Monday Afternoon Links

Miscellaneous material to start your week.

- Geoffrey Deihl writes about the polycrisis we're currently facing - and the need to stand up to those determined to inflict it on us. And Laura Paddison discusses the juxtaposition between continually-increasing carbon pollution, and the extreme heat and weather it's causing.  

- Jaela Bernstien points out that the climate damage from Canada's oil and gas exports exceeds that from our entire domestic economy and society - but that our governments are choosing not to count it in setting climate policy. And Mike de Souza weighs in on the sudden disappearance of the Pathways Alliance's greenwashing the moment it was held to a standard of accuracy, while Sarah Krichel interviews Jordan Kinder about his book Petroturfing and the suppression of any message other than fossil fuel chearleading in Canada.  

- Mark Olalde examines how the fossil fuel sector is stifling any plans to ensure the cost of oil contamination is paid by the industry responsible. And Sarah Do Couto reports on a new study finding that the effects from last year's Ohio hazardous chemical spill reached 16 states as well as Canada (contrary to public assurances at the time). 

- Adam King reports on the work being done by unions to fight arbitrary return-to-office mandates and ensure safer work environments for workers generally. Aiyani Bodi discusses the strong desire among young workers to contribute to climate solutions rather than being forced into contributing to a climate breakdown. And Daron Acemoglu writes that the widespread crisis of democracy is based largely on the failure of politicians to represent workers' interests. 

- Finally, Olamide Olaniyan discusses the intersectionality of hate as the general theme of "anti-woke" is used to push - and build alliances between - multiple forms of bigotry and oppression. 

Tuesday Afternoon Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Arijit Chakravarthy and Martha Lincoln offer a reminder that COVID-19 isn't about to go away just because we're refusing to deal with it. And CBC News and Adam Toy report on renewed masking requirements in Manitoba and Alberta health care facilities respectively. 

- Meanwhile, Roberta Lexier and Joe Vipond write about the need to respond to critical threats such as COVID-19 and the climate crisis with facts rather than fantasies. But Mike De Souza exposes how Danielle Smith is systematically preventing Albertans from having access to anything of the sort. 

- Matthew Rosza asks why a climate breakdown which is making our planet uninhabitable is somehow being ignored rather than treated as the top news story of our time. And Andrew Nikiforuk points out how  the Trans Mountain pipeline is proving to be an ever-deepening money pit (even as its best-case scenario would result in its worsening the climate crisis for the sake of enriching oil barons).  

- Brian Doucet discusses the housing strategies which have helped to somewhat alleviate the shortage of affordable homes in some Canadian communities - with public housing authorities and protections for tenants serving as the most promising examples. But Rumneek Johal reports that real estate executives are shoveling massive amounts of cash at the federal Cons in an effort to ensure federal housing policy serves to goose their profits rather than meeting people's needs.  

- Finally, Alex Purdye examines how greedflation is at the root of the growth of increasing food prices (and grocery chain profits). 

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Claire Pomeroy and the Financial Times each highlight the likelihood that survivors of long COVID will be affected for the rest of their lives by a disease which governments have decided to allow to spread. And a group of health experts in the UK weighs in on the folly of condemning thousands of people to illness or death in the name of "personal responsibility" in response to a social threat. 

- Apoorva Mandavilli and Benjamin Mueller discuss how the Delta variant is exacerbating the gap in outcomes between the reality-based portion of the U.S. and the Trumpist death cult. And Jonathan Bernstein discusses the willingness of Republicans to sacrifice the lives of their supporters for political gain. 

- Umair Haque makes the point that none of the interlocking crises which are endangering our health and our living environment are anything close to normal - even as far too many people have accepted (at the behest of those in power) that we should normalize a state of catastrophe. 

- Ezra Klein points out the absurdity that we would let our natural environment burn even as we're experiencing the results of a climate breakdown. And Sofia Andrade reports that climate scientists are recognizing that they've underestimated the climate impacts of increased greenhouse gas emissions and temperatures so far. 

- The Associated Press reports on Greenland's decision to reject oil development which would provide temporary profits at the expense of long-term survival. Mike de Souza reports on new polling showing that oil and gas workers are more than willing to transition to work in the renewable energy sector as long as petrostates aren't standing in their way. But Noam Scheiber points out the need to ensure that green development actually results in the creation of good jobs, rather than following a corporatist model which suppresses wages and working conditions.

- Finally, Lisa Carter highlights how women stand to bear the brunt of yet another set of impossible demands in navigating a reopening after exhausting available time away from work and losing pandemic-related supports. And Arisa Valyear points out the CCPA's work showing how families would stand to benefit from a full national child care plan.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Jeremy Samuel Faust, Harlan Krumholz and Rochelle Walensky write about the false - and dangerous - assumption that COVID-19 would pose few risks for young adults. 

