Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Jake Johnson writes about the growing recognition that we'll never avert a climate breakdown by putting all action at the mercy of petrostates and oil lobbyists. And Carl Meyer discusses how the Libs have spent far more time and political capital doing PR work for the tar sands than to work on developing an international framework to combat the climate crisis. 

- Luke LeBrun notes that Europe is taking steps to work around reliance on the U.S. over the course of another Trump presidency, and writes that Canada should be pursuing the same option.  

- Max Fawcett writes that the importance of the CBC has only been amplified by the spread of disinformation from elsewhere - meaning that the Cons' plans to trash it could have devastating consequences. And Mitchell Anderson warns of the dangers of allowing propaganda to overwhelm any sense of shared objective reality. 

- Jon Milton discusses how the U.S. Democrats' campaign serves as a painful example of how not to combat far-right demogoguery. And Sheima Benembarek discusses how the compulsive blaming of immigrants - which is currently being enabled by the Trudeau Libs - serves as an entry point to fascism.

- Finally, Jeremy Appel calls out Danielle Smith's attacks on trans people in Alberta. And Duncan Kinney reports on the UCP's use of for-profit nurses - coupled with its refusal to provide any information about the scope of the practice. 

Friday Afternoon Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Adam Bienkov highlights the evidence from the UK's COVID-19 inquiry which has demonstrated the utter neglect for public health from Boris Johnson and the political system around him, while Andrew Nikiforuk offers a reminder that the pandemic is still roiling around us. And Tinker Ready interviews Ziyad Al-Aly about new research showing that multiple infections exacerbate the risk of long COVID. 

- Seth Borenstein and Mary Katherine Wildeman examine how fossil fuel lobbyists (whether or not labeled as such) have derailed any effective international action to avert a climate breakdown. And Mitchell Anderson points out that Alberta's emissions policy involves preferential treatment for the conscience-free polluters who are singlehandedly preventing Canada from having any hope of being anything but a climate laggard. 

- Noah Smith writes about the asymmetric propaganda war which has allowed Russia and China to pollute the U.S.' information ecosystem (and lay the groundwork for the rise of fascist politics). And Karl Nerenberg offers some suggestions as to how the CBC can respond to the Cons' fixation on silencing any distinct and independent Canadian voices. 

- Meanwhile, Jason Garcia exposes how a billionaire-funded "think tank" is behind Florida legislation to facilitate the use of child labor. 

- Finally, Juste Rajaonson discusses the need to develop housing policy based on the social importance of the right to a home, rather than focusing solely on how to generate immediate returns for developers and landlords. 

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Evelyn Lazare discusses how the refusal of the powers that be to act to mitigate an ongoing pandemic is only ensuring that its effects will be worse and longer-lasting than they need to be. And Emily Moskal reports on a promising new type of long-cost, non-refrigerated vaccine which could provide a means of protecting everybody if any attempt were being made to help anybody. 

- Rebecca Leber writes about new data showing that air quality is deteriorating in the U.S. as the pollution caused by the productions of climate change (including wildfires, heat and drought) outweighs any gains in pollutant regulation. And the Canadian Press reports on a release of polluted water from a Suncor tar sands mine, while Natasha Bulowski reports on the warranted outrage of Indigenous leaders who were kept in the dark about Imperial Oil's release of toxic tailings into food and water sources.  

- Julian Jacobs writes about the contrast between the capital class which continues to rack up massive increases in wealth, and the recession of choice being imposed on workers. And David MacDonald points out how federal benefits for housing and dental care have seen low uptake rates which results in far less improvement of people's material conditions than promised. 

- Emily Leedham offers a primer on the strike among federal government bargaining units seeking to avoid losing ground, while Jeremy Appel reports on the massive strike vote among WestJet pilots. 

- Finally, Max Fawcett writes that the alt-right takeover of Twitter has allowed Pierre Poilivre to claim one victory over truth in his contrived fight against the CBC. And Martin Lukacs points out that beyond serving to separate more gullible supporters from their money, Poilievre's false outrage also works the refs to help ensure the CBC's coverage remains objectively biased in favour of conservatives. 

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Fred Hahn writes about the importance of government investment in times of crisis to make up for what people can't afford - or are understandably scared - to spend. Erica Natividad reports on the millions of Canadians who have no fallback plan if federal relief funding doesn't get renewed - though it's of course worth remembering that many in need either weren't included in the first place, or saw any benefits clawed back by self-serving provincial governments. Trevin Stratten and Robert Asselin note that we should want to be strategic in deciding how to use the resources we have available to tide people over and to set ourselves up for the future. And Brendan Kennedy reports on an appeal by the Canadian Chamber of Commerce to see Ontario's basic income project revived by the federal government.

- Meanwhile, Ryan Malosh discusses the updated (if seemingly obvious) research showing that we can't treat specific lengths of time or distances as a magic bullet in limiting the spread of COVID-19. Justine Coleman reports on Anthony Fauci's recognition that the U.S. is likely over a year away from anything resembling the previous normal. And the Alberta NDP has offered its proposals to try to avert a similar uncontrolled outbreak - though there's reason for concern that all of the prairie provinces may be past the point of avoiding a catastrophic fall wave.

- CBC News reports on the lack of any realistic prospect of another oil drilling boom - no matter how much we subsidize fossil fuels either by building pipelines or undermining environmental protections. And Carl Meyer discusses the contrast between a Lib government punting on effective methane rules, and the people pushing for immediate action to limit the greenhouse gas with the most immediate effect on our climate.

- Finally, Kelly Crowe is rightly dubious of the CBC's plan to put a price on its reputation through a sponsored content division.

