jurisdiction moving forward.
The CCSD’s new Social Development Report Series is an essential tool that provides an understanding of how
geography, history and politics have created varying approaches to community building across our country. Watch for the next edition in 2011.
NEWS RELEASE
Young Canadians face worst job market in decades, says annual report card
Canada’s Vital Signs also highlights trends in aboriginal education, violent crime OTTAWA (Oct. 6, 2009) – Canada’s youth jobless rate has soared under the economic pressures of the
past year and even the lucrative summer months were a bust, with young people’s hours of work hitting
30-year lows, according to Canada’s Vital Signs 2009, the annual report card on quality of life from
Community Foundations of Canada.
"The report shows us how the impact of the recession has been immediate and severe for vulnerable
groups, such as youth," said Monica Patten, President and CEO of Community Foundations of Canada. "It
also shines a light on inequities that pre-date the recession, such as the disturbing high school completion
rates among the aboriginal population."
Canada slow in combating child poverty: report
CBC News (7 October 2008)
Canada is not taking enough action to reduce the number of children living in poverty across the country, says a new report
released Tuesday by a group that represents community foundations.
The report by the Community Foundations of Canada, entitled Vital Signs 2008, says the level of child poverty is currently
at the same level it was in 1989.
According to the report, which was obtained by the Canadian Press, 1.6 million children, or 23 per cent, lived in poverty in 2006. [...]
From the site...
(accessed 7.10.08; passim):
Community Foundations of Canada (CFC) is the membership organization for Canada's vibrant and growing network of 164
community foundations. Community foundations bring together
people who care about their communities. They are independent, volunteer-driven,
charitable organizations that aim to strengthen their communities by
facilitating philanthropy, by partnering with donors to build permanent endowments and
other funds from which they support community projects, and by providing leadership on issues of broad
community concern.
Vital Signs® is an annual community check-up conducted by community foundations across Canada that measures
the vitality of our cities, identifies significant trends, and assigns grades in at least ten areas critical to
quality of life. Vital Signs® is based on a project of the Toronto Community Foundation and is coordinated nationally
by Community Foundations of Canada. The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation provided critical support for the national
expansion of the Vital Signs program.
Each city's report card data is a compilation of numerous research sources, much of it local, that help communities
make connections between issues and trends in different areas. The findings are presented in a reader friendly format
to make them as accessible as possible.
CFC offers professional development and training opportunities to its members,
provides communication links and acts as an information clearinghouse,
facilitates partnerships and initiatives with national and regional funders,
reflects member views and concerns on philanthropic issues, promotes sound
public policy [and] is active in global networks that promote philanthropy and a healthy
civil society. Community foundations build and manage permanent
endowments, using their knowledge of their communities’ needs to connect donors to the causes and organizations that can
help them make a lasting difference. With more than $2.9 billion in assets, the community foundation movement is one of
Canada’s largest grantmakers, providing more than $176 million in grants last year to thousands of charities.
Vibrant Communities
Poverty is one of Canada's most serious and persistent social problems. Canadians think significant things can be done about it.
Vibrant Communities was founded on the unique approach of bringing together multisectoral leaders - from business, government,
the voluntary sectors and citizens, including people directly affected by poverty - to compassionately and creatively solve
poverty. The heart beat of Vibrant Communities comes from leaders and national sponsors in communities across Canada.
Since 2002, Vibrant Communities has been learning to tackle poverty in new ways. It is lead by four highly respected national
sponsors including: Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement, The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation along with the
Caledon Institute of Social Policy and Human Resources and Social Development Canada. Community-led efforts in Victoria, Surrey, Edmonton,
Calgary, the Niagara Region, Hamilton, St. Michel (Montreal), Trois Rivières and Saint John have been beacons by creating welcoming,
vibrant communities. Some of the significant results to 2007 include more than 1200 local partners in 15 communities that have
collaborated in creative ways to assist over 34,000 individuals in their journey out of poverty. Communities pursue their best
pathways to reduce poverty. These may include: workforce development and employment, education and training, housing supports,
income security, and human resource practices including wage adjustments or policy change. "One of the strengths of Vibrant
Communities…is its single-minded focus on eliminating poverty. Motivating and engaging all sections of the community to attain
this goal has been paramount" (Tim Brodhead, President, The J.W. McConnell Family Foundation).
Although we have demonstrated many successes using the Vibrant Communities approach, we need to learn more about what works
in poverty reduction and why. We are continually striving for better rather than simply replicating "good enough." Vibrant
Communities is growing and we invite Canadians to join together to create durable solutions to poverty.
For more information please contact:
Susan Eckerle Curwood, Community Coordinator: susanc@tamarackcommunity.ca
Source: Aboriginals imprisoned like never before: Prisons StatsCan survey reveals new high for aboriginal representation among province's inmates
Tessa Holloway, Prince Albert Daily Herald (22.07.09) Links Added.
About 80 per cent of people sentenced to jail in Saskatchewan last year were aboriginal, a statistic that has stayed disproportionately high for several years.