- David Cyranoski examines how restaurants and other crowded businesses have proven to be regular transmission grounds for the coronavirus, while pointing out how occupancy limits can help to avoid that outcome. But CBC News reports on Dale MacKay's recognition that restaurants and their employees are likely far better off being supported through public relief, rather than having to keep working at limited capacity while increasing the risk of catching or spreading COVID-19.

- Rosa Saba reports on the confusing information given to many Canadians who applied for the CERB and are now receiving CRA warning letters threatening to retrench what little support they've had through a pandemic. Jolson Lim reports on Jagmeet Singh's push for forgiveness for self-employed people caught in a lack of distinction between net and gross income, while Melanie Doucet and Rachel Gouin call for amnesty for former foster children who applied in order to have some income after aging out of care. But Catherine Cullen reports on the Libs' refusal to offer any relief to people who applied based on the advice of the government. 

- Meanwhile, Yves Engler weighs in on the Libs' concurrent refusal to relax intellectual property restrictions to allow less wealthy countries to have access to COVID-19 vaccines within a reasonable period of time.

- Finally, Mike De Souza and Julia Wong report on the Alberta Energy Regulator's warnings that the province's oil industry was polluting land and water - and recklessly failing to set money aside to remediate it - long before the coronavirus hit. And Sharon Riley asks what happens now that leaking for tar sands tailings ponds is becoming common knowledge as the sector faces being wound down.

Sunday Morning Links

This and that for your Sunday reading.

- Heather Scoffield points out that the Trudeau Libs' definition of poverty (for the purposes of claiming credit for having reduced it) excludes many people facing extremely precarious financial circumstances. Sarah Boseley discusses how the UK Cons' gratuitous austerity has led to declining life expectancies among lower-income people. And Smokey Thomas slams the Ford PCs' use of a foreign corporation to try to take social assistance away from Ontarians.

- Alistair Steele writes that Ottawa's catastrophic choice to use a P3 to build the Confederation light rail line should offer important lessons for other governments looking at developing infrastructure.

- Imelda Dacones highlights how our climate breakdown is a public health crisis (among other dangers). And a group of B.C. health professionals calls for a moratorium on liquid natural gas pipelines due to their risks to health and the environment.

- Meanwhile, Hadrian Mertins-Kirkwood argues that the withdrawal of the Teck Frontier project should offer us an opportunity to begin a needed conversation about a transition away from fossil fuels. But Mike De Souza and Heather Yourex-West's report on the UCP's cover-up of a report on harms from the climate crisis should remind us not to expect a trace of honesty from Canada's petropoliticians.

- Finally, Graham Thomson points out that the obvious answer to Alberta's budget is to start raising revenue at least somewhat commensurate with the norm across Canada. But PressProgress notes that Jason Kenney has instead chosen to attack Alberta's most vulnerable citizens along with its public service.

Saturday Morning Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- Ploy Achakulwisat writes about the health emergencies emanating from an ongoing climate breakdown. And Andy Kroll points out that even in the U.S., a concerted effort of corporate spinmeisters and anti-environment politicians hasn't been able to override the public's concern about climate change.

- Meanwhile, Mike de Souza exposes the National Energy Board's deliberate deletion of documents which would otherwise have proven embarrassing - showing once again how a regulator which is supposed to act in the public interest has instead flouted the law to serve the interests of the fossil fuel sector. Robyn Allan writes that Justin Trudeau and other enablers of unsustainable dependence on dirty energy are wilfully ignoring where our future society and economy are headed. And Owen Jones calls out the UK's willingness to hand massive amounts of money to the oil and gas sector while demanding that low-income individuals fend for themselves. 

- Jennifer Morgan and Sharan Burrow write about the need to combat both climate change and inequality. But while they try to make the case that the main task is to convince the Davos set to care about the planet and the majority of humanity, Shawn Gude interviews Evelyne Huber about the need for workers to drive democratic change. And George Monbiot examines the role of community spaces in creating the possibility of meaningful transformation.

- Barry Ritholtz discusses the latest research confirm that increased minimum wages tend to lift lower incomes without having any negative effect on the availability of work.

- Finally, Laura Macdonald and Nadia Ibrahim highlight how the abandoned promises surrounding the new iteration of NAFTA include the suggestion that a trade deal could reduce gender inequality rather than exacerbating it.