On sucker's deals

While my Leader-Post column won't be running this week, I'll take the opportunity to offer some context and an update on Geoff Leo's must-read report on Brightenview's founders who have become the Wall government's latest corporate darlings.

By way of background, Leo was also the one to break the news about how the Saskatchewan Party's campaign promise based on Brightenview was built on an incomplete deal, as well as the province's giveaway to CP which was supposed to provide an anchor tenant for the Global Transportation Hub to encourage other businesses to build without the need for massive public subsidies. And Julie Mintenko and David Giles reported on Brightenview's disappearance of its past promises of a Dundurn megamall.

With that in mind, should we expect anything different from Brightenview in the GTH? To answer that, let's take a photographic tour of its planned development.

First, here are artist's renderings of what it's supposed to look like (from Leo's report):

Second, the "breaking ground" photo op three weeks ago (also from CBC's report), showing what was advertised for public consumption as the start of work:

And for the punch line, the same site in its current condition:

Needless to say, the smart money looks to be on past performance predicting future results. But since Brightenview and the Saskatchewan Party each seem to have contributed to each other's confidence games, whether they lead to any benefit for the public is at most a secondary consideration.

Wednesday Afternoon Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Thomas Frank writes that a progressive party can only expect to succeed if it places principles of equality and workers' interests at the core of everything it does - rather than serving mostly as the voice of a wealthy professional class:

Somewhere in a sunny corner of the country, either right now or very shortly, a group of tech tycoons or well-meaning private equity investors will meet to discuss what went wrong in this election cycle. They will consider many things: the sexism and racism of Trump voters, the fundamental foreignness of the flyover, the problems one encounters when dealing with evangelicals. They will celebrate some activist they learned about from NPR, they will enjoy some certified artisanal cuisine, they will hand out prizes to the same people that got prizes at the last event they attended, and they will go back to their comfortable rooms at the resort and sleep ever so soundly.

These people think they know what liberalism includes and what it doesn’t include. And in the latter category fall the concerns that made up the heart and soul of liberal politics a few decades ago: labor and work and exploitation and economic equality.

To dedicate your life to concerns like these today is to sign up for obscurity and frustration. It’s to enter a world without foundation grants, without appearances on MSNBC, and without much job security. Nothing about this sphere of liberal activism is fashionable or attractive. Books on its subjects go unreviewed and unread. Strikes drag on for weeks before they are noticed by the national media. Labor organizers are some of the hardest-working but least-thanked people I know. Labor reporters are just about extinct. Promises to labor unions are voided almost as soon as they leave a politician’s lips.

- Meanwhile, Tom Parkin discusses how the NDP - and Jagmeet Singh in particular - may serve as Canada's antidote to the Trump brand of politics.

- Chuck Collins, Helen Flannery and Josh Hoxie examine the toxic effects of relying on gilded giving from a small number of extremely wealthy individuals to support services, rather than being able to build a base of broader funding (whether public or charitable). And Cathy Crowe makes the case for a push toward building affordable housing.

- Daniel Leblanc reports on the CRA's long-awaited progress in cracking down on offshore tax havens.

- Kevin Metcalf discusses how the new surveillance state established by C-51 is only criminalizing and isolating youth while offering no real security benefit. And Justin Ling notes that the RCMP's response to the repeated rejection of "lawful access" legislation is to push for the same powers under a different name - with Ralph Goodale and the Libs only enabling them in the cause.

- Finally, John Doyle writes about the blatant elitism behind Kellie Leitch's drive to destroy Canada's only major media outlet which isn't ultimately answerable to corporate interests.

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Julie Delahanty comments on Canada's crisis of inequality and poverty. And Sean McElwee highlights how the ill-founded belief that income inequality is more a matter of merit than luck tends to lead people to accept far more of it than should be tolerable.

- Susan Riley rightly challenges the myth of "tax relief" - which typically results in tiny individual returns at the expense of any capacity to build a functional society.

- Paris Marx argues that a basic income serves as the most promising support system to allow for the growth of art and culture. And Angella MacEwen points out that employment insurance is the most obvious means of targeting stimulus money toward both social needs and economic growth.

- Finally, Colin Horgan examines the future of media as a public good in Canada, including this suggestion as to how to develop new opportunities for focused discussion of issues:

(T)he CBC’s online division offers the best chance at producing more new, niche-oriented media, given that it continues to receive federal funding — and if the current government has anything to do with it, apparently will receive more. This is not to say that all out-of-work journalists could work for the CBC, but rather that it may be there where experimentation could work, as it bears fewer (though still some) of the pressures of private media.

More specifically, this might mean launching an iPlayer-style TV app, and commissioning programming for it that otherwise might not make it to the main network simply because it appeals only to a small sub-section of viewers. Similarly, expanding its battery of podcasts beyond merely recordings of its radio shows, to include specific — or even random — topics (Video games? TV recaps? Vacations in continental Europe? WHL team coverage? The Aboriginal music scene?) would be inexpensive and, more importantly, allow advertisers more specific audiences to target. Likewise with its journalism: why not open sub-sites? Why not, for example, a data-journalism site akin to FiveThirtyEight? Any of these ventures that proves successful at the CBC might strike out on its own, starting another series of similar shows or podcasts, complete with a website garnered toward those viewers or listeners. Who knows?

There are problems with this idea — I can name a few already. For one, it would take a major shift in the way we conceive of a public broadcaster (as part start-up incubator). But if a varied, engaged, and thoughtful media sphere is indeed a public policy concern, then it might be incumbent of us to at least spitball some ideas about what we can do with the media corporation we all still own.

The secret platform

It never figured to take long for the Cons to start making up numbers for lack of any legitimate criticism of the NDP's platform - and Jason Kenney has charged into the breach. But it's worth noting the source of many of the supposedly-costed items, which consist of NDP MPs' committee reports.