In 2005-2006, 79 per cent of those sentenced to jail time in the province were of aboriginal ancestry, compared to just 11 per cent of the province's total population.
In 2007-2008, that had edged up to 81 per cent, according to a new report from Statistics Canada.
That's higher than any other province. In Manitoba, the next highest, 69 per cent of those sentenced to jail time are aboriginal, despite a slightly higher proportion of
aboriginals in the total population.
Saskatchewan Justice Minister Don Morgan acknowledged there is a major problem, pointing to poverty as the main contributor.
"We just look at it as we know that we have a significant portion of the population that have a socio-economic gap," said Morgan.
He said the province is attempting to provide supports to low-income children through community schools and is also increasing the number of children put into foster care.
Income was touched on as a likely cause in the report as well.
The report said differences in age, education and employment status could only partially explain the discrepancy between aboriginal and non-aboriginal incarceration.
About 50 out of every 1,000 aboriginal people without any post-secondary diploma or employment were incarcerated as of May 16, 2006, whereas just 4.3 out of every 1,000
aboriginal people with a diploma and employment were incarcerated.
While the gap is narrower for those with education and employment, aboriginal people are still about 14 times more likely than non-aboriginal people to be incarcerated. [...][Read More] See Also: Poverty a factor in aboriginal incarceration rates, CBC News (22.07.09) Fontaine: New AFN chief must fight poverty, CBC News (21.07.09)
Source: B.C. Holds Worst Child Poverty Record for Sixth Sraight Year
BCNDP (24.11.06) Link added.
VICTORIA - For six years in a row, the B.C. Liberals have failed to act while B.C.'s children have lived in the worst child poverty in the entire country, said New Democrat leader
Carole James today.
In response to a report entitled B.C.'s 2009 Child Poverty Report Card, which shows B.C. has had the highest child poverty rate in Canada for six straight years, James reiterated
her call for a comprehensive strategy to eliminate child poverty. [...]
Source: BC has the worst poverty rate in Canada for 5th straight year
Jean Swanson, Carnegie Community Action Project (19.01.09)
It’s too bad reports on how bad poverty is won’t end poverty. If they
would, 2 reports that came out last month would help quite a bit. As
it is, if you need any word ammunition to fight against poverty, the latest 2008
Child Poverty Report Card and recommendations from the United Nations Committee
on Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) should help.
The 2008 Child Poverty Report Card says that BC has the highest poverty rate
(16.1%) and child poverty rate (21.9%) of all the provinces for the
5th year in a row. Over half of the poor children in the province
live in families where at least one person is working full time, so wages are
dismally low. Over half of all single parent mother led families are
poor. A couple with 2 children living on welfare is almost $21,000 a year
BELOW the poverty line. The poverty line (about $39,000 a year for a
family of 4) would be untold riches to a family on welfare.
Some other interesting stats from the report: Over 245,000 BC workers
earn less than $10 an hour. The average total income for the richest one
tenth of one percent of families grew by almost a million dollars between 1982
and 2004 to about $2.5 million a year. Meanwhile the average income for
the poorest 10% of taxfilers in 2004 was $6000. The income of the richest
10% grew while the income of the poorest and second poorest 10% fell. [...]
The Report Card says governments should increase minimum wage to almost $11
an hour, end the $6 an hour training wage, raise welfare to about $1300 a month
for a single person, restore welfare earnings exemptions and stop clawing back
child support payments, among other things.
The UN report says that the CEDAW committee is concerned that there is no
federal accountability to ensure that there are minimum standards for social
assistance funding. It calls on the Canadian government to establish those
standards.[...]
Almost 70% of all poor people - almost 3.3 million - lived in Canada’s 25
largest urban areas in 2000. Responding to these pressing human needs presents
an enormous challenge - and one which requires planning, persistence, and
partnerships.
The Urban Poverty Project (UPP) supports those efforts with
reliable data and analysis. Community Profiles is the first product from the
Urban Poverty Project. It provides 2001 Census data on 13 critical social
indicators in a concise fact sheet format for 111 places in Canada, including
cities, regions and provinces.
Online Tool: Find Your Community
The following drop-down lists contain data sheets about 111 different
communities and geographic levels across Canada. [Please see the glossary for definitions
of the geographic levels (CMAs, CDs, CSDs)].
CHOOSE:
OR:
OR:
OR:
If you need data on a community not listed, click
here.
Poverty and Policy in Canada
March 2007 978-1-55130-323-9 CAD $45.95 / US $41.95 384pp
Poverty and Policy in Canada provides a unique perspective on poverty and its importance to
the health and quality of life of Canadians. This original volume considers a range of issues t
hat will be of great interest to a variety of audiences. Throughout the book, particular emphasis
has been placed on the lived experiences of poverty.
This new book has three straight-forward goals:
to provide a range of approaches for understanding poverty and its effects;
to help readers understand how society and its distribution of resources are the primary determinants of poverty;
to provide realistic solutions to poverty.
Author Dennis Raphael PhD, Professor and Undergraduate Programme Director at the School of Health Policy and Management at York University, serves as a consultant
to the Canadian Public Health Agency and is an advisor to an upcoming PBS series on social inequalities and health in the USA.