New column day

Here, on the Trudeau Libs' biased approach to the Trans Mountain expansion - and the need to take a fair look now, rather than allowing Kinder Morgan to dictate timelines and play governments against each other and their constituents.

For further reading...
- Mike De Souza's report on the Libs' refusal to consider anything but approval of Trans Mountain is here. Thomas Sisk wrote about his experience trying to provide current science about the risks of a dilbit spill to the Trudeau government. And Andrew Nikiforuk offered needed background on the connection between Kinder Morgan and its origins in Enron.
- Trish Audette-Longo reports on the role of bots in manipulating the flow of information about Trans Mountain online.
- Both Sisk and Elan Global point out the utter incompatibility between any serious effort to rein in climate change and the continued expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure.
- Denise Balkissoon writes about the importance of a just transition for workers in the resource sector.
- Finally, while the column doesn't go into any detail about Indigenous rights as another crucial aspect of the federal government's responsibility, Eriel Deranger offers an important look at the continued colonialism involved in the approval of a pipeline over the protests of affected communities.

Saturday Morning Links

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 and tax increases land disproportionately on the shoulders of the poor while simultaneously lavishing multiple tax breaks on corporations, it certainly doesn’t do the more vulnerable in our province any favours. The province is suspending the Saskatchewan Rental Housing Supplement (SRHS), which will force the poorest in the province to devote even more of their meagre earnings towards rent. This continues the government’s myopic focus on wrenching cost-savings from programs explicitly designed to support the poorest in the province. While the government did increase education spending by $30 million, it restores little more than half of the $54 million that was cut last year. School boards will be forced to find even more “efficiencies” in the classroom, even as student enrolment expands.  As we have seen in the past, these “efficiencies” seem to fall disproportionately on special needs supports and programs.

If there is a small sliver of a silver-lining in this budget, perhaps it’s the government’s growing recognition that austerity during a downturn is bad economic policy. It’s better to allow positive economic growth fight your deficits than deep cuts that can jeopardize positive economic growth, a point the CCPA Saskatchewan Office has been at pains to make over the past few years. After two years of negative economic growth, the economic assumptions in the 2018 budget are betting that a return to positive economic growth will do much of the heavy lifting of fighting the deficit. While this is welcome, it further throws into question the wisdom of the 2017 budget cuts and the government’s embrace of austerity, all evidence to the contrary.

- Bruno Caprettini, Fabio Schmidt-Fischbach and Hans-Joachim Voth study the connection between U.S. welfare spending and a willingness to volunteer support for World War II efforts - signalling the reciprocity of expectations between governments and citizens.

- Mike De Souza reports that Justin Trudeau was warned by the civil service that it was pushing the Trans Mountain expansion too quickly and without adequate consultation. And Gary Mason points out how Trudeau's bungling of the issue could cost him support among all kinds of voters no matter what ultimately happens with the pipeline proposal.

- Tom Korski exposes the Libs' commissioning and placement of state-sponsored "news". And Alex Boutilier reports on what may be the most appalling suppression of actual government records yet, as Library and Archives Canada wants to wait eighty years to respond to a single access-to-information request.

- Finally, Lana Payne offers a warning about the spread of anti-social, right-wing populism across much of Canada.

Sunday Morning Links

This and that for your Sunday reading.

- Andrea Gordon offers the latest on the inequality caused by forcing schools to rely on fund-raising for basic equipment and activities. And Wanda Wyporska comments on the class pay gap which sees children of less wealthy parents face lifelong disadvantages:

The report pointed to the intergenerational dominance of the professional class. As the report found “the odds of those from professional backgrounds ending up in professional jobs are 2.5 times higher than the odds of those from less advantaged backgrounds reaching the professions.” Tellingly, it goes on to say that “45% of earnings inequalities are passed across generations”, which should worry us all greatly. Especially when you take into consideration the Longevity Science Panel’s report this month reiterated that ‘of the many factors comprising the Index of Multiple Deprivation, income levels have the most powerful influence over neighbourhood death rates.’ So the relationship between class and income matters, because a boy born in 2015, in one of the most advantaged 20% of neighbourhoods can expect to live 8.4 years longer than his contemporary born in one of the least advantaged 20% of neighbourhoods. This has increased from 2001, when that gap was 7.2 years.

Starkly, 73% of doctors are from professional and managerial backgrounds, but fewer than 6% are from working-class backgrounds. 

The deck is stacked against working class and poor children, as some may be as far as 12-18 months behind their peers when they start primary school, a gap that gets ever more cavernous as many fall further behind. Although education isn’t the only engine of social mobility, it’s clear that those who can afford to work unpaid as interns, secure work experience through family connections and have recourse to the bank of Mum and Dad, are likely to earn more and to gain jobs in the professions.