To be clear, committee reports represent an important contribution in Parliament's governance of public policy. And what makes them stand out is that fact that they offer independent review by representatives tasked with assessing particular issues - who can then be expected to reach their own conclusions on the optimal solutions for those issues in a vacuum.

But because reports are necessarily focused on specific areas of review, they can't generally be taken as a statement of the decisions which a party might make in balancing competing priorities. And that's exactly where voters normally have reason to look to a party's platform as an integrated set of policy choices for the next term of office - and to ignore any attempt to let opposition parties treat committee reports as a substitute.

That said, there is one exception which is only highlighted by Kenney's stance.

It's well-known (and recently confirmed) that due to the meddling of Stephen Harper's PMO, Conservative caucus members - MPs and Senators alike - don't have the freedom to conduct independent reviews of legislation or policy choices that we'd expect from the rest of our parliamentarians. And so it's probably fair to treat the Cons' committee reports as reflecting Stephen Harper's judgment - a conclusion which is only reinforced by his right hand man in saying he consideres other parties' representatives' reports to be party policy.

That means that Harper is on the hook to answer for, say, the proposals from his Senate caucus to pursue government certification of imams, or to gut the CBC. And the opposition parties may want to take a far closer look at the Cons' committee reports as the campaign progresses - since no less a figure than Jason Kenney considers them to be part of his party's platform.

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Robert Reich describes how U.S. voters are rejecting the concept of a ruling class from both the left and the right - while noting that it's vital to get the answer right as to which alternative is worth pursuing. And Owen Jones sees Jeremy Corbyn's rise as an inevitable response to the emptiness of New Labour in the UK:

Corbyn’s campaign has been unique in the Labour leadership campaign in actually offering coherent policies and a fleshed-out economic strategy: a radical housing programme; tax justice; democratic public ownership of utilities and services; a public investment bank to transform the economy; quantitative easing to invest in desperately needed infrastructure; a £10 minimum wage; a National Education Service; a costed abolition of tuition fees; women’s rights; and so on. His campaign is making astounding headway – against the odds – because it offers a coherent, inspiring and, crucially, a hopeful vision. His rivals offer little of any substance. What’s left for them?
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If those in the self-described “centre-left” offered a coherent, inspiring vision, the Corbyn phenomenon would never have happened. They have failed to develop one. If they want to regain momentum within their own party – let alone win over the country – they should sideline the voices of negativity and learn how to inspire people. And however much they resort to cod psychology or sneering about the Corbyn phenomenon, the truth remains: they made it possible.

- Andrew Nikiforuk reminds us that the storm currently swamping Canada's economy was entirely predictable - and indeed predicted by those who didn't buy the Cons' belief in a narrow resource economy. And Louis-Philippe Rochon duly slams the Cons for now making matters worse with gratuitous austerity as another recession forms on their watch:

There may be a time and place to balance the books but now is not the time. Every economist today will tell you that Harper's pursuit of balancing the federal budget in times of crisis and indeed, in times of recession, is simply a bull-headed and wrong idea.

It does not help the economy; in fact, it hurts it — and hurts it deeply. At the very least, it is preventing the economy from taking flight and keeps it well anchored in a depressed state.

What we need now is more fiscal stimulus.
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We are well aware of the absence of empirical support in favour of austerity, yet austerians like Harper insist on claiming that their approach is somehow superior, that contractions in fiscal stimulus will somehow, magically, be expansionary.

Imagine geocentrists being shown proof that the earth actually revolved around the sun, and dismissing the new science as fuddleduddlery. This is the world in which austerians like Harper live: first, deny fiscal stimulus can make any positive contribution to economic growth, despite the mountain of scientific evidence. Next, deny the mountain exists.

In the face of the lack of evidence and empirical support for their views and policies, one can only conclude that ideology and powerful interests are what keep these ideas afloat.

This is where Harper's policies come in: adopt policies that bring rewards to those who support you to the detriment of the rest, since they will contribute to your party that will get your elected and perpetuate those failed policies.

In this world, austerity and balanced budgets have nothing to do with economics. It's all politics.

- Michael Plaxton explains the "caretaker convention" which should limit how much more the Cons' ongoing power is used now that the campaign is officially underway.

- Finally, Ian Welsh offers a useful summary of what's at stake in October's election, while kev takes a first look at some of the policy choices on offer. Karl Nerenberg sets out the record that each party will have to defend. Greg Lyle examines the current party standings and paths to victory. Luke Savage rightly laments the state of election coverage which seems bent on focusing more and more on the trivial at the expense of the substantive. And Warren Bell writes about how the election may serve as a decision point for the CBC in particular, as the Cons have taken several steps to suggest it won't last in its current form if they have any say in the matter.

Monday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material to start your week.

- Chantal Panozzo discusses the lack of work-life balance which serves as the default in the U.S. - and notes how preposterous precarious work looks once a person has experienced an alternative:

Before I moved to Switzerland for almost a decade, American Reality was all I knew. I was living in a two-bedroom apartment making $30,000 a year in a job where I worked almost seven days a week with no overtime pay and received 10 days of paid time off a year.

In other words, for the hours worked, I was making minimum wage, if that. The glamour of this job was supposed to make up for the hours, but in reality, working every weekend is a ticket to burnout — not success.

My husband and I were so accustomed to American Reality that when he was offered an opportunity to work in Switzerland, we both thought about travel and adventure — not about improving our quality of life. It hadn't occurred to us that we could improve our quality of life simply by moving.

But without realizing it, or even asking for it, a better life quality came to us. And this is why, now that I'm back, I'm angry that my own country isn't providing more for its people.

