There was an odd article last week on the explainer site Vox that argued Sweden doesn’t achieve its relative equality with very progressive, “soak the rich” taxation. While Matt Bruenig and Mike Konczal have already provided excellent, US-centred rebuttals to this argument, I thought this would be a good occasion
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Accidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – The Star criticizes the Harper Cons’ selective interest in international cooperation – with war and oil interests apparently ranking as the only areas where the Cons can be bothered to work with other countries. And Catherine Porter reports that the Cons have demonstrated
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Sunday reading. – Frances Russell notes that the corporate sector is laughing all the way to the bank (and often an offshore one at that) after fifteen years of constant tax slashing, while Canadian citizens haven’t benefited at all from the trickle-down theory. And Jordan Weissmann
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Bruce Johnstone points out that one can’t justify Stephen Harper’s gross dereliction of duty in addressing greenhouse gas emissions based on any system of principles other than climate change denialism. And Tony Burman criticizes the Cons for burying their heads in the oil
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Don Pittis makes the case for a guaranteed annual income on economic and social grounds: The young would be some of the biggest beneficiaries. Students could use the money to pay for their education, thus eliminating student loan programs. Students from poor families
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Joe Cressy argues that we need to take strong progressive positions to highlight the kinds of public investment which need to be made, rather than buying into right-wing spin about slashing taxes and eliminating public institutions: Public investment is about social justice, taking
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: To end homelessness in Canada, systemic change is needed
Molly McCracken, the Director of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives Manitoba Office, argues that the current federal response to homelessness in Canada “is disproportionate to the scope of the problem.” The post To end homelessness in Canada, systemic change is needed appeared first on The Canadian Progressive.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Linda Tirado writes about life in poverty – and the real prospect that anybody short of the extremely wealthy can wind up there: I haven’t had it worse than anyone else, and actually, that’s kind of the point. This is just what life
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that to end your weekend. – Paul Krugman notes that a concerted effort to combat climate change could be as beneficial economically as it is important for the future of our planet: Where is the new optimism about climate change and growth coming from? It has long been
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Linda McQuaig discusses how a politically-oriented audit of the CCPA fits with the shock-and-awe part of the right’s war against independent (and public-minded) though: In the conservative quest to shape public debate in recent years, no tool has proved more useful than
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
This and that for your weekend reading. – James Meek observes that decades of privatization in the UK have eliminated public control over housing and other essential services – and that privatization takes far more forms than we’re accustomed to taking into consideration. And Rick Salutin offers his take on
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Rick Smith discusses the growing public appetite to fight back against burgeoning inequality – along with the need to make inequality a basic test for the fairness of any policy: (I)t is significant that a finance minister of our decidedly right-wing government showed
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – The Broadbent Institute studies wealth inequality in Canada, and finds not only that the vast majority of Canada’s capital resources remain concentrated in very few hands but that the disparity continues to grow: The new Statistics Canada data show a deeply unequal
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Should Welfare Recipients Try Harder to Find Work?
This morning the Social Research and Demonstration Corporation released a new report about “motivational interviewing” for welfare recipients. The link to the full report is here, and the link to the executive summary is here. Authored by Reuben Ford, Jenn Dixon, Shek-wai Hui, Isaac Kwakye and Danielle Patry, the study
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Evening Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Scott Clark and Peter DeVries criticize the Cons’ choice to prioritize right-wing dogma over sound economic management: What should Canada do? For starters, the passive approach isn’t working. In the face of global economic uncertainty and a secular decline in growth, Canadian policy
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Bryce Covert writes that U.S. workers are receiving a lower share of economic output than at any point since 1950 – and that the decline in wages has nothing to do with the quality or quantity of work: Workers aren’t earning less because
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
This and that for your weekend reading. – Andrew Jackson writes that public investment is needed as part of a healthy economy, particularly when it’s clear that the private sector isn’t going to put massive accumulated savings to use. Bob McDonald notes that we’d be far better off using public
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Olga Khazan writes about the connection between lower incomes and obesity in the U.S. And Truthout discusses how poverty and other stressors can directly affect individual and communal genetics for generations: (A) study by researchers at University College London’s Institute of Child
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Rebecca Vallas, Melissa Boteach and Shawn Fremstad write about the need for a new social contract. And Drew Nelles takes a look at the role of a guaranteed basic income in ensuring a fair standard of living for everybody: Although implementing basic income
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Afternoon Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Nora Loreto reviews the Canadian Foundation for Labour Rights’ Unions Matter: Unlikely to convince someone who is anti-union on its own, Unions Matter provides the fodder for union activists to be able to make important arguments in favour of unionization. Even more important,
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