- Rebecca Burns discusses the criminalization of debt as an additional gratuitous punishment for people living in poverty. Laurie Monsebraaten notes that a reasonable quality of life is out of reach for far too many people in Toronto. And Nick Bunker highlights the dangers of relying on household debt to drive economic activity.

- Daniel Triesman points out that public policy which exacerbates inequality can largely be traced to a lack of understanding as to where people fit on the income spectrum - not to mention just how far that spectrum extends at the top end. And Paul Krugman writes that anybody who isn't already among the U.S.' privileged few will lose out from the Republicans' tax giveaways to the rich.

- Finally, Mike De Souza notes that the federal government's assumptions about oil production suggest that new pipelines would serve little purpose until at least 2030. And Andrew Nikiforuk discusses the growing recognition of the dangers of fracking.

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 of wealth and power:

(O)nce you have money and property, you can use it to accumulate more money and property, taking an ever greater share of society’s wealth, through the harvesting of economic rent. By economic rent I mean charging people over the odds to use a non-reproducible resource over which you exercise exclusive control. Think, for example, of the ridiculous price we pay in the UK for train tickets, because the train companies have us over a barrel.

By this means, through no enterprise of their own, the rich become richer and the poor become poorer. This process has no natural limits. Eventually, as we’ve seen in the past, the very rich can capture almost the entire production of society.

At this point, the debt, destitution and unemployment that results can cause economic collapse: the Great Depression is a good example.

This predicament is not a perversity of the system. It is an innate characteristic. It is bound to work this way, unless there is a political movement capable of breaking the vicious circle of wealth accumulation.
...
The right will never break the power of patrimonial wealth, because the right exists to defend it. But the left, when it remembers what it’s for, exists to confront it.

During the 1940s, when the left was arguably at the peak of its power in mainstream politics, the top rate of income tax in the US rose to 94%, and in the UK to 98%. Economists today look back on these rates and describe them as irrational. They argue that the Laffer Curve suggests that governments raise no further revenue above a rate of about 70%. But this is to miss the point. The point of these taxes was not just to raise revenue, but to break the power of patrimonial capital, and the vicious circle of wealth accumulation and inequality.

- Meanwhile, Frances Ryan discusses how the UK's punitive system for social benefit recipients is doing nothing but adding gratuitous stress for people already struggling to get by.

- Mike de Souza reports on the National Energy Board's attempt to weed out staff for providing accurate information to the media. And Barry Saxifrage examines how continued expansion of the tar sands is utterly incompatible with any serious attempt to meet Canada's already-unambitious greenhouse gas emissions targets, while Marc Jaccard calls out Justin Trudeau's Orwellian attempt to claim we can only cut carbon pollution by increasing it.

- Finally, Daniel Leblanc reports on the parting message of retiring Information Commissioner Suzanne Legault - and particularly the reality that access to information isn't getting any better under the Libs than it was under the Cons. And de Souza notes that the Harper Cons' habit of muzzling federal scientists remains standard operating procedure under Trudeau.

Sunday Afternoon Links

This and that for your Sunday reading.

- Tom Parkin discusses how the growing pile of Liberal disappointments is creating opportunities for Canada's opposition parties.

- Julie Ireton reports on the continued problems being caused by the federal government's Phoenix privatization debacle - including by forcing retirement-eligible employees to hold on until their retirement income comes into focus. And Mike De Souza reports on the National Energy Board's focus on stifling any flow of accurate information to the public in the name of resource-sector corporate profits.

- Rupert Neate highlights how the extravagant bonuses paid to property developers could provide housing for large numbers of people who actually need it. And Yogi Achyara discusses Toronto's need for increased shelter resources (rather than the cuts being imposed by John Tory and right-wing councillors).

- Don Giesbrecht wonders why Canada is allowing itself to fall behind its international peers in investing in child care.

- And finally, Kendall Latimer reports on the continued fallout from the Saskatchewan Party's decision to trash STC - with rural residents having to reconsider whether they can afford to be trapped without reliable transportation, while Brad Wall's minions continue to pretend that private operators will materialize out of nowhere.

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- Matthew Yglesias offers his take on how to strengthen the U.S.' economy through full employment and improved wage and family benefits. And Richard Florida discusses how everybody can benefit if an increasingly important service sector starts to provide higher wages and better work:

The only way to close Canada’s yawning economic divide and rebuild the middle class is to upgrade the wages and working conditions of Canada’s service workers.