- Travis Lupick highlights why we should encourage the development of supportive housing rather than assuming there's anything to be gained by trying to push it away.

- Daniel Tencer reports on how the TPP would have prevented Crown entities including the CBC from operating in the public interest rather than as a commercial body - meaning we may have dodged a bullet in the breakdown of last week's talks. And Alice Olstein points out how trade agreements and control by financial elites have led Puerto Rico to fiscal disaster.

- Jacqueline Nelson writes about the confusing and ineffective patchwork of funding for prescription drugs in Canada.

- Finally, ThinkPol reports that the Cons have pushed any public access to documents evaluating the constitutionality of their two-tiered citizenship and terror legislation until after election day.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Rick Salutin discusses how corruption has become endemic in the global economy as an inevitable consequence of me-first values:

You wouldn't have those CEO pig-outs absent neo-liberalism's moral model: get rich not just quick but hugely. As Kevin O'Leary loves saying, and CBC plasters on its promos: God put us here to get rich. Note it's a public broadcaster where he barks that and no one contests it. (I consider Amanda Lang's ripostes pro forma.)

Since there's no counter model (excluding, maybe, the pope) it becomes almost embarrassing not to grab for all you can get, legality be damned. The mentality seeps into areas like pro sports and the World Cup, with PED corruption, game fixing -- and trickles down to kids. There's also a sort of pre-emptive political corruption, where leaders like Bill Clinton and Barack Obama have their eye on the vast returns available after they leave office, through their own foundations, etc., as long as they don't offend the corporate titans who are the donors. But none of it would thrive without the grotesque, tantalizing wealth inequalities that equate with neoliberalism.

Why anyone thought privatizing huge chunks of public wealth and letting the profit motive slither all over them would mean less corruption evades me, along with thinking Ontario's Liberals are the beginning and end of the problem. Corruption may always be with us but it comes in different forms. We're currently driving the globalization-privatization model right off a cliff.

- Meanwhile, Jacques Leslie takes note of Gabriel Zucman's work on the widespread abuse of tax havens. And in a sign of just how thoroughly the service-to-the-rich is becoming entrenched, CBC reports on the latest WikiLeaks revelations - showing Canada among a group of countries negotiating an agreement to prevent governments from reining in financial-sector abuses.

- In case there was any doubt that fair tax increases can form part of a viable electoral strategy, Linda McQuaig argues that Ontario's recent experience - featuring both high-income surtaxes implemented in a minority provincial Parliament, and a decisive election defeat for the party insisting on cuts all around - should put that to rest.

- Stephen Maher reports on impending legal challenges to the Unfair Elections Act. But Leslie MacKinnon reminds us that the Cons will doggedly fight voting rights in any form and in the most intrusive way possible - most recently by waiting until four by-elections were in full swing before seeking a stay of a ruling extending voting rights to Canadians living abroad.

- James Hutt writes about the dangers of increasingly privatized health care. And Iglika Ivanova responds to some anti-teacher spin from B.C.'s Liberal government by pointing out that teachers - like most public servants - have been receiving far less than their fair share from economic growth.

- Finally, Wade Rowland makes the case that a stronger CBC would do wonders for all kinds of broadcasters in Canada.

Sunday Afternoon Links

Miscellaneous material for your Sunday reading.

- James Greiff makes the case against the right's faith-based reliance on costly high-end tax cuts in place of attracting people through jobs and quality of life:

(T)he recent record suggests those U.S. states that cut taxes find themselves with bigger deficits and none of the economic revival that might stop the population loss plaguing the Rust and Farm belts.

Consider Ohio, where Republican Governor John Kasich is pushing to cut the top marginal tax rate to 5 per cent or less from the current 5.92 per cent. This might save the average taxpayer a few hundred dollars a year. It’s always nice to have a little more change in one’s pocket, though you should ask yourself: For this amount of money, would you pick up hearth and home and move to Ohio or cancel plans to move out of state?

But if people don’t relocate because of tax rates, why do they move? The answer is as basic as it gets. The biggest group of cross-border movers is people relocating for jobs or looking for work, according to a new study by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Adding in people who move for cheaper housing and milder weather — mostly retirees leaving colder climates for the South and Florida — accounts for a majority of the people who leave.
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There’s also evidence that cutting corporate taxes is of little use in stimulating business. First, many entrepreneurs aren’t that mobile; second, they tend to want to be in cities with large talent pools. Taxes don’t often figure among the reasons entrepreneurs cite for where to start a business. And once a company is up and running, marginal tax rates are rarely something that leads a company to move.

- Paul Krugman discusses the Financial Times' failed attack on Thomas Piketty's discussion of wealth inequality. And Travis Lupick reports on Oxfam Canada's effort to put inequality at the forefront of its international development work.

- Meanwhile, Guy Standing argues for a "precariat charter" to enshrine new rights of citizenship (most notably a guaranteed basic income). But I do have to wonder whether he's proposing the wrong means to the right end - as the case for greater control over time and income security seems more defensible and appealing as applying to all individuals, rather than mattering only to the subset of workers who see their current employment (or lack thereof) as including them within the precariat class.

- Jim Stanford eviscerates the Cons' attempt to keep a pool of disposable employees at business' fingertips based on the claim that they're particularly important to international service industries:

On average, TFWs on LMOs are more important in goods-producing industries than service-producing industries.  They accounted for almost 3% of all jobs in goods industries, but only 1.35% in services sectors.  (While these ratios may seem small, don’t forget that the rapid expansion of the TFW program under the Conservatives has meant that migrant workers accounted for a surprisingly large share of all net new jobs created in the economy; employers tapped migrants for one in five net new paid positions created in the whole economy from 2007 through 2012).

