2007 National Vital Signs Report

Comments - Michael Clague

The significance of the 2007 NVSR for poverty reduction in Canada is that economic growth and prosperity are not of themselves having any appreciable impact. At the same time the income gap between rich and poor continues to increase. Equally worrying is that those at risk of entering the poverty cycle of unemployment, debt, poor housing or homelessness is increasing through rising housing costs and low minimum wages. In the longer term the growing absence of access to private employer-matched pension plans to complement the Canada Pension will be a significant concern for an aging population as more people engage in self-employment and part-time contract work.

We have social policy vacuum in Canada. Reducing systemic poverty and reducing the chances of poverty for those currently at risk requires the following measures: an expanded income support program through income tax credits; a higher minimum wage, welfare programs that are accessible, that provide higher incomes and which provide strong, positive incentives to move out of welfare dependency through employment earnings exemptions and supportive training and employment opportunities. All of these measures have proven themselves effective in the past.

Affordable, safe, and appropriate housing is the other major poverty prevention and reducing measure. The absence of federal funding for housing and the patchwork of provincial programs is contributing directly to the problematic housing picture in the Vital Signs report. It must be stressed that financing shelters for the homeless is not a solution.

There is a pressing need for supportive non-market housing for people whose lives are most at risk and for non-market (non-profit and cooperative) and low end market (rental and ownership) for Canadians. Currently in Vancouver the market rental vacancy rate is 0.3 percent for a bachelor suite. The rent for such a suite is $727 a month. For a single working poor person receiving minimum wage the short fall in income after rent requires a trip to the food bank. Sole earner families will be worse off .

It is a puzzle that senior governments are not providing leadership in the affordable housing market. Creating affordable home ownership (through accessible, manageable mortgages and incentives for builders) for people on low to moderate incomes achieves both social and economic objectives. People move out of non-market housing, freeing up space in the existing stock. They develop equity in their home thereby improving their long term assets. They are enabled to pay down debt and, to increase savings and investments as well as be active consumers.

Needed are public housing policies that bring more individuals into home ownership and as well, assist non-profit housing societies to expand and increase their own equity through property ownership. This in turn helps societies finance further expansion of non-market housing stock.

Michael Clague, President of the Carold Institute for the Advancement of Citizenship in Social Change, Vancouver, British Columbia