Canada: 40% liberal, 30% conservative

One thing I've found difficult to find for Canada is polling on the underlying ideological beliefs of Canadians, as opposed to party preference.  Our pollsters just don't seem to ask the question very often, perhaps because it's probably viewed as a confusing mess to voters where our traditional two big-tent parties are named after the very ideologies they're supposed to represent.  I don't have empirical data to back it, but based on the confusion over the subject I see online every day, I don't think many people have a clear understanding of the distinction between ideology and party preference.  In Canada-ese we say "small l liberal" and "small c conservative" when we're talking about the ideology, but even that really only makes the distinction clear to people who are clear about the disctinction.

Hell, even highly politically active people have very deep differences of understanding over the meaning of the term "ideology" - just go back to the silly claims of many of the strongest Obama supporters shortly after his election about Obama lacking an ideology and instead being about "what works" as if pragmatism isn't itself a question of ideology. 

Still, any oasis in the polling desert so I'm glad to see pollster Ekos ran a poll on the subject of Canadian ideology not so long ago.  Top line results are that 40% of Canadians self-identify as liberal, 30% as conservative, 26% as neither and 5% as don't know or refused.  Ekos calls this "starkly divided" but I'd call it a clear lead for liberalism.  I'm really glad they resisted providing "moderate" as an option too, though I think I would have preferred to ask on a 7 point scale to reflect on strength of belief. 

Further, if you look at page 6 of the PDF, this is a high for liberalism as far back as the graph goes, to 1997, and the gains clearly come from the "neither" group which has declined to third place for its first time. 

The chart on page 11 with some demographic break downs is also fascinating:

• Saskatchwan/Manitoba (combined probably for sample size reasons) are more conservative at 54% than Alberta at 41%
• Men are barely more liberal than conservative (within MOE) but women are almost 2:1 (42% to 23%) more liberal
• The only age group that is more conservative than liberal are over 65's and it's fairly modest (and within that subsample's margin of error)
• the effect of university appears profound with 53% of university educated identifying as liberal
• Liberal party supporters are more liberal than NDP party supporters 72% vs 61% (more on this below)
• Green supporters are barely more liberal than conservative and the only party to have their leading group be the "neithers" at 38%
• 11% of Conservative party supporters identify as liberal, which really has to be an appealing target for NDP and Liberal strategists:  These should be highly persuadable voters.

liberal Liberals versus liberal New Democrats

On the higher number of liberals supporting the Liberals than the NDP, there's lots of ways to interpret that.  One possibility is that NDP supporters dislike the term "liberal" for its association with the party of that name, even if they are left-of-centre ideologically and hold views most would identify as being mainline liberal/progressive as usually understood in Canada and the US.  Or they may be people who feel they are left of liberalism itself, bona fide socialists or even communists.  Another aspect is the NDP's roots in the praries as the predecessor party, the CCF and its relatively greater strength in places like Northern Ontario where voters may support the NDP but somehow not consider themselves liberal or even left-wing.  It's unfortunate that the poll's regional breakdown combined Manitoba and Saskatchewan because I can buy a right shift in Saskatchewan, but Manitiba's provincial NDP government has been going strong for a very long time.  I realize the provincial NDP in Manitoba are closer to the Liberals federally, but hard to believe they would appeal much to conservatives even then. 

On the Liberal party supporters specifically, the very low number of "neithers" and conservatives tells me that fears of a Liberal collapse entailing half the party's remaining supporters going to Harper are unlikely to come to fruition.  Basically the blue Liberals have mostly left already and what's left are people who are genuinely left-of-centre and just have issues supporting the NDP or abandoning the party of Laurier, Trudeau and Pearson. 

