Ultra-wealthy elites…Political corruption…Vast inequality… These problems aren’t new — in the late 1800s they dominated the country during America’s first Gilded Age. We overcame these abuses back then, and we can do it again.
Continue readingTag: Income Inequality
In-Sights: Priorities
A tweet written by Jeffrey Levin made sense to me. So, I produced a Canadian version.
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: Money Cannot Buy Happiness But …
They say money cannot buy happiness but it certainly can buy food and shelter and education that can make the difference between misery and happiness, not to mention that health is directly related to economic status. Yet people still claim people are poor because they are lazy and all we
Continue readingIn-Sights: Vulnerable societies
Compounding the economic risk factors that are manifesting is a widespread domestic discontent with current economic systems, perceived to be rigged and unfair. Concern about inequality underlies recent social unrest on almost every continent…
Continue readingIn-Sights: Democratic delusion
“Politics has become so expensive that it takes a lot of money even to be defeated.” Even with contribution limits, generous as they are, government remains biased toward serving interests of prosperous citizens…
Continue readingTHE FIFTH COLUMN: On Inequality, Democracy and Taxing the Rich – A Modest Proposal
No doubt many raised in our capitalist society, where inequality rules and excessive incomes and wealth are seen as a right (and where even the NDP only proposes a measly 1% tax on excessive wealth), will consider this proposal to be radical but it is actually quit a modest proposal.
Continue readingIn-Sights: Taxes buy civilization
Neoliberalism has brought us extreme concentrations of wealth and power and a society governed by and for the rich. The Guardian reports America’s three wealthiest billionaires—Bezos, Gates and Buffett—have as much wealth as the bottom half of the US population combined. Funders—like the American Koch brothers and Fraser Institute directors
Continue readingIn-Sights: For the times they are a-changin’
Today, British Columbia is far richer than fifty years ago but that wealth is distributed much differently. As a result, despair is widespread, homelessness grows, thousands die each year from drug abuse, more than one hundred die by homicide. Uncounted humans are wasted. Our current provincial government is searching for
Continue readingIn-Sights: Bitter old man
A person shilling for the pension funds management business complained about my recent article revealing extravagant salaries at the BC Investment Management Corporation (BMI). He wrote that I was a bitter old man…
Continue readingIn-Sights: Civilized people pay for civilization
Maclean’s produced a ranking of the most dangerous places in Canada by examining communities with populations as small as 10,000. They explain the methodology: The report ranks communities according to the Crime Severity Index, which is a Statistics Canada measure of all police-reported crime collected through the Uniform Crime Reporting
Continue readingIn-Sights: Labour Day – Canadian heritage moment – Rerun
First published here in 2009 Flipping the radio dial on Labour Day I noticed CKNW’s Christy Clark featured a guest who seemed a strange choice on that day. It was a Fraser Institute automaton, there to talk once more about our “unsustainable medical system.” This is content that the silver-spooned Shaw
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Federal budget must take action on inequality and boost economy
The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’ latest annual Alternative Federal Budget urges the federal government to table a budget that makes good on its promises to reduce income inequality and drive inclusive growth. The post Federal budget must take action on inequality and boost economy appeared first on The Canadian
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: The Haves Certainly Have It
This from today’s Letters To The Editor, to which I have nothing to add: Re: Two richest men as wealthy as poorest 30 per cent, Jan. 16 It is telling that this news report was not a front-page headline in the Star. As if the world needed any more data
Continue readingTHE CAREGIVERS' LIVING ROOM A Blog by Donna Thomson: WHAT BREXIT MEANS TO UK CAREGIVERS AND WHY POLICY MATTERS EVERYWHERE
News feeds are awash in stories of the BREXIT referendum debacle in the UK. Weak and deceitful campaigns on both sides of the argument about whether to leave the European Union or not resulted in a surprise victory by the ‘Leavers’, prompting the…
Continue readingTHE CAREGIVERS' LIVING ROOM A Blog by Donna Thomson: WHAT BREXIT MEANS TO UK CAREGIVERS AND WHY POLICY MATTERS EVERYWHERE
News feeds are awash in stories of the BREXIT referendum debacle in the UK. Weak and deceitful campaigns on both sides of the argument about whether to leave the European Union or not resulted in a surprise victory by the ‘Leavers’, prompting the…
Continue readingIn-Sights: "A strong message…"
The federal anti-money laundering agency has levied a $1.1-million penalty against an unnamed Canadian bank for failing to report a suspicious transaction and various money transfers.
