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
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Accidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Tom Parkin discusses the need for a new Tommy Douglas to start leading the way toward national social programs – and the hope that Andrea Horwath can earn that role in Ontario’s provincial election: Since Douglas’s time, Canadian health care has been
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This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Scott Gilmore discusses how Canada is actually backsliding in some crucial development goals. And Colin Gordon writes about the inequality growing on multiple fronts around the globe. – Kathy Tomlinson uncovers a Vancouver real estate market rigged to benefit developers and speculators.
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This and that for your weekend reading. – Simon Enoch offers his take on Saskatchewan’s latest budget – including what little the Saskatchewan Party has learned, and how much it’s still getting wrong: (W)hile the 2018 budget is more measured in that it doesn’t replicate a 2017 budget that saw cuts
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on how Scott Moe’s first budget is just more of the same in leaving Saskatchewan’s low-income residents behind in the face of rising costs of living. For further reading…– D.C. Fraser’s general report on the budget is here. – The inflation data cited in the column is here, while
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This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Matthew Yglesias examines the direct effects of social programs, and finds there’s every reason to invest more in them: Mercury emissions (mostly from coal plants) end up in the water, where they end up in fish, from whence they end up in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Assorted content to start your week. – Charlie May writes that the inequality which is radically reshaping the American political scene receives short shrift compared to other stories. And Thomas Piketty studies (PDF) the political realignment which is seeing relatively well-defined class politics replaced with “multiple-elite” models. – Meanwhile, Tom
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Lana Payne offers her take on the need for Canada to catch up to the rest of the developed world in providing social supports: Canada is sitting at a dismal 17 per cent, down at the bottom of the pack with Ireland,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on Canada’s failure to live up to our self-image as a generous and compassionate country – and the reality that we have plenty of fiscal capacity to close the gap. For further reading…– The abstract for the JAMA article referenced in the column is here, and has already been
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Nathaniel Lewis laments the state of the U.S.’ woefully insufficient social supports, while emphasizing the importance of public social spending in particular: (P)rivate “social spending” is, for the most part, regressive and narrowly distributed. Households are bearing the cost directly for the goods
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Evening Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Andre Picard notes that contrary to our self-image, Canada actually lags behind international peers in health and social spending. And PressProgress points out the same conclusion in new OECD research. – Andrew Mitrovica writes that Doug Ford’s ascendancy in Ontario politics suggests that
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Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Ann Pettifor rightly questions the supposed gains from austerity in belatedly balancing budgets only at the expense of avoidable social devastation. And the CCPA documents the billions of dollars in lost assets and thousands of jobs slashed in Saskatchewan even when Brad Wall
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Livia Gershon discusses why relative equality plays a far greater role in people’s well-being than absolute income in developed countries. And Stefanie Stantcheva writes about the cultural roots of the U.S.’ relative acceptance of extreme inequality (though it’s worth noting that even in
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Thursday Morning Links
This and that for your Thursday reading. – Elizabeth Piper reports on Jeremy Corbyn’s much-needed declaration that under a Labour government, the financial sector will serve the public rather than the other way around. And George Monbiot comments on the role the left needs to play in reversing the accumulation
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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: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – Noam Scheiber and Ben Casselman comment on the role of corporate consolidation in undermining pay and working conditions. And Meagan Day rebuts the claim that employers can be excused for ignoring not-yet-qualified pools of workers by pointing out that the same people
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Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading. – Joseph Stiglitz discusses how the Republicans’ tax scam is designed for the sole purpose of further enriching their already-wealthy donors, while Theodoric Meyer notes that it also stands to make loads of money for lobbyists. – Jagmeet Singh makes the case for Canada
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Assorted content to end your week. – Richard Partington writes that the poorest Britons stand to bear the brunt of the next wave of technological change through further diminished employment prospects. But Peter Goodman points out that a stronger social safety net in Sweden (among other countries) tends to ensure
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, on how Quebec’s latest poverty plan falls far short of the “basic income” title it’s received in some national coverage – and on how we should insist on political leadership toward the genuine article. For further reading…– CBC has reported on the new plan and the response it’s received,
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Toby Sanger discusses how the Trudeau Libs’ obsession with privatized infrastructure only stands to put control over public services in the hands of corporate predators: Corporations are sitting on hundreds of billions of excess cash in Canada and trillions worldwide — money they
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