Greens

The Green numbers really back my suspicion that the Green party is a protest vote for a lot of disaffected voters of other parties.  Having "neithers" as their top group seems likely to be akin to the situation in the US where self-identified moderates and "independents" tend to be the least politically aware/informed and most prone to decide "they're all crooks!" and so a party like the Greens becomes an attractive place to park your vote.  I'm somewhat surprised at the high number of conservatives supporting the Greens.  I know the NDP line on the Greens I often hear is that they're a "crypto" conservative party.  There's some truth to that in their policies and platform, but I don't think that matters a whit to most voters, for whom the Green party is literally about the association to environmentalism.  It may be that this is where conservatives who accept the reality of climate change go, since they just can't stand the NDP or Liberals and yet want to register their support for some kind of market friendly action to rein in greenhouse gas emissions.

It also tells me it's probably not worth the NDP or Liberals' time trying to woo Green voters.  Numerically there's just not that many liberals there and they're probably pretty dedicated environmentalists who have real issues with the Liberals and NDP.  I'm doubtful the neithers supporting the Greens are easy to reach either.  If the left-of-centre vote does solidify on the NDP, and some of the existing liberal support for the Conservatives can be pulled back, the NDP can forge a winning coalition.  Chretien managed to find majority coalitions (over 40% support in '93 and 2000) even with the NDP and BQ taking substantial numbers of votes in the 90s and early 2000s.  Even after the right wing parties merged, a badly scandal wounded Martin did eke out a minority in 2004 all the same. 

Canada may just be liberal enough to put a left-of-centre party into government even with four of them vying for that pool of votes.  In fact, if the NDP dominance of the BQ in Quebec continues, we're back down to three effective parties, which isn't much different from the Chretien/Martin days.

It's Time to Update the Ontario Condominium Act

Don't know what chances it has, but I'm for this, from Trinity-Spadina Ontario NDP MPP Rosario Marchese:

Dear Friends,

Did you know the law that governs your condo hasn’t been changed in 14 years?

On May 10, I will be introducing legislation to improve Ontario’s Condominium Act.  If my bill is passed, Ontario’s laws will finally reflect the interests of condo owners. My proposals include the following:  

• The creation of a Condo Review Board to settle disputes between condo owners, boards, property managers and developers. (Currently, disputes must be settled through the courts at great financial cost.)
• Establishes better building and soundproofing standards.
• Prevents developers from asking owners to move into unfinished buildings.
• Extends developer responsibility for condo fees from one to three years.  
• Improves Tarion warranty protections on new condos and provides warranty coverage for conversion condos such as lofts.
• Requires developers to use good faith language in contracts and to disclose any business names they have used in the past.
• Requires property managers to be licensed by the Province.

I will be speaking at information sessions about my condo bill on the following dates:

CityPlace Residents’ Association Town Hall Meeting
Date: Sunday, May 6.
Time: 3-5 PM.
Location: Renaissance Hotel (next to the Rogers Centre).
Map:

King West Community Meeting
Date: Wednesday, May 9.
Time: 7-9 PM.
Location: Thomson Hotel, Wellington Room (550 Wellington Street West, south of King and Bathurst).

My wife and I both bought new condos off plans in the early 2000s before we met.  Mine went okay as far as these things go, but hers was a debacle with a developer who clearly was not playing in good faith, and took advantage of every loophole and a few that aren't even loopholes but that they know they can get away with.  Almost every item on that list would have been a tremendous help to her, and Tarion proved to be toothless or captured by the developers based on how it handled her complaints.  There was a litany of ridiculous things the developer did, but the most egregious was how they rushed to get the occupancy permit, then cancelled it at the last minute (after she had already booked movers) and even when she did get legal occupancy, she only had power to one item in the whole unit, a light by the entrance, clearly done to fool the inspector that the unit had power (no stove, fridge, lights anywhere else, etc).  That had to be illegal.

As a first time homebuyer you really only have the option to sue over stuff like this, and the reality is that isn't likely to happen over a collection of small stuff, your instinct is always to just get through it.

I know this is mostly an upper-middle class problem and all, but still no reason to let these scumbag fly-by-night developers bilk people.  This is all part of the decline of the middle class as you get fleeced at every opportunity and the law is always on the side of the powerful.  The bit about forcing disclosure of other names the developer has operated under is a pretty good idea.  Some of the bigger developers with established reputations to protect are generally pretty good for that reason, but currently that's really the only worthwhile consumer protection there is when it comes to new condo purchases, and you definitely pay a premium for the big name builders.  Even that is no surety, as established brands have been known to decide to cash in on their residual good will at times and churn out some junk for a quick profit.