Moreover, within services industries, TFWs are clearly concentrated in non-tradeable services sectors.  60% of all service-sector LMOs were issued in the three biggest sub-sectors, each of which is overwhelmingly domestic in its outlook: hospitality (with 45,000 LMOs), “Other Services” (21,000 LMOs, most of whom work in personal care), and wholesale and retail trade (11,000 LMOs).  The proportional reliance on LMOs is highest, not surprisingly, in the hospitality and other services categories, where LMOs represented almost 4% of all employment — and where the expansion of the program has provided employers with attractive low-wage recruitment opportunities.

In contrast, a total of 23,000 LMOs were in effect in 2013 in the four major tradeable service industries listed on the table above: transportation, information, finance, and professional services.  That represents 0.9% of employment in those four sectors.  A more detailed disaggregation of employment within those tradeable services industries (were the data to allow for it) would likely confirm, I suggest, that the use of TFWs in the more specialized and innovative services jobs (those which are most oriented around exports to foreign purchasers) would likely be significantly lower.  Of course, there are some TFWs who have entered Canada to fill higher-skill jobs, including some in finance, professional services, and other tradeable services.  So we cannot say that TFWs play no role in services exports; they clearly do.  But we can certainly say that TFWs are used less intensively in tradeable services than non-tradeable services, and even less intensively again than in goods industries.  That makes it all the more curious for Mr. Kenney to highlight this part of the economy with his dramatic argument.
...
Opponents of the TFW program have argued for its replacement with systems of permanent immigration, and adequate transition measures to allow those who are in the country to continue working here under alternative provisions.  (See for example the fine work of the Alberta Federation of Labour on this point.)  In that regard, with due notice to both employers of TFWs and the migrant workers themselves, the TFW program (and in particular its most troublesome aspect, the low-skill stream) could be cancelled with no impact on Canada’s services exports.  In fact, the impact on goods-producing industries and non-tradeable services would be greater (but still negligible, given appropriate notice and transition measures) than the impact on tradeable services.

In light of this evidence, Mr. Kenney’s claim that the TFW program is essential to Canada’s international trade in services should be seen as far-fetched and desperate.  And the extravagant hyperbole of this argument makes a mockery of his own appeal, in his earlier tweet that same day, for more “nuance in the discussion” of the TFW issue.

- Finally, Antony Lowenstein discusses how public broadcasters represent a much-needed counterweight to the wealthy and powerful - and why they're thus bound to come under attack.

Saturday Morning Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- Ezra Klein comments on the U.S.' doom loop of oligarchy - as accumulated wealth is spent to buy policy intended to benefit nobody other than those who have already accumulated wealth:

On Thursday, the House passed Paul Ryan's 2015 budget. In order to get near balance, the budget contains $5.1 trillion in spending cuts — roughly two-thirds of which come from programs for poor Americans. Those cuts need to be so deep because Ryan has pledged not to raise even a dollar in taxes.

As a very simple rule, rich people pay more in taxes and poor people benefit more from services. So if you pledge to balance the budget without raising taxes, you're going to end up making the rich richer and the poor poorer. But Ryan goes further than that: he actually cuts taxes on the rich.
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Wealthy people will be even better poised to influence the 2014 and 2016 elections than they were to influence the 2010 and 2012 elections. Now, wealthy people are not a single voting bloc, but most wealthy people would like to continue being wealthy. And so you see bipartisan movement towards policies that protect their wealth, most recently with the Democratic legislature in Maryland voting to eliminate the state's estate tax.

Over time, a political system that gives the wealthy more power is a political system that is going to do more to protect the interests of the wealthy. It's the Doom Loop of Oligarchy, and we're seeing it daily.

- Meanwhile, Jim Stanford documents Canada's own descent into neoliberalism. And Carol Goar highlights how the Cons are doing their utmost to eliminate opportunities for young workers.

- The National Post's editorial board points out the absurdity of the Cons attacking their own appointed Chief Electoral Officer. Andrew Coyne calls out the Cons for turning what should be wholly unobjectionable principles - such as an accurate census and a fair electoral system - into their own political firing line. And Tabatha Southey duly mocks the assertion that Elections Canada is the new Illuminati.

- But then, a party merrily engaged in systemic illegality - such as, say, interference with access to information - figures to have little choice but to try to shout down any investigation which might reveal what it's actually up to.

- Finally, Thomas Walkom reminds us about some of Jim Flaherty's deliberate cuts to important public services including the CBC. And PressProgress charts how Lib and Con governments alike have slashed Canada's public broadcaster over the past three decades.

Monday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading.

- Stephen Hume writes about the importance of tax revenue in building a functional and compassionate Canada:

My taxes provide our mostly peaceful, prosperous and safe society; a health care system that for all its flaws and glitches is pretty darn good compared to the alternatives; a policing and justice system that despite occasional hiccups is fair, merciful and trustworthy; a brave and honourable military.

My taxes provide income support for the unemployed, the indigent, the impaired and the unlucky.

My taxes helped create educational facilities of exceptional quality and performance; public infrastructure that makes doing business in Canada stable, predictable and profitable compared to many other parts of the world.

My taxes keep cities clean and safe and full of life. They provide generally good government by mostly decent, hard-working public servants and politicians.

My taxes helped send Chris Hadfield into space; Carey Price, Hayley Wickenheiser and all our other wonderful athletes to the Olympics. They helped writer Alice Munro and scientist Gerhard Herzberg to win the Nobel Prize. They also paved B.C.’s roads, brought electricity to remote First Nations communities and built bridges across the Fraser River that enable Vancouver’s prosperity.

Canada is far from perfect. Many social injustices remain to address. But life is better than it might be for most of us, even for the aggrieved.