Increasing the minimum wage, as Ontario is doing, is an important first step. And, it is important to link the minimum wage to the steep variation in the cost of living across cities: $15 an hour buys a lot less in expensive cities like Toronto and Vancouver than in does in many smaller places. Indeed, nearly half of Canada’s low-paid service workers are concentrated in the nation’s five largest metros — Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary and Edmonton. But it is only a first step.

The real key is to upgrade the millions of low-wage service jobs that workers across Canada toil in. We fail as a society if 40 per cent of Canada’s workforce is condemned to toil in such low-wage precarious jobs.
...
It has been done before. During the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, Canada and other advanced nations turned low wage manufacturing work into middle-class family supporting work. Henry Ford famously initiated his $5 a day pay policy to enable blue collar workers to purchase the cars they were making on the assembly line.

The government created new labour laws that enabled workers to form unions and bargain collectively enabling blue-collar wages to rise higher. Manufacturing companies developed strategies to involve more high-paid blue-collar workers in efforts to improve quality, productivity and ultimately profits, creating a win-win cycle. The same can be done for low-wage service work, the analog of blue-collar factory work today.

- Hugh Muir discusses how only the wealthy few actually benefit from selectively open borders - including the ability to purchase citizenship or immigration rights when it becomes convenient.

- Amanda Carver writes about the importance of using evidence-based approaches to solving homelessness - including the Housing First model that has proven successful. Jordan Press writes that the Trudeau Libs are willing to talk about a right to housing, but not to back it up with any meaningful steps to actually provide it. The Star's editorial board comments on how the growing use of food banks to paper over the unmanageable cost of rent highlights the need for a housing benefit. And Robert Booth reports on new research showing how housing has become unaffordable for young workers in the UK.

- Mike De Souza highlights how the same National Energy Board which has shrouded pipeline approvals in secrecy has been entirely reckless with the personal information of journalists trying to report on its activity. And Justin Gillis discusses how human behaviour is the great unknown in trying to project the damage to be done by climate change.

- Finally, Gary Mason writes that John Horgan's NDP is finally bringing British Columbia into the 21st century with effective campaign finance rules - leaving Saskatchewan as the only laggard. And Bob Mackin's slightly dated report on the B.C. Libs' advertising spending is worth noting again, as it shows the party which is now set to scream bloody murder over public financing for political parties had no scruples whatsoever about using similar amounts of public money solely for its own self-promotion.

Saturday Afternoon Links

Assorted content for your weekend reading.

- Erika Hayasaki surveys the developing body of research on how poverty and deprivation affect a child's long-term brain development:

Early results show a troubling trend: Kids who grow up with higher levels of violence as a backdrop in their lives, based on MRI scans, have weaker real-time neural connections and interaction in parts of the brain involved in awareness, judgment, and ethical and emotional processing.

...Though it’s still largely based on correlations between brain patterns and particular environments, the research points to a disturbing conclusion: Poverty and the conditions that often accompany it—violence, excessive noise, chaos at home, pollution, malnutrition, abuse and parents without jobs—can affect the interactions, formation and pruning of connections in the young brain.

Two recent influential reports cracked open a public conversation on the matter. In one, researchers found that impoverished children had less gray matter—brain tissue that supports information processing and executive behavior—in their hippocampus (involved in memory), frontal lobe (involved in decision making, problem solving, impulse control, judgment, and social and emotional behavior) and temporal lobe (involved in language, visual and auditory processing and self-awareness). Working together, these brain areas are crucial for following instructions, paying attention and overall learning—some of the keys to academic success.
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The second key study, published in Nature Neuroscience , also in 2015 , looked at 1,099 people between ages 3 and 20, and found that children with parents who had lower incomes had reduced brain surface areas in comparison to children from families bringing home $150,000 or more a year.

“We have [long] known about the social class differences in health and learning outcomes,” says Dr. Jack Shonkoff, director of the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. But neuroscience has now linked the environment, behavior and brain activity—and that could lead to a stunning overhaul of both educational and social policies, like rethinking Head Start–style programs that have traditionally emphasized early literacy. New approaches, he says, could focus on social and emotional development as well, since science now tells us that relationships and interactions with the environment sculpt the areas of the brain that control behavior (like the ability to concentrate), which also can affect academic achievement (like learning to read). 

- Adria Vasil discusses the worldwide trend of water being made available first (and for inexplicably low prices) to for-profit bottlers over citizens who need it. And Martin Regg Cohn examines how the story is playing out in Ontario in particular.

- Mike De Souza reports on how the National Energy Board, rather than acting as a neutral regulator, misled Denis Coderre to try to take free PR for both the NEB itself and fossil fuel development in general. And Carrie Tait points out how the Husky oil spill is raising questions about Saskatchewan's fully captured regulatory system. 