It is the first time the Ottawa-based Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada, known as Fintrac, has penalized a bank. The centre identifies cash linked to terrorism, money laundering and other crimes…
Fintrac spokesman Darren Gibb says he cannot legally discuss details of the bank’s infraction, and the agency is exercising its discretion to withhold the financial institution’s identity.
But Fintrac wants to send a strong message that it will take whatever measures are needed to encourage compliance with the law…
A strong message, really? Instead, Fintrac’s action demonstrates that oligarchs and influential institutions are not subject to laws that apply to others. I see a parallel to management of the Panama Papers that writer Craig Murray describes.
Corporate Media Gatekeepers Protect Western 1 Percent From Panama Leak, Truthdig, April 4, 2016
The filtering of this Mossack Fonseca information by the corporate media follows a direct western governmental agenda. There is no mention at all of use of Mossack Fonseca by massive western corporations or western billionaires—the main customers. And the Guardian is quick to reassure that “much of the leaked material will remain private.”
…Do not expect a genuine expose of western capitalism. The dirty secrets of western corporations will remain unpublished.
While the $1.1 million penalty assessed a Canadian organization may seem substantial, we should evaluate its severity by considering ability to pay. Canada’s two largest banks are Royal Bank and TD Bank. The first has assets of $1.20 trillion and the other has $1.17 trillion. For either, a $1.1 million penalty is equivalent to 9¢ for an individual with $100,000 in assets. For CIBC, the smallest of Canada’s big-five banks, the equivalency is 23¢.
Keeping the wrongdoer’s name secret is another benefit for plutocrats. Bank executives may want to avoid dealing with shame at the country club but there is a widely accepted tenet of justice that calls for punishment to be in public view for deterrence and denunciation. However, in Canada, under Harper Conservatives and now the Trudeau Liberals, favoured groups are exempted from meaningful punishment.
Perhaps because controlling shareholder Murray Edwards arranged millions for BC Liberals, Imperial Mines was not charged for the catastrophic failure of the tailings dam at its Mount Polley gold and copper mine. Several communities experienced a state of emergency and drinking water bans. Meanwhile, this year in North Vancouver provincial court, homeowners were fined $100,000 when their landscaping project led to a sediment dump into a small creek that affected the water supplies of no communities.
Landslide on ground they made unstable put homeowners in court. They didn’t donate millions to #BCLiberals. #bcpoli https://t.co/fvPooA0Lbk
— Norm Farrell (@Norm_Farrell) April 3, 2016
The National Observer is publishing Secrets of Government, a series of special reports describing what happens in the back rooms of power. We’ve seen secret no-penalty, no-prosecution deals CRA gave high-net-worth Canadians, continuation of huge subsidies to fossil fuel industries, regulators co-operating with businesses they allegedly regulate, political appointees waiving fines assessed by inspectors against pipeline operators and countless other examples. However, if an ordinary citizen seeks accommodations from government, the likelihood of receiving it is remote. One CRA program was supposed to ensure fair treatment but it has been so understaffed that the initial response to an individual’s application could take more than a year. Because stalled fairness applications weren’t fair, CRA made a change:
The Taxpayer Relief service standard is being deleted due to an inability to report reliable results.
Returning to the subject of Fintrac’s “strong” message, I wonder if the bankers’ reaction to the agency’s warning was something like Churchill’s in the 1941 Canadian Parliament when he offered this famed riposte to French Generals:
In-Sights: "A strong message…"
Canadian bank fined $1.1M for failing to report suspicious dealings, CTV News, April 5, 2016 The federal anti-money laundering agency has levied a $1.1-million penalty against an unnamed Canadian bank for failing to report a suspicious transaction and various money transfers. It is the first time the Ottawa-based Financial Transactions
Continue readingIn-Sights: "A strong message…"
Canadian bank fined $1.1M for failing to report suspicious dealings, CTV News, April 5, 2016The federal anti-money laundering agency has levied a $1.1-million penalty against an unnamed Canadian bank for failing to report a suspicious transaction and v…
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Federal Budget 2016: Alternative plan proposes lifting 1.1 million Canadians out of poverty, fighting climate change
The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’ Alternative Federal Budget would lift 1.1 million Canadians out of poverty and empower Canada to fight climate change.
The post Federal Budget 2016: Alternative plan proposes lifting 1.1 million Canadians o…
In-Sights: The inequality puzzle
Excerpts from an article by Dambisa Moyo at Project Syndicate. An economist and author who sits on the board of directors of global corporations, she was named by TIME Magazine as one of the “100 Most Influential People in the World.” NEW YORK – …
Continue reading