Thank my taxes — and yours — for that.

- Meanwhile, John McDermott offers a worthwhile read on how the UK Cons' attacks on social benefits are making life more difficult for low-income individuals both inside and outside the workforce. And Kathleen Geier highlights how more progressive tax policy could go a long way toward reducing inequality on both local and national levels.

- Huffington Post reports that the Cons' priorities run in exactly the opposite direction - as they continue to encourage the use of temporary foreign workers to suppress wages and channel resource wealth to those who need it least. And CP reports on an internal government study showing that any attempt to sell 20 years of corporatist policies as a benefit to middle-class families is based on myth rather than fact. (Which likely explains why the defenders of the status quo are making up fictitious symbols rather than talking to or about real people.)

- But we're at least seeing much-needed pushback against the Cons' assumption that health, safety and equity all need to be sacrificed on the altar of burning more oil - including from Suncor employee and Unifor member Lori McDaniel, who's earned the NDP's nomination in Fort McMurray-Athabasca.
 
- Finally, Huffington Post also reports on one of the many nasty surprises in Stephen Harper's latest omnibus budget bill, as the Cons are planning to take direct political control over CBC labour relations and personnel decisions.

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Thomas Walkom discusses how a continued economic slump is combining with the Cons' economic policies to destroy secure jobs in favour of precarious, low-paying work:

Those making economic policy from afar may admire creative destruction. Those being destroyed rarely do.

Here in Canada, this entire high-wire act is being performed without safety nets. The ones we had — such as welfare and employment insurance — were either eliminated or reduced by successive federal governments.
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What is to be done? Poloz says we have no choice but to wait — until foreigners start buying Canadian goods again, until domestic business owners feel more upbeat.

Harper wants the economy to be more competitive. To that end, his government is aiding in the destructive side of creative destruction by pushing wages down.

Thus, it attacks unions. Thus, it imports temporary foreign workers to dampen down labour costs for business.

Provincial governments, like that of Ontario Premier Kathleen Wynne, are helping the destructive process along by cutting back their spending.

They fear public debt. But that fear means that public assets — from health care to transit to schools — are left to decay.

The hope of the destroyers is that, in the long run, we will all be better off.

Perhaps. But as economist John Maynard Keynes once noted, in the long run we will also all be dead.

- Jefferson Cowie notes that in the U.S. (as in Canada), it's long past time for labour standards law to be updated to avoid loopholes used by employers to avoid basic protections:

(Seventy-five) years ago today, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Fair Labor Standards Act to give a policy backbone to his belief that goods that were not produced under “rudimentary standards of decency” should not be “allowed to pollute the channels of interstate trade."

The act is the bedrock of modern employment law. It outlawed child labor, guaranteed a minimum wage, established the official length of the workweek at 40 hours, and required overtime pay for anything more. Capping the working week encouraged employers to hire more people rather than work the ones they had to exhaustion. All this came not from the magic of market equilibrium but from federal policy.
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(T)oday the act faces an uncertain future, thanks to a series of disconcerting shifts in the way we think about work in America.

The problem is indicative of the moral and political slipperiness of our time. A large and growing number of employers willfully classify their employees as “exempt” from the law by shifting their jobs, but not their pay, to administrative, executive and professional categories. Being exempt allows employers to ignore pesky things like overtime or minimum wages, since these are salaried, not hourly workers. Lawsuits over back overtime pay resulting from misclassifications have gone through the roof.

If the line between exempt and nonexempt workers has become unfairly blurred, the line distinguishing employee and independent contractor has faded to near invisibility. We are moving toward the “1099 economy,” named after the tax form provided to independent contractors, a classification that often walks the line of legality.

For some workers, being a 1099’er means more flexibility, creativity and control over their work. However, there are many more reluctant 1099 workers who want regular jobs but find themselves locked out of the system by employers looking for an easy way to buck their responsibility to their employees.

And then there is the most infamous classification hustle: the internship. For bright, young (and typically affluent) interns at America’s top corporations there is no actual job, so there are no fair labor standards to apply. That means no minimum wage and no maximum hours. There is often no pay at all.

And CBC reports on Bell Canada's efforts to squeeze free labour out of interns.

- Meanwhile, Nicole Reinert and Zach Dubinsky report on offshore tax avoidance by Canadian banks.

- Finally, Michael Geist discusses how the Cons' familiar combination of sellouts to industry and regulatory delays has left Canada without a functional anti-spam law.

Thursday Morning Links

This and that for your Thursday reading.

- Ed Broadbent takes a look at how our tax system can combat inequality in more ways than one:

The Broadbent Institute is presenting proposals Tuesday to the Finance Committee of the House of Commons. Our primary recommendation is that Canada establish as a goal the provision of a basic income-tested guarantee to all citizens through a fairer personal income tax system.

The tax/transfer system equalizes income in two important ways. First, progressive income taxes mean that the affluent pay a higher percentage of income than middle and low income earners. Second, these taxes help finance social programs that benefit those who have middle and low incomes more than the affluent.

Our tax/transfer system is modestly re-distributive, but we still have a very unequal distribution of income after the impact of taxes and transfers has been taken into account. And the re-distributive impact of has been declining since the mid-1990s. It’s now 20% below the advanced industrial country average.
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(A)s a long-term goal, we should abolish welfare as it currently exists. Our current system, paid for by the provinces, provides meagre and stigmatizing benefits that leave recipients well below the poverty line. It also creates a “welfare wall” since recipients lose their benefits almost entirely if they take a low paid and insecure job. A negative income tax has been broadly championed across the political spectrum, including by Senator Hugh Segal and the late Tom Kent, the prime architect of Canada’s social reforms of the 1960s. It should be given serious consideration.

Fourth, improvements to income support programs should be financed by making our income tax system fairer. Even as the income share of the top 1% has risen, their effective income tax rate has fallen, from 39.4% to 33.3% since 2000. We should consider changes to address this, scale back special tax breaks that deliver huge benefits primarily to the very well off, e.g. on capital gains, and crack down on tax cheaters. Corporations should be required to pay to clean up their own pollution. Making these changes would help stabilize government finances and restore public trust in the fairness of the tax system.

- Meanwhile, Matt McClure points out that Alberta's "low tax" branding only applies to the wealthy - as low- and middle-class families actually pay more there than in other provinces.

- Trish Hennessy documents the costs of the Cons' austerity. But Kenneth Thomas notes that the disastrous results of austerity haven't stopped the Republicans from pushing it in the U.S. And lest we think Canada is lacking for Very Serious People eager to inflict economic pain in the name of appeasing the bond vigilantes regardless of the human costs, Neil Macdonald argues for exactly that.

- Finally, it should come as no surprise that the type of irresponsible Con government which can lose track of $3.1 billion without blinking an eye is focusing its efforts on...muzzling in the watchdogs and media outlets which might otherwise be able to hold it to account.

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Thomas Walkom writes that yesterday's minor tinkering aside, the goal of the Cons' temporary foreign worker program is still to drive down Canadian wages. And Miles Corak argues that the resulting distortion of employment markets shouldn't be any more acceptable to a libertarian than a progressive:

Flooding the market with workers from elsewhere, year in and year out – even during a major recession – is not about an acute labour shortage. It is nothing more than a wage subsidy to low-paying firms, a subsidy that stunts the reallocation of goods, capital, and labour that is the basis for efficient markets.

Not only that, but by blunting the rise in wages that market forces are calling for, the Temporary Worker Program is exacerbating the inequality of earnings in the lower half of the income distribution.

It will continue to displace Canadian workers silently if not directly, despite government assurances, for the simple reason that it artificially keeps wages low, and spoils the magic of the market.

The entire program amounts to a needless intervention that creates both inefficiency and inequity. Perhaps libertarians can see that more clearly than politicians. The whole thing should simply be scrapped.

- Doctors for Fair Taxation make the case for Ontario to balance its budget through more progressive taxes rather than through massive cuts. And Andrew Jackson again debunks the Fraser Institute's anti-tax hysteria by pointing out that it's based on falsely counting corporate taxes, user fees and any other public revenue as household-level taxes - while deliberately omitting any income for anybody but individuals in order to present artificially high rates.

- Tim Naumetz reports on the Cons' power grab to take control over the CBC. Lauren Strapagiel collects a few of the Twitter responses as to what #harperscbc would look like.

- Finally, Joseph Heath pens a defence of sociology (and criminology in particular) against the Cons' attacks:

The common-sense conservative disdain for sociology is long-standing. After delivering a swingeing 25-per-cent budget cut to Ontario universities in the 1990s, then premier Mike Harris specifically fingered “sociology” as one of the useless disciplines that the universities might consider cutting.

As a liberal intellectual, whenever I encounter this sort of hatred, I naturally ask myself, “What are the root causes?” What did sociologists ever do to them? Why isn’t “society” something that conservatives consider worthy of study?

In this case the root cause is not hard to find. It comes from an accident of intellectual history, which is that criminology developed as a subspecialty of sociology. The people who conservatives actually hate are criminologists. They hate criminologists because criminologists are pretty much unified in the conviction our common-sense ideas about crime, both with respect to its causes and its remedy, are wrong.
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(M)ost of us have a huge bias in the way that we think about punishment, which affects our judgment in everything we do, from raising kids to managing people at work, and, of course, to thinking about crime. The only way to correct this, and to figure out what actually works, is to collect data and look at long-term trends.

This is why people who read books and study statistics are much more likely to support programs that appear to coddle criminals (what conservatives like to call “hugs for thugs” programs). It’s because social scientists actually know something important about how the world works, and in this case reality does have a liberal bias.

Hostility to expertise in all of its forms is the closest thing that Canadian conservatives have to a unifying ideology. Criminologists, however, rankle them just a little bit more than others, because their expertise happens to touch on an area that many conservatives feel strongly about. Recent changes in Canadian criminal justice have served no productive purpose, other than promoting punishment for the sake of punishment and vengeance for the sake of vengeance. This may make some people feel better, but it does nothing to prevent crime. Criminologists are the ones with the data to prove this, so it’s no wonder they’re unpopular with the government.

Sunday Afternoon Links

Assorted content for your Sunday reading.

- Ian Lovett reports on the use of "capital appreciation bonds" in California to ensure that future generations pay an inflated price to private-sector developers for infrastructure today.

- Justin Ling's review of Joyce Murray's message about electoral non-competition pacts is well worth a read - but I'll particularly highlight this part:

Do you want Stephen Harper to be defeated in the next federal election?

Alright, we’re already off to a rocky start.

Politics of negation is dangerous, ugly, and unfortunately rears its ugly head very often in leadership campaigns.

“Elect me and I’ll stop [gay marriage/abortion/separatists/Toronto elitists]” has long between a rhetorical sledgehammer that’s good at getting gut reaction from ignorant people. Nothing more.

So when Joyce Murray asks me if I want Stephen Harper to be defeated, my immediate answer is ‘no’ — I want a government that, if possible, is more competent than our current one. Everyone should want that. Murray, like Trudeau or Garneau, should be making a case that she can do that. Not offering an Ocean’s Eleven caper on how to dupe the prime minister.

