Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Joel Achenbach and Angela Fritz discuss how climate change is amplifying all kinds of extreme weather (with severe heat as only the most obvious example). And Umair Irfan examines some of the dangerous economic and social side effects of unprecedented heat waves. –
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Accidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Katie Dangerfield reports on new research showing that carbon pricing can be an economic benefit, while unrestrained climate change would be disastrous. Bill Curry and Shawn McCarthy report that Scott Moe has eagerly lumped himself in with Doug Ford as Canada’s most
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Osmond Chui writes that Australia is no exception to the trend of modest economic growth being entirely hoarded by the wealthiest few, while work and life are ever more precarious for everybody else: What makes people angry about excessive executive pay is the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Matt Bruening comments on the National Low Income Housing Coalition’s research showing that minimum-wage workers are unable to afford basic housing across the U.S. – Sarah Butler reports on the UK’s latest parliamentary study of precarious work. Jordan Press reports on the state
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Claire Connelly calls out the perennial right-wing spin that there’s always money available for corporations or the security state, but that anything which would actually help people is invariably unaffordable. And Jim Pugh discusses how Republicans are looking to punish and impoverish
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Ed Finn reminds us that ending child poverty makes good economic sense in addition to being a moral necessity: The same huge financial benefit would be reaped in Canada from an equivalent investment in curbing poverty here. Based on the variance in populations
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Andrew O’Hehir talks to Yanis Varoufakis about the impossibility of building shared prosperity on a foundation of consumer debt and financialization. And the Institute for Public Policy Research offers a discussion paper on the important equalizing role of organized labour – and
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: First-Past-The-Post: An Ontario Horror Story
Has Justin Trudeau not betrayed his promise of electoral reform, perhaps all provinces would be seriously considering it for their own jurisdictions, not just British Columbia and Quebec. And now Ontario is about to reap the full horror of the first-past-the-post system: a clown (no doubt accompanied by seltzer bottle
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – J.W. Mason reviews Quinn Slobodian’s Globalists with a reminder that the decades-long push to subjugate popular democracy to corporate interests is nothing new – and that we know well the consequences: In the early twentieth century, there were many people who saw
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Ed Broadbent examines how Doug Ford’s platform (such as it is) would only further enrich the wealthy, while causing catastrophic results for everybody else: Just imagine waking up on Friday morning and having to hear the phrase “Premier Doug Ford” for the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Evening Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Alex Boutilier discusses the glaring gap between hype and reality when it comes to tech sector jobs. And Virgina Eubanks writes about the futility of expecting miracles from algorithms in allocating grossly insufficient funding for social programs. – Meanwhile, Dean Baker argues
Continue readingDemocracy Under Fire: Stark choices…..
In a blog dedicated to commentary on Canadian Democracy how can I avoid discussing the upcoming Ontario Provincial election and when doing so how can I avoid being highly partisan in my comments given the increasingly divisive commentary coming from some, if not all, participants? I am not sure that
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Lee Drutman points out that Donald Trump’s presidency represents an entirely foreseeable result of a two-party, first-past-the-post electoral system: (C)ontrary to claims that American political parties have to appeal broadly to win, they only need to win a quarter of the voting-age population
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Dylan Walsh interviews Jeffrey Pfeffer about his book Dying for a Paycheck, and the ways in which employer demands make people worse off: Has this connection always been there, or has there been an evolution in workplace culture that got us to
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Lana Payne writes about the need for real wage increases to relieve the financial stress on Canadian workers. – Sheila Block examines the relative effects of tax cuts and minimum wage increases on lower-income workers, and finds that people are far better off
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Elizabeth Bruenig makes the case for the U.S. to make a much-needed turn toward democratic socialism: In fact, both Sullivan’s and Mounk’s complaints — that Americans appear to be isolated, viciously competitive, suspicious of one another and spiritually shallow; and that we
Continue readingDemocracy Under Fire: Electronic Voting Not an Option…. yet.
Following the panel discussion on voter engagement of young people at Ryerson University recently backbench Liberal MPP Arthur Potts proposes that the voting age should be lowered two years, to 16. Scotland and Argentina are among the places where teenagers are allowed to cast ballots at that age, a time
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Afternoon Links
Assorted content to end your week. – May Boeve and Michael Brune comment on the danger that political- and court-based attacks on U.S. unions could substantially weaken the progressive movement as a whole. But Jane McAlevey writes that West Virginia’s successful teachers’ strike may provide an important reminder that the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Anna Coote discusses some of the potential problems with a universal basic income on its own – particularly to the extent it takes momentum away from the prospect of universal basic services. – Scott Sinclair examines how little has changed – and how
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Jim Hightower writes about the importance of a popular movement to build the policy foundation for middle- and working-class prosperity. And Doug Henwood notes that the U.S. union movement managed to hold its ground in 2017. – Ellie May MacDonald points out
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