A rchive Date
[ 23-02-2005 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Canada ]
|
[Book on poor betrays intellectual poverty of the left
The voice of Winnipeg's political left is sounding a little sillier than usual these days
By TOM BRODBECK - Winnipeg Sun
June 18, 2000
With the provincial economy humming along at a tempo not seen for decades - knocking jobless figures down to levels unmatched in nearly a quarter of a century - left-wing thinkers are running out of ammunition in their onslaught against the market economy. Nowhere is that more glaring than the latest publication from the collective voice of the left - a new book called Solutions that Work: fighting poverty in Winnipeg.
Reading it, you'd think you were living in the ravages of a war-torn, Third World country. It's alarmist, perverted and it even further discredits the hysterical arguments of the political left. The book is penned by Winnipeg's prominent left-leaners - university professors Jim Silver, John Loxley, Errol Black et al.
Here's a taste of their postulations on poverty in Winnipeg:
"Indeed, the incidence of poverty has reached what we consider to be catastrophic levels," the authors write. "We believe that what we have documented is the continued growth in our midst of what might reasonably be thought of as 'third world' living conditions."
The book goes on to say that the problem of poverty in Winnipeg "constitutes an emergency, and demands immediate attention."
Catastrophic levels? Third World living conditions? I guess that's what happens when you spend too much time in the campus reading room. The analysis in Solutions that Work is so flawed and so out of touch with reality, it's barely worthy of a response. The central defect of the book is the use of Statistics Canada's Low Income Cut Offs (LICOs) as the measurement of poverty.
Without getting into the technical debate about LICOs, consider the following:
Jean, a single mother with an eight-year-old son in school, earns $11 an hour as a junior draftsperson. Her annual pay is $22,022. She has a two-bedroom apartment in Winnipeg, cable TV and a VCR, and her son never goes without nutritious food or proper clothing. Under the LICO scheme, Jean is part of Manitoba's 200,000 poor.
How about Jim?
He earns $7.50 an hour as a clerk, or $15,015 a year. He lives with a buddy in a pretty nice three-bedroom apartment, where they have a computer and Internet access. Under LICO, Jim's poor.
It's clear LICOs are not an accurate gauge of poverty. So, to claim almost one in five Manitobans lives in poverty is an overstatement to say the least.
Abject poverty does exist in Winnipeg. There are children who go to school in the winter with empty stomachs, no boots and no lunch money. But social scientists do a lousy job of measuring real poverty, which extends far beyond measuring people's relative incomes.
Using LICOs is the lazy academics' way of making grand statements about poverty from their comfortable campus offices without really penetrating the issue. Solutions that Work slams the market economy, accusing it of failing the average Canadian. But the book provides no real economic alternative.
However, it doesn't mind relying on the rich resources of the market economy to propose more funding for community-based organizations like Andrews Street Family Centre. Without a well-oiled, market economy pumping out jobs and lining government treasuries - like the one we've got right now - there is no funding for Andrews Street.
And that's the part the John Loxleys, the Errol Blacks and the Jim Silvers of the world can never seem to explain.
Tom Brodbeck is the Winnipeg Sun's legislature reporter. Letters to the editor should be sent to editor@wpgsun.com
 World Fact Book (CIA)]
|