Following are two articles from the world socialist web site
Homelessness and hunger in Ontario
By Lee Parsons
23 October 1998
Several reports over the past weeks have drawn attention
to the growth of hunger and homelessness across
Canada, and in Ontario in particular.
One such study conducted by the Canadian Association
of Food Banks, called "Hunger Count 1998," reveals that
the number of people forced to use food banks has
increased dramatically in the past several years. More
than 700,000 people used one of 2,141 food banks last
year in Canada, an increase of 5.4 percent over 1996.
The
sharpest rise was in Nova Scotia, which saw an increase
of 40 percent. Food bank use in Ontario, while climbing
only 2.1 percent, has recorded an increase of over 30
percent in the last three years.
The Daily Bread Food Bank in Toronto is the largest of
its
kind in Ontario and has become a permanent necessity
since its establishment nearly 20 years ago. While the
food bank issues reports regularly, the approach of
winter
in Ontario has focused media attention on a number of
its
recent publications that look at the broader effects of
poverty in one of the wealthiest cities in North
America.
While a good deal of attention, legitimately enough, has
been paid to the plight of poor children in Ontario, who
account for 41.5 percent of food bank users, the poverty
of
their parents and other adults is often overlooked.
Revealing statistics in one report from Daily Bread,
"Who
goes hungry?," show that among adults polled who use
food banks, the majority were childless and a
disproportionate two-thirds were in their thirties or
forties--prime earning years. With incomes of between 25
to 50 percent below the government low-income cutoff or
poverty line, the percentage of those counted as the
poorest of the poor is increasing.
Another study reveals the connection between poor health
and hunger, as well as other important features of
systemic poverty in Ontario and in its largest urban
center in particular. Entitled "No Apples today ...
maybe
tomorrow," the report declares that with almost
one-third
of those who use food banks suffering poor health,
hunger is a health issue. While it may come as no
surprise that those who lack adequate nutrition are also
more likely to have poor health, this report is valuable
in
elaborating concretely the impact of the decline in
living
standards in the province. However, as the study itself
states: "Food banks are not a viable option for
addressing
the long term problem of poor health and hunger."
On another front the Toronto disaster relief committee
issued a report last week calling homelessness a
national
disaster that should be treated like last winter's
devastating ice storm. Ontario Premier Mike Harris
responded by saying, "I don't know whether it's a
national state of emergency at this point of time. I
don't
know whether it's any worse than last year."
Advocacy groups have raised the issue of homelessness
in anticipation of a large shortfall in available space.
Current shelters are filled to capacity. Last year in
Toronto 26,000 people used emergency shelters, and that
number is expected to increase over the next 12 months.
It
is estimated that 700 new beds will have to be found to
meet the demand even if it stays at last year's level.
Some
4,700 individuals are currently homeless in Toronto,
with
about 4,200 of them staying in emergency shelters and
the rest sleeping outside. The city has set up a task
force
to find a long-term solution, but without adequate
funding officials are pressed simply to meet immediate
needs.
Responding to a task force report on homelessness
commissioned by her office, Ontario Social Services
Minister Janet Ecker stated that the cuts to welfare
would
help Ontario's homeless people to build a life off the
streets. According to Ecker, the government is out of
the
subsidized housing business, which she declares is not
the only answer to the problem. The report, while
outlining the extent of the crisis, offers no solutions
and
places the responsibility on municipalities.
Ecker applauded the report and went on to boast that
there are 133,000 fewer children on welfare today than
in
1995. The reason for this change is not that poor
families
have fared any better over that period, but that changes
to
welfare eligibility and a 21.6 cut in benefits have
removed
welfare as a means of support for thousands of poor
families. Ecker's ministry is reportedly seeking to
expand
the "workfare" program which is currently in place only
for public sector and nonprofit agencies.
Opposition critics called the 22-page study pitiful,
pointing out that while it calls for cities to get
people off
the streets and into hostels, the hostels are already
full. In
Toronto an advisory committee on homelessness has
suggested setting up tent cities and trailer parks to
solve
the growing crisis. The solutions offered resemble
measures taken in 1946 when the city faced a housing
crisis resulting from the return of soldiers from the
Second
World War.
Referring to the destruction of social programs by both
provincial and federal governments, Councilor Jack
Layton, who heads the committee, stated, "The hostels
are
full, affordable housing programs have been canceled,
rents are being allowed to go up--we really are stuck
here,
and we've been abandoned totally by Ottawa and
Queen's Park." Ann Golden, head of Toronto's
homelessness task force, said the report ignores issues
of
poverty and the housing market, and the shortage of
supportive housing needed to keep the mentally ill off
the
streets.
