>From another list. Ed Weick
----- Original Message ----- From: "John Fraser (ISAC)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, May 27, 2003 11:53 AM Subject: [ow-watch-l] Globe article on new Market Basket Measure of poverty... > Hi everyone - here's an article from the Globe and Mail on the new Market > Basket Measure that's being released today. > > All the best, > > John. > > --------------------------------- > > New yardstick places more people in poverty > > > By MARGARET PHILP > SOCIAL POLICY REPORTER > > UPDATED AT 11:47 AM EDT Tuesday, May. 27, 2003 > > Ottawa will unveil a new measure today showing that one in eight people in > Canada lives in poverty, a rate higher than Statistics Canada's previous > calculations. > > Five years in the works, the Market Basket Measure has become the third > yardstick of low income in Canada. It is the first to break down poverty > rates by geography, taking into account that people living in big cities, > with lofty rents and steep prices, are worse off than those with the same > incomes in a small town in Saskatchewan. > > Calculated using the new measure, 13.1 per cent of Canadians -- almost four > million -- are poor. > > Under Statscan's Low-Income Cut-Off, a complicated and much-maligned > calculation of low income devised four decades ago and long treated as the > unofficial poverty line, 10.9 per cent of Canadians are poor after taxes. > > Expected to be less baffling for Canadians, the Market Basket Measure shows > the number of Canadians unable to afford a collection of goods -- food, > clothing, shelter, transportation and sundries such as telephone service and > postage stamps -- that the federal government has set as the minimum > standard for decent living in Canada. > > The new poverty lines are certain to place provincial welfare rates, which > are far lower than the price of the market basket in every province, in a > fresh light. > > The provinces had pushed for a lower benchmark than the LICO to measure the > impact of the National Child Benefit program introduced at the same time to > reduce child poverty. But the resulting Market Basket Measure, with its > higher poverty rates in almost every province, will provide powerful > ammunition for antipoverty activists, who have long decried social > assistance rates across the country as stingy. > > The Market Basket Measure pegs Vancouver as Canada's most expensive city, > with the basket of goods setting the threshold for poverty at $27,800 for a > family of four. Close on its heels is Toronto, where the ingredients of the > basket cost $27,300. In Calgary, the line was drawn at $24,180; in Edmonton, > it stands at $23,571. In St. John's, the same family would be considered > poor if its disposable income falls below the $24,000 cost of the market > basket. > > The measure considers people to be low-income when their incomes after > taxes, child support, daycare, payroll deductions, and out-of-pocket medical > expenses slips short of the cost of goods as priced where they live. > > The market basket is a list of remarkably specific items priced in 48 > different parts of the country. Food includes the contents of an average > grocery cart, such as strawberry jam and vanilla ice cream. Clothes are > counted down to the number of pairs of underwear and socks for each child. > Transportation includes the cost of bus and taxi fares for city dwellers, > and the cost of operating a five-year-old Chevy Cavalier for those in the > country. > > Across the country, the measure shows 16.9 per cent of people under 18 to be > poor, far higher than the 12.6 per cent who are considered poor after taxes > under LICO. And it finds that 39.5 per cent of families led by single > mothers are poor, while the age-old Statscan measure calculates an after-tax > rate of 33.9 per cent. > > Newfoundland and Labrador is the province with the greatest number of poor > people, with 23.4 per cent of them unable to afford the basket of goods. > British Columbia follows, with a low-income rate of 20 per cent. Ontario, > with 11 per cent of the population surviving on incomes falling below the > threshold, is the province with the fewest poor people. > > But more than just the rate of low-income dwellers, the new measure also > shows the depth of poverty among those who fall short of the threshold. > > While Alberta followed Ontario as home to the fewest poor people, the median > income of those who were poor was 29 per cent below the provincial poverty > line, revealing deeper poverty than in most other provinces. (The median > income is the point at which half of incomes are higher and half are lower). > > No other country uses a yardstick of poverty such as the LICO, considered a > relative measure that regards as low-income a family that spends a > disproportionate share of its income on food, clothing and shelter compared > with other Canadians, drawing a somewhat arbitrary poverty line at the point > where families spend 64 per cent of their incomes on these necessities. > > Constantly climbing with inflation, it has long been criticized by > conservatives as exaggerating Canada's problem of poverty. Others dismiss it > for lumping all Canadian cities together, ignoring the huge impact on > incomes of the different costs of living. > > Its other measure of low income -- for years, the agency has avoided > declaring anyone "poor" -- is called the Low-Income Measure, which sets the > threshold for poverty at half of Canadians' median income and is widely used > for international comparisons. > > Unlike its predecessors, it is more of an absolute measure of poverty, the > first to regard poverty as the inability to pay for groceries, food, rent > and transit fares, rather than expressing it as relative to the fortunes of > other Canadians. > > Measuring poverty > > Percentage of families that fall below the new, "market basket" thresholds. > > NFLD.: 23.4% > > B.C.: 20% > > N.S.: 16.1% > > PEI: 14.6% > > SASK.: 13.9% > > N.B.: 13.8% > > MAN.: 13% > > QUE.: 11.9% > > ALTA.: 11.9% > > ONT.: 11% > > > To change delivery options, subscribe, or unsubscribe from OW-Watch-List: > http://list.web.ca/lists/listinfo/ow-watch-l > Visit the Workfare Watch Project Website at: > http://www.welfarewatch.toronto.on.ca/ > - _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://scribe.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework
