Krishna
Pendakur
Consumption Poverty in Canada, 1969 to 1998
In
this paper, I estimate the poverty rate as the proportion of individuals
who have consumption - rather than income - lower than an absolute
poverty line. The absolute poverty line used is based on the expenditure
necessary to achieve a minimum level of material well-being. It
does not change over time with changing social values as do relative
poverty lines. Consumption is used because consumption levels
are chosen by households with some knowledge of future and past
incomes, and may thus be a better indicator of material well-being
than income.
It
does not change over time with changing social values as do relative
poverty lines. Consumption is used because consumption levels are
chosen by households with some knowledge of future and past incomes,
and may thus be a better indicator of material well-being than income.
Here, consumption is adjusted for differences in the prices faced
by, and demographic characteristics of, different households.
The
story told by consumption poverty measures is mixed. As with income
poverty measures, the consumption poverty rate declined over the 1970s
and 1980s - all boats rose in the rising tide. However, the 1990s
tell a different story. The consumption poverty rate increased by
more than half between 1992 and 1998. Outcomes for children were even
worse. The rate of consumption poverty among children more than doubled
between 1992 and 1998.
Jane
Aronson and Sheila M. Neysmith
Manufacturing Social Exclusion in the Home Care Market
This
paper examines how the health care perspective which dominates home
care obscures the broader processes of social exclusion that play
out in this arena of public policy. A study of elderly women and women
with disabilities receiving home care in Ontario reveals how managed
community care generates and reinforces service users' social isolation
and their spatial, institutional, and political exclusion. Analysis
of study participants' experiences points to the challenges of moving
away from a market discourse and a health framework to develop home
care policy which achieves the inclusion and participation of elderly
citizens and citizens with disabilities in need of assistance at home.
Boris
Kralj
Physician Distribution and Physician Shortage Intensity in Ontario
During
the 1990s, in Ontario and many other jurisdictions, the focus on the
physician human resources debate has moved from aggregate surpluses
to shortages. However, the problem of equitable access to those resources,
and health services in general, has remained. During this period,
much government policy effort has been targeted toward the perceived
"maldistribution" of resources between geographic regions.
This paper applies the Gini index of resource concentration methodology
to gauge the maldistribution of physician resources in Ontario during
the 1990s. It also proposes, and implements, an approach for quantifying
physician shortages through a physician shortage intensity index.
The results reveal that despite numerous government policies and programs
aimed at alleviating the geographic maldistribution of medical human
resources, the distribution of physicians in Ontario has become more
uneven during the 1990s. This puts the efficacy of government policies
to correct geographic maldistribution into question. Additionally,
there has been no meaningful improvement in overall physician shortage
intensity during the 1990s.
Michele
Campolieti
Disability Insurance and the Labour Force Participation of Older
Men and Women in Canada
This
paper examines the effect of the Canada/Quebec Pension Plan (C/QPP)
disablity program on the labour force participation rates of older
men and women. I use aggregate provincial data and exploit the time
series and cross-sectional variation, which results from the different
policies used by the C/QPP disability programs, in these data to examine
the impact of a number of different aspects of the C/QPP disability
program on the labour force participation rates of older men and women
in Canada. The results from these regressions indicate that, for the
most part, the C/QPP disability program has had a large effect on
the participation rates of older men and women.
William
K. Carroll and Murray Shaw
Consolidating a Neoliberal Policy Bloc in Canada, 1976 to 1996
This
paper charts the development of a neoliberal policy bloc in Canada
by considering five sites of business activism: two organizations
with roots in the 1950s, which more or less embraced neoliberal projects
in the 1980s; two that emerged in the 1970s; and one that was formed
in 1994. Our investigation focuses on how these groups contributed
to the consolidation of neoliberal hegemony in Canadian public policy.
To that end, we present comparative case studies of the five groups
(their ideological trajectories and their contemporary niches within
an organizational ecology of neoliberal policy formation) and a network
analysis of the positions they have taken up in the web of interlocking
corporate directorates. Some political implications in the current
era are discussed.
Richard
Shearmur
Financial Flows and Places: The Case of Monreal
In
1999, an agreement was signed between the four Canadian stock exchanges,
the principal aim of which was to consolidate the various markets.
This agreement led to considerable debate in Montreal concerning the
symbolic importance of the stock exchange, but also dealing with the
loss of local equity trading, and consequent impossibility of local
IPOs (Initial Public Offerings). This, it was argued, would significantly
hamper economic development in Montreal and Quebec. This paper sets
out to review the current trends concerning regional stock exchanges,
and to assess the relevance of an exchange to the local economy. To
do this, two approaches are used: a review of the literature and an
empirical analysis of employment data. It is concluded that there
is very little link between a local exchange and the local economy,
but that there may be room for the resurgence of more localized, or
at least locally sensitive, financial markets.
Åke
Blomqvist
A Comment on "The Kyoto Protocol: Implications of a Flawed but
Important Environmental Policy"
Sandra Rollings-Magnusson
Rejoinder to the Comments of Dr. Åke Blomqvist
