Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- The NDP has unveiled another positive ad to keep up its momentum over the last week of the federal election campaign:



- And in case we needed a reminder why a more honest and positive brand of politics would be such a radical departure from what we have now, the first appointee to the Cons' Ombudsman for Victims of Crime is saying publicly that the office was a wasteful and politically-motivated sham.

- Likewise, it may be news that yet another of the Cons' environmental plans is designed to be as expensive and ineffective as possible. But there's no reason to be the least bit surprised based on their track record.

- And one more to file under "what needs changing", as the latest reality check on the cost of F-35s looks mostly to confirm what should already have been obvious about the Cons' unwillingness to acknowledge what a new fleet of sole-sourced fighter jets would cost.

- Finally, Armine Yalnizyan points out how the Cons' tax slashing has been pitched as being directed at the middle class even while its benefits are felt almost exclusively at the top:

Where’s the real middle? There are many ways to measure it, but let’s keep it simple: the dead centre of the income distribution -median income. Half of Canadian households have more, and half of Canadian households make do with less. In 2008, median after-tax household income of Canadians was $48,500 ($55,000 before taxes).
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Both the Liberals and the NDP address poverty and decry growing income inequality. Harper’s Conservatives do not. They all claim to introduce measures to ease pressures on average families, but Harper’s proposals actually worsen income disparities and do almost nothing of substance for those truly in the middle.

Take income splitting for young families -a promise that comes with a $2.5-billion price tag. The Harper team touts average savings of $1,300 per family. But a 2006 Library of Parliament assessment showed only 8% trickles down to half of Canada’s young families, those with incomes under $60,000. Most goes to the rich, nothing goes to the poorest -single parents have no incomes to split. (One in five families raising children are headed by single parents. They have the highest poverty rate of any group in Canada.)

It’s the same with elderly benefits. Harper promises modest improvements to Guaranteed Income Supplements, worth $300-million. But his pension splitting scheme, introduced in 2007, costs the public purse over $920-million. The elderly living on incomes under $30,000 get 6% of that. They make up 40% of seniors’ households. None gets to the poorest seniors, mostly women living alone.

Then there’s the Tax Free Savings Account. Introduced in January 2009 -at the height of the recession, when every other govern-ment across the globe was trying to stimulate spending, not saving. Harper now promises to double the maximum contribution, from $5,000 to $10,000.

It’s pitched as something that’s good for everyone, with a whopping price-tag of over $6-billion a year upon full implementation. But in 2008, before the recession hit, half of Canadians made less than $25,400 after tax. Try taking $10,000 out of that. But their incomes, along with those of every other Canadian, are enhanced by the public health care, public transit and other public services (clean water, bridges and roads, education and more) that taxes support.