- But of course, there's loads of room for improvement on the government we're currently stuck with. And on that front, Steven Shrybman points out just the latest example in commenting on Harper's dubious assertion that his party's misleading robocalls weren't in breach of CRTC regulations, while Information Commissioner Suzanne Legault laments the fact that the Cons are trampling on access to information more and more as their stay in office drags on.

- Herbert Gans discusses how the U.S. media can contribute to genuine democratic debate far better than it currently does. And Rick Salutin laments the state of the CBC in having fallen into the same infotainment format as other broadcasters:

The gold standard for anchors was the U.S.’s Walter Cronkite. He was ready to stand up against the state and the flow and was solid as the bronze statue of the American revolutionary minuteman who stood “by the rude bridge that spanned the flood/ His flag to April’s breeze unfurled.” He had rhetoric and a voice to accompany it: “All things are as they were then except — You Are There.” When president Lyndon Johnson heard Cronkite turn against the Vietnam War, he said, “If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost the country.” Compared to Cronkite, Mansbridge isn’t an icon, he’s a barometer.

He’s happily gone with the flow — and the pressure. CBC has become numero uno for crime stories, weather coverage (today’s snow), product launches, celebrities and awards gossip. None of this is new, or news, and CBC itself doesn’t contest the point. The penny story was another example but the one that probably propelled me into this anchor obit was their infinite overkill on the new BlackBerry. (To give CBC radio its due, Carol Off did an item about that on As It Happens.) Also, to be clear, the Z10 drowned in pseudo-journalism everywhere. That’s my point: why have a public broadcaster if it duplicates everybody else’s obsessions? Nor do I want to romanticize the old CBC news. It was pompous and often misleading. But at least it distorted stories I cared about.

- Finally, Murray Mandryk rightly recognizes the significance of Jack Mintz' report on Saskatchewan's incoherent potash royalty structure.

Saturday Morning Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- Michelle Ervin discusses Ed Broadbent's ideas to start closing Canada's yawning income gap:

Broadbent outlined four broad prescriptions for bridging this gap, and ultimately, for creating a fairer society: investing in good jobs, strengthening income supports, increasing access to public services and reforming the tax regime to make it more progressive.

He wasn’t short on specifics either. Concrete actions toward these goals might include funding skills development in such sectors as early childhood education; introducing a minimum guaranteed income modeled on the system we have for seniors; expanding affordable housing and creating a national child care program; and cracking down on tax evasion and closing “boutique” tax loopholes.

- CBC reports on the Cons' announcement that only Christian chaplains will be employed in Canadian prisons (and in the name of not picking and choosing between religions no less). Malcolm offers up the due response.

- Meanwhile, the NDP is making a concerned effort to call out the Cons' backbenchers for being nothing more than mindless talking-point dispensers. And while I'd normally be skeptical of the likelihood of shaming the Cons into changing course, their partial EI reversal offers a bit more reason for hope than we've seen in quite some time.

- Dan Gardner rightly notes that a commitment to evidence-based policy necessarily implies a willingness to invest in new ideas to actually generate evidence. But I'd think it's worth challenging Gardner's commitment to his own standards: would he support, say, "government-as-player" rather than "government-as-referee" not only for the purpose of research, but also in areas where direct intervention works in practice?

- Finally, the Young Turks discuss Mitt Romney's distaste for PBS. And the desire to attack culture and alternative sources of information is no less obvious among the Sask Party, the Harper Cons and the Republicans' other Canadian cousins:

Wednesday Evening Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Frances Russell comments on the Canada which the Harper Cons are determined to destroy. But the more important point looks to me to be less any theory of constitutionalism than the desire to have governments be as ineffective as possible at all levels:

Harper, the man who co-authored the infamous 2000 Alberta firewall letter, abhors the 1982 Canadian Constitution and its Charter of Rights and Freedoms. He is a strict constitutional constructionist. He believes in the Canada of Confederation in 1867 when Ottawa managed defence, foreign affairs, fisheries, the currency and penitentiaries and the provinces looked after matters of a local nature.

Unfortunately for Canadians, what were local matters 145 years ago now constitute government's biggest, most expensive and important programs -- health, education and social assistance. The notion that 10 provinces and three territories of vastly different size and wealth can be left to finance them on their own assisted by an equalization program whose future is now in doubt as it comes under increasing attack from the right, is simply a prescription for growing disparity -- and disunity.

It was all predictable. During his years with the libertarian National Citizens' Coalition, the prime minister seldom hid his disdain for Canada and Canadians. "Canada appears content to become a second-tier socialistic country, boasting ever more loudly about its economy and social services to mask its second-rate status," he told the National Post in December 2000. In 1997, he asked an American audience not to "feel particularly bad" for Canada's unemployed. "They don't feel bad about it themselves, as long as they're receiving generous social assistance and unemployment insurance."

Most ominously in light of Thursday's budget, he told an NCC audience in 1994 that: "Whether Canada ends up with one national government or two governments or 10 governments, the Canadian people will require less government no matter what the constitutional status or arrangement of any future country might be."

- If there's anything the Cons can abide less than public broadcasting, it's Rights and Democracy. Which is why the former is merely being cut, while the latter is meeting with a wrecking ball.

- Meanwhile, Andrew Coyne, Bruce Anderson and John Ibbitson tear into the Cons for their combination of deception and incompetence in continuing to push F-35s long after they should have been well aware their talking points were utterly nonsensical.

- Paul Wells comments on the hidden release of another report on Afghanistan as a symptom of all that's wrong with a government more focused on propagandizing than discussing what it's actually doing - and a media far too willing to play into that choice.

- Finally, Murray Mandryk notes that while the Cons can never expect the facts to be on their side, they can usually expect the Wall government to come to their rescue in the PR department.