NDP Member of the Provincial Parliament Rosario
Marchese stated, "This is a man-made crisis that can
only be corrected by the provincial government taking
the
lead--and that means housing." When the NDP was in
power it pioneered the workfare program and quashed
plans to build 20,000 nonprofit housing units, measures
that contributed to the current social crisis.
Actions taken by every level of government have helped
swell the ranks of the poor. The federal Liberals have
cut
billions from transfer payments to the provinces that
finance social programs, while posting a surplus of
nearly $20 billion in employment insurance since
restricting eligibility and reducing rates last year.
Over
the last 10 years the proportion of the unemployed who
actually qualify for benefits has fallen from 83 to 42
percent.
In Ontario the provincial Conservative government has
deepened its victimization of the poor since slashing
welfare rates three years ago. Hospital closings and
cuts
to health care have thrown thousands of mentally ill
people into the streets to fend for themselves. Waiting
lists
for subsidized housing now extend years into the future,
with no new housing being built and existing shelter
being privatized.
In Toronto tuition hikes and a shortage of decent paying
jobs have worsened conditions for thousands of young
people. In typical fashion bureaucrats at city hall last
summer launched a campaign to criminalize the
so-called "squeegee kids," youth who make money by
washing car windshields.
The harsh economic reality is about to get worse. While
the full impact of government cuts to welfare, social
programs and subsidized housing are now making
themselves felt, it is clear that the anticipated
economic
downturn will place whole new sections of the population
in jeopardy.
The expressions of concern from the various
parliamentary parties are hypocritical. The Liberals,
Tories and NDP have each, over the past period,
contributed to the growth of poverty in response to the
demands of big business to divest government of social
responsibility and leave the poor at the mercy of the
market.
=======================================================================
Report documents staggering growth
in social inequality
By Lee Parsons
4 November 1998
A report issued by the Centre for Social Justice, a
think
tank supported by church, union and community groups,
documents a staggering growth in social inequality in
Canada over the past quarter century and especially the
past five years.
Titled "The Growing Gap" and written by economist
Armine Yalnizyan, the report presents a vast array of
data, most of it gleaned from government studies, to
substantiate its claim that increasing numbers of
Canadians are being driven into poverty, even while the
rich have seen their incomes and wealth soar.
Amongst the most telling statistics:
* In 1996, the average market income (that is income
derived from wages, dividends, rents, etc., as opposed
to
state benefits and tax credits) of the richest 10
percent of
Canadian families having children under 18 was 314
times greater than that of the poorest decile of
families.
* Newspaper proprietor Ken Thomson's net personal
wealth of $14.4 billion surpasses the collective wealth
of
the poorest third of all Canadian households.
* In the three years, between 1995 and 1997, the average
Canadian CEO had a 39 percent salary increase--while
workers' wages grew on average by no more than 2
percent, or less than inflation.
* In 1997, the compensation of the top 100 Canadian
CEOs rose on average by 56 percent.
Ten of these CEOs earned more than $10 million and
Robert Gratton of Power Corporation received a total pay
package, including bonuses and stock options, of $27.4
million.
* Although women's participation in the labour force has
risen sharply, 60 percent of families with children are
earning less in real terms than they did in 1981.
The Growing Gap is principally concerned with
documenting the extent of the social polarization, but
it
also shows how the dismantling of unemployment
insurance and other government programs has
contributed to the widening and deepening of poverty.
The last third of the 100-page report advances solutions
to
what Yalnizyan contends is a social imbalance so severe
it could soon engender social unrest.
The report observes that the corporate and political
elite's
glorification of the capitalist market has had the
effect of
lessening public awareness and concern about growing
social inequality, and suggests that this has even
impacted on the type of information Statistics Canada
collects. Whereas formerly Statscan carried out surveys
of
wealth and indebtedness roughly every five years, the
last
was conducted in 1984.
Distribution of market income
The phenomenal increase in the difference between the
market income of the top and bottom decile of Canadian
families with children--in 1973 the top 10 percent
earned
21 times more and in 1996 314 times more--is due mainly
to two interrelated processes. Large numbers of poor
people have been driven out of the work force by an
unrelenting wave of corporate restructuring; the rich
are
appropriating an ever-greater share of the national
income.
"In 1989," says the report, "the average market income
of
families in the bottom 10% of society was around $4,000.
By 1996, the average had fallen to less than $500 a
year."