- Ian MacLeod reports on a sudden and unexplained increase in CSE interception of private communications.

- Finally, Andray Domise discusses what Colten Boushie's shooting and its aftermath say about the blight of racism in Canada.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Melisa Foster points out why millennials should be strongly interested in a national pharmacare program:

Today, young Canadians are searching for jobs in an economy with high levels of precarious employment, unemployment or underemployment. According to a recent Statistics Canada labour force survey, approximately 39% of workers 15 to 29 are precariously employed. That means that almost half of millennials between 15 and 29 are part-time, temporary or self-employed workers, and likely don’t have access to employer-run private health insurance plans. An estimated one out of every four Canadians who are uninsured cannot afford their prescriptions.

Canada’s patchwork pharmacare system compounds these obstacles further. Provinces, territories and the federal government each fund drug therapies for a distinct portion of the population. Your postal code and socioeconomic status continue to dictate your ability to access the medication you need, making drug coverage highly inequitable. Too many are forced to pay out of pocket for prescription drugs they can’t afford to go without.
...
Understandably, prescription drug coverage only becomes a concern for many individuals when high costs limit their access. But if you haven’t personally experienced problems with drug coverage or the consequent poor health outcomes that far too many Canadians have, there is a high probability that your friend or loved one has.

Millennials must begin to understand who is involved in the decision making process and how we can work together to close the gaps in access. Parents and children have a responsibility to voice their concerns and demonstrate the struggles that arise as a result of the patchwork system.

- Bruce Sherman examines the role the health care system can play in addressing the social determininants of health. Owen Davis highlights the importance of addressing inequality in order to improve mental health. And Araz Rawshani, Ann-Marie Svensson, Björn Zethelius, Björn Eliasson, Annika Rosengren, and Soffia Gudbjörnsdottir study the connection between low incomes and mortality from diseases including diabetes and cancer.

- Linda McQuaig argues that the Ontario Libs' privatization of Hydro One is indefensible - particularly based on the excuse of "broadening" ownership in a utility shared in by every citizen of the province. David Bush points out that Canada Post's bargaining strategy seems to be intended to allow it to sell itself off for parts before a government review of its future is complete. And Duncan Kinney discusses how Alberta is trying to remedy the damage from a power purchasing scheme which allowed corporations to take easy profits then leave the province holding the bag during lean times.

- Finally, Paul Dechene examines the state of pipeline regulation in Saskatchewan, featuring Emily Eaton's observation that "almost no oil and gas infrastructure in the province undergoes an environmental impact assessment". Julie Dermansky points out that Saskatchewan is far from the only jurisdiction with an epidemic of spills arising out of lax regulation, as a single Louisiana parish has been hit by three in ten days. Robyn Allan notes that British Columbia is picking up much of the tab for the cleanup from the Mount Polley mine disaster. And Mike De Souza reports on the National Energy Board's deception about its meeting with Jean Charest while he was under contract with TransCanada.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- Trevor Hancock writes that if we're going to designate anything as a public health emergency, poverty should top the list:

I was pleased to see the B.C. Ministry of Health use the powers of the provincial health officer to designate opioid drug overdose deaths a public-health emergency. But this is not the only, nor is it the largest, such emergency.

Of the likely candidates for designation as a public-health emergency, none seem as important as poverty, especially in B.C.
...
Personal experience and common sense, as well as a great deal of evidence, tell us that poverty results in poorer health. There is little doubt that inequalities in income translate to inequalities in health, which translate into additional health-care costs. It is time the B.C. government recognized that if opioid overdose deaths are an emergency, poverty is a far greater and more long-lasting emergency.

We need a concerted plan to reduce poverty and the health inequalities and economic impacts that result. Among other things, this plan needs to include a fair minimum wage, so people who work full time are not left in poverty, a level of social assistance that respects human dignity and a solid commitment to ensure that no child in B.C. grows up in poverty.

- Frances Ryan points out that major social issues like child poverty and the failures austerity have been driven out of the U.K.'s headlines as a result of the Brexit vote.
 
- Don Pittis writes that we shouldn't expect the public to put up with trade deals which undermine employment, while Daniel Kitts interviews Maude Barlow as to what type of agreement would actually be worth pursuing. And John Holmes and Jeffrey Carey take a look at the Trans-Pacific Partnership's fine print to see how it looks to undermine Canada's auto sector.

- James Wilt discusses how lobbying rules are easily evaded by the corporate interests whose influence over government is most problematic. And Mike De Souza reports on Jean Charest's secret meeting with the National Energy Board after he had been hired as a consultant by TransCanada as a glaring example.