Part I: Defining and Measuring Poverty in Canada
Chapter 1. Poverty and the Modern Welfare State
Chapter 2. Canadian Perspectives on Poverty
Chapter 3. Who is Poor in Canada?
Chapter 4. Making Sense of Poverty: Social Inequality and Social Exclusion
Part II: The Experience of Poverty
Chapter 5. Pathways to Poverty
Chapter 6. The Lived Experience of Poverty
Chapter 7. Interactions with the Service Sector: Poverty, Social Assistance, and Health Care
Part III: Poverty, Health, and Quality Of Life
Chapter 8. Poverty and Health
Chapter 9. Poverty and Health: Mechanisms and Pathways
Chapter 10. Poverty and Quality Of Life
Part IV: Public Policy and Poverty
Chapter 11. The Politics of Poverty
Chapter 12. Canadian Poverty and Public Policy in International Perspective
Chapter 13: Poverty and the Future of the Welfare State
UNICEF Innocenti Research Centre
Child poverty in rich countries 2005 Per cent of children living below national poverty lines
The proportion of children living in poverty has risen in a majority of the world's
developed economies. No matter which of the commonly-used poverty measures is applied, the situation of children
is seen to have deteriorated over the last decade. This publication is the sixth in a series of Innocenti Report
Cards, designed to monitor and compare the performance of the OECD countries in meeting the needs of their children.
It is also the first in what will be an annual Innocenti Report on Child Poverty in Rich Countries.
[Child poverty in rich countries 2005]
Figure 1: The Child Poverty League
...the percentage of children living in ‘relative’ poverty, defined as households
with income below 50 per cent of the national median income...(p.04) Table adapted from original figure (bar graph) which does not show numeric "Rank".
Canada: children still waiting
A descriptive overview of the measures of low income produced by the Canadian
statistical agency, Statistics Canada, is offered by M. Skuterud, M. Frenette and
P. Poon, Describing the Distribution of Income: Guidelines for Effective
Analysis, Statistics Canada, 2004, Catalogue No. 75F0002MIE, No.010.
A summary of the first set of findings from the Canadian Market Basket
Measure of Low Income is available at [hrsdc.gc.ca],
while the specifics of the construction of the basket are
presented in M. Hatfield, Constructing the Revised Market Basket Measure,
Ottawa: Human Resources Development Canada 2002. The quotations in the text
are taken from these sources.
The all party resolution committing the government of Canada to "seek to
eliminate child poverty by the year 2000" can be found in Government of Canada,
Hansard, November 24, 1989.
The reference for the government quote "it is not possible to say with certainty
whether the incidence of low income for children using the Market Basket
Measure is higher or lower than in the years prior to 2000." is www.hrsdc.gc.ca/en/cs/comm/news2003/030527.shtml(p.35)
Christmas is quickly approaching and many charities are busily preparing to help the needy during the holidays. Here is a list of organizations
seeking your help and a separate list of organizations selling Christmas items as fundraisers in the coming weeks. Many offer receipts for income tax purposes on request. Not all agencies
could be listed....[Read more] [Printer-friendly version]
Note: In the event that the above URLs no longer work, we have replicated the Canada.com Network page and content of this important article
here. Copyright remains with the Ottawa Citizen and the Canada.com Network.
A non-profit community organiza- tion providing free programs and services for low-income Ottawa residents to fight financial exploi- tation and indebtedness.
Gang Violence Among Youth and Young Adults: (Dis)Affiliation and the Potential for Prevention
Bania M.
IPC Review.
Vol. 3:89–116. (March 2009)
[...] Developmental prevention policies and programs for marginalized youth are
unlikely to make a significant difference – and could even accentuate the
frustration – if current labour market conditions are not addressed (Castel,
1995). What is the use of encouraging youth to "maximize their potential"
or of spending resources on preparing them for the workforce if they are
unlikely to find adequate employment? Similarly, placing a focus on the
dynamics within neighbourhoods fails to acknowledge the broader sociopolitical
and economic factors (i.e., lack of affordable housing, poverty, (un)
employment, racism, exclusion, etc.) that are beyond the jurisdiction and
control of local "communities", but that play a significant role in challenges
of crime and safety (Cohen, 1985; Crawford, 1998; Hastings & Jamieson,
2001; Hughes, 2007). In this sense, we may be setting the "community"
up to fail, and setting the stage for increased frustration and resentment
(Hastings & Jamieson, 2001).
If we are serious about addressing the issue of gang involvement and violence
among youth and young adults, we need a comprehensive, coordinated approach
that addresses underlying issues of child poverty, inadequate housing, barriers
to education, unemployment, mental health, racism and discrimination. [...]
Besides poverty, social disorganization, particularly
in the case of mobile changing populations, provides an ideal breeding ground for
the development of a gang subculture. (p.17)
...[T]he socio-economic aspect of the community in which a gang is formed must
necessarily be taken into account while doing research on the matter. Indeed, in a low income
community where there is little concern for the fate of young people, an adolescent can come to view
a gang as his only alternative. (p.26)
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