Whereas in 1973 3.7 percent of families had no wage
earner, by 1996 the number was 8.4 percent.
Meanwhile, the income of the corporate elite has swelled
to the point that the average CEO earns 48 times more
than the average worker. Between 1989 and 1996 the
number of millionaires in Canada tripled, and that
number is expected to triple again by 2005.
The "new generation gap"
The report also documents changes in the composition of
the work force and wage differences between generations.
About one in five jobs is part-time, as compared with
one
in ten 20 years ago. In the 1990s the fastest growing
segment of the labour market has been temporary,
contract and seasonal employment, which have risen
from 5 to 12 percent of all jobs.
The other major change in the composition of the labour
force has been the rapid growth in self-employment
brought about by downsizing and the outsourcing of
work. "Of the million plus jobs added to the labour
market
this decade," writes Yalnizyan, "over half have come
from
self-employment--accounting for 76 percent of the job
growth in 1996 and 83 percent in 1997. This type of
employment varies widely in the reward it brings and
diverges significantly from the waged and salaried
population. 16 percent of the self-employed made less
than $5,000 in 1996 compared to 3 percent of paid
employees and 2.3 percent made over $100,000 compared
to 1 percent of the waged."
Canadians still work an average 37-hour week as they
did a generation ago, but "the difference is that a
generation ago the majority of people worked those
hours.... In 1976 almost two-thirds of Canadians (65
percent) worked between 35 and 40 hours a week. By
1997," as a result of the spread of part-time employment
and increasing amounts of overtime--much of it
unpaid--"only about half did (54 percent)."
Young people--especially young males--have been the
hardest hit by these changes. "While all age groups saw
some loss in earnings between 1990 and 1995, the
youngest group--aged 15 to 24--experienced a 20 percent
drop. In both 1970 and 1980 young people, on average,
earned about half the overall national average. By 1995
they made less than a third of the national average (31
percent)."
Warning of an "emerging generational faultline," the
report observes that "men under the age of 35 have seen
a
remarkable, perhaps unprecedented erosion in what their
work is worth compared to older age groups and
compared to what under 35-ers were worth in 1980."
Disappearance of middle-income earners and assault on
social programs
Central to the report's findings about social
polarization
and warnings of potential social unrest is the hollowing
out of those whose incomes fall in the median between
rich and poor. Based on a comparison of market incomes
in 1973 and 1996, the report shows that 17 percent of
the
population had earnings in 1996 that in real terms would
have put them in the poorest decile in 1973. Similarly,
18
percent of Canadians had earnings in 1996 that would
have placed them in the top 10 percent in 1973. "By 1996
the earnings bracket that used to account for 60 percent
of the population held only 44 percent of Canadian
families with dependent children."
The Growing Gap underscores both the significance of
income transfers--social benefits and tax credits--to
large
segments of the population and the potential for
widespread pauperization as governments at all levels
restrict eligibility and slash social benefits.
In 1996 income transfers raised the average income of
the
poorest fifth of families by some $11,000, from just
under
$6,000 a year to almost $17,000. But since then the
federal Liberal government has drastically reduced
eligibility for unemployment insurance. "In 1990 almost
all unemployed Canadians received UI benefits (87
percent of the jobless). This proportion had dropped to
42% by 1997 and is still falling in 1998."
Yalnizyan goes to some length to portray Canada as a
historically more equitable society than the US and
other
advanced capitalist countries. In truth, while in the
1980s
the Canadian bourgeoisie was more wary than its US
counterparts in imposing wage cuts and gutting social
programs, that lag has been more than made up for in
the big business offensive of the 1990s. Contrary to the
myths of the Canadian nationalists, Canada has
historically been characterized by great social
inequality
and the polarization of corporate ownership in the hands
of a very few.
A believer in the possibility of regulating the
capitalist
market and reviving the welfare state, Yalinizyan is at
a
loss to explain the cause of the current social
polarization.
Her report is very much to raise an alarm to the ruling
class that the deepening polarization will propel
working
people toward radical political alternatives. The
Growing
Gap also presents a brief for the trade unions and
social-democratic New Democratic Party urging big
business to restore their role in "balancing" market
forces.
Much of the deepening of poverty and unprecedented
social polarization detailed in this report have taken
place
during a period of so-called economic recovery. If those
in
positions of power and privilege to whom this report
appeals would not and could not relent in their assault
on the social position of the working during such a
period, what can be expected of them when the economy
enters a new downturn?
Copyright 1998
World Socialist Web Site
All rights reserved