- Finally, Christo Aivalis points out that the major issue in dispute between CUPW and Canada Post is the former's refusal to sell out future workers. And H.G. Watson outlines the issues being bargained while pointing out the need for the Trudeau Libs to rein in management run amok.

Wednesday Morning Links

Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.

- John Milloy discusses the difference between trade and corporate control - while noting that recent "trade agreements" have tended to favour the latter without being the subject of meaningful public debate:

For far too long, elites have characterized trade discussions as too complicated for the general public to understand. It’s time we engaged ordinary citizens. My only plea is that we don’t ignore the growing power and influence that multinationals and foreign investors are gaining through these agreements.

Modern-day trade agreements are not simply about country to country relations. Most also contain something known as Investor State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) provisions. These allow foreign investors and corporations to challenge a government’s policies, actions or decisions if they believe they will hurt their bottom line. To make matters worse, these matters are not dealt with through a country’s regular judicial system but instead by special trade tribunals that lack the same procedural protections as a court.

Not only is the process questionable, but it also allows corporations to challenge matters such as environmental, health and labour protections that they feel hurt their business. Under NAFTA, for example, corporations have challenged Canadian laws designed to prohibit the export of PCB waste; ban gasoline additives suspected of being neurotoxins; restrict fracking; and stop development in environmentally sensitive areas. In 1994 the tobacco giant Philip Morris International threatened a NAFTA suit if the federal government went ahead with plain packaging rules for cigarettes.
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As the frequency of these challenges increases, are we going to start to see the erosion of vital programs — like public healthcare – as companies challenge the lack of private competition in these areas? Reminiscent to what happened in Canada, Philip Morris recently brought a claim against the Australian government’s plain-packaging laws for cigarette packs. Although unsuccessful, it does demonstrate the steps that corporations will take to challenge domestic policies.
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It is worth questioning, however, the constraints being placed on us as we negotiate more and more trade agreements.  Sadly, few Canadians are even aware of them.  It took European complaints rather than Canadian ones, for example, to force changes to the Canadian European free trade agreement to provide greater protection for governments against foreign corporations.

As a nation we may decide that these infringements on our freedom of action are worth it, but let’s have the discussion.  Trade brings many benefits but isn’t it time we wake up to the full costs.

- And Deirdre Fulton notes that substantial public opposition has forced the European Union to give countries a say in whether to push forward with CETA.

- CBC reports on the provincial auditor's report (PDF) examining the Wall government's gross mishandling of land acquisitions for the Global Transportation Hub. And Tammy Robert thoroughly excoriates the Saskatchewan Party for its dishonesty and incompetence in dealing with carbon capture and storage.

- Mike de Souza exposes the veil of secrecy over pipelines which are found to be "ticking time bombs" by the National Energy Board. And Charles Pierce notes that the U.S. doesn't even have that level of monitoring of its own pipelines.

- Finally, Tom Stafford examines the underlying elements of trust - and finds that expertise tends to rank well below affinity in determining what people are willing to consider credible.

Tuesday Morning Links

This and that for your Tuesday reading.

- Tom Parkin writes about the growing divide between the lucky few who are siphoning wealth out of Canada, and the mass of people facing a precarious economic future.

- PressProgress highlights much the same distinction by examining the types of workers who make less in a year than Christy Clark's donor-funded car allowance. Andrew MacLeod reports on the connection between the B.C. Libs' donations and real estate developers. And Derrick O'Keefe points out that Clark (and her corporate-funded peers) are counting on the public not paying attention to who's pulling the strings.

- Roderick Benns talks to Daniel Blaikie about the prospect of a basic income. And Murray Mandryk takes a look a Saskatchewan's budget which shows relatively large amounts of money toward education, social services and policing producing lamentable results.

- Mike De Souza exposes Enbridge's direct role in dictating what the National Energy Board reported about its pipeline safety failings. 

- Finally, Alex Boutilier reports on the Communications Security Establishment's attempts to avoid providing an honest account of its breaches of privacy. And Jim Bronskill and Dean Beeby offer some useful suggestions to modernize Canada's access to information laws.

New column day

Here, on the Conference Board of Canada's environmental report card - and the conclusions we should draw from both Saskatchewan's last-place finish, and the typically appalling response from the Wall government.

For further reading...
- Brendan Haley discusses the steps needed to reach a cleaner and more equitable economy - featuring a focus on transitioning how workers are able to use their existing skills and training rather than propping up dirty resource industries.
- Mike de Souza reports that the minimally-discussed Line 3 pipeline expansion has received NEB approval to expand export capacity to the U.S. And Justin Ling writes that the Parliamentary Budget Officer has concluded Canada is almost certain to miss every greenhouse gas emission target we've set - meaning that Canada's D grade in the Conference Board's report card isn't much to write home about.

Friday Morning Links

Assorted content to end your week.

- George Monbiot discusses how neoliberal ideology has managed to take over as the default assumption in global governance - despite its disastrous and readily visible effects:

(T)he past four decades have been characterised by a transfer of wealth not only from the poor to the rich, but within the ranks of the wealthy: from those who make their money by producing new goods or services to those who make their money by controlling existing assets and harvesting rent, interest or capital gains. Earned income has been supplanted by unearned income.

Neoliberal policies are everywhere beset by market failures. Not only are the banks too big to fail, but so are the corporations now charged with delivering public services. As Tony Judt pointed out in Ill Fares the Land, Hayek forgot that vital national services cannot be allowed to collapse, which means that competition cannot run its course. Business takes the profits, the state keeps the risk.

The greater the failure, the more extreme the ideology becomes. Governments use neoliberal crises as both excuse and opportunity to cut taxes, privatise remaining public services, rip holes in the social safety net, deregulate corporations and re-regulate citizens. The self-hating state now sinks its teeth into every organ of the public sector.

Perhaps the most dangerous impact of neoliberalism is not the economic crises it has caused, but the political crisis. As the domain of the state is reduced, our ability to change the course of our lives through voting also contracts. Instead, neoliberal theory asserts, people can exercise choice through spending. But some have more to spend than others: in the great consumer or shareholder democracy, votes are not equally distributed. The result is a disempowerment of the poor and middle. As parties of the right and former left adopt similar neoliberal policies, disempowerment turns to disenfranchisement. Large numbers of people have been shed from politics.

- And Mike Small highlights how privatization schemes are predictably enriching private contractors at the expense of the general public without delivering the promised services. 

- Steven Chase reports on the Libs' deceptive attempt to dodge responsibility for approving the sale of arms to Saudi Arabia. Alison succinctly links the sale to its known consequences, while Neil MacDonald points out that there's no difference at all between the Cons and Libs in their determination to push military exports at the expense of human rights. And both Michael Harris and the Globe and Mail's editorial board tear into the Libs for their hypocrisy and dishonesty.

- Meanwhile, Desmond Cole reminds us that Canadian torture victims are being met with utter contempt by the Trudeau Libs.

- Finally, Bruce Campbell writes that there's been virtually no progress on rail safety since the Lac-Mégantic disaster. And Mike De Souza notes that contrary to the spin of pipeline proponents, there's reason for concern that similar regulatory neglect and corporate greed connected to pipelines can result in damage on an equally large scale.

Sunday Morning Links

This and that for your Sunday reading.

- John Ross makes the case for a focus on the social determinants of health in all kinds of public policy-making:

Many studies show that if you work long hours in low-paying jobs and live paycheque to paycheque, constant life stresses have far more negative health effects than the causes listed on public health posters.

Life for many Canadians is more complicated than recommending a “healthy lifestyle.”

Society broadly needs to change the circumstances for all members of our society to enable people to have options and live differently. In our small province we could actually achieve this.

Donald Berwick, former CEO of the Institutes of Healthcare Improvement, said, “Any healthcare funding plan that is just, equitable, civilized and humane must — must — redistribute wealth from the richer among us to the poorer and the less fortunate. Excellent health care is by definition re-distributional.”
...
How about this radical suggestion?

Start spending proportionally less on disease care and more on addressing the inequities of the determinants of health (and disease)?

‘Quality health care’ should be access to equitable income distribution, education, employment, food and housing security. That is not currently the case.

- Meanwhile, the Toronto Star calls for a concerted effort at all levels of government to address the needs of precarious workers. And Lois Weiner sees the Chicago Teachers Union's strike as an important step in challenging fundamentally unfair laws designed to silence workers. 

- Scott Vrooman points out that for all the bleating over relatively small budget numbers, there are far more important deficits that we should be addressing - including the glaring gap between any progress to limit greenhouse gas emissions and the steps needed to avoid catastrophic climate change. And Robert DeConto and David Pollard find that the feedback loops created by a warming planet in fact look to be substantially worse than typically assumed.

- Solomon Israel canvasses how the system of low-threshold arrests and peace bonds set up under Bill C-51 (and seemingly to be left in place by the Libs) raises severe civil rights concerns without making anybody safer.

- Finally, Jennifer Ditchburn writes about the future of open government in Canada. And Mike de Souza catches the National Energy Board deleting a sensitive internal e-mail.