There's no social advantage I can see to letting shoddy developers put up crap buildings that their owners hate and take a loss selling off.  Condo buildings are going to be there for decades, they should be built well and if a few shoddy developers stop doing business, in an overheated real estate market I can't see how that's a negative.  Ontario has a minority government right now so it's a chance for the age-old formula of the NDP pulling the Liberals left to work again.  My wife and I are unlikely to ever buy a new condo again, but no reason anyone else should go through what she did.

I wrote the Premier and Margarett Best, the Minister of Consumer Services.  Private Members bills rarely make it to law, but this is a good idea and I hope this one does.

Temporary Poverty isn't Poverty

Yes:

A big class divide these days is between those who had family members who could help them and those who didn't. Lots of people who didn't get a lot of financial help from their families - they didn't, for example, borrow $20K from them - are unaware that the fact that family help was potentially available, whether or not they used much of it, always provided a little insurance policy for them, a little backstop. And of course it's the case that, generally, such families did help. A hundred bucks here, a car insurance payment there, an overnight loan covering the tuition, etc. Even if it doesn't add up to much overall it's the difference between treading water and drowning, between having to quit school and not.

This is me.  I paid for University on my own and voluntarily lived on my own while doing it.  But I did get a little help a couple times when my bank account was running low and never had to deal with a crisis point like choosing between food and rent, or tuition and rent, plus I had the luxury of a part time job that was quite flexible about time off to study, so I never had to work a shift the night before an exam or when a big assignment was due just to keep employed.

For awhile in my 20s I was very proud of this and looked down on college types who protested tuition hikes and complained about student debt upon graduation, but I'm sure I had it easier than many even if I wasn't living high on the hog and had to be pretty careful with money.  Knowing the Banks of Mom and Dad were available was a major psychological comfort. 

Also having to eat canned ravoli or mac & cheese on a tight budget for a couple years in university isn't the same as being poor:  You expect the poverty will end.   It might be considerably more bleak now but when I was in University (c2001) you had a pretty reasonable expecation of graduating to a decent job in short order.  The inconveniences and sacrifices were always temporary.  Also, there's usually no stigma in being short on funds while in college, everyone expects it and generally treats you according to the norms of the social class you're going to join when you graduate, rather than the one your current income might otherwise suggest.  I will always remember that I was turned down for a credit card while working full time at minimum wage for a year after I graduated high school (to save up for University).  Then, when in University and making significantly less, they were suddenly eager to give me one.

How was Ayn Rand ever an acceptable figure to cite?

Republican House Budget Committee Chair Paul Ryan disavowing Ayn Rand strikes me as a very positive sign that the ideological ground has shifted.  Or maybe not, his quote is a bit hard to parse:

“I reject her philosophy,” Ryan says firmly. “It’s an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview.

Now it could be that it is Rand's atheism that is causing Ryan to flee her, though the second part of that statement is a more general rejection of her worldview.  Further, Ryan's move seems likely to be in reaction to this letter signed by over 90 members of Georgetown University faculty criticising Ryan's budget from Catholic grounds (which isn't even the first time someone has embarassed Ryan with the discordance between Jesus' teachings and Rand's).  That letter does not mention Rand's atheism, though there is a reference to her "antagonism" to religion.  It makes sense for Ryan to cite the atheism angle first, since that evades the discussion about Rand's vision of economics.  But it's not like her atheism is news to anyone, it has always been something conservatives just conveniently ignored (which I don't actually mind, because it's frankly irrelevant to the content of her world view - plenty of "prosperity Gospel" Christians embrace an economic system that isn't so different from Objectivism and plenty of atheists reject Social Darwinism).  Her atheism is an awfully convenient excuse to forswear her though.

Really though, either way is progress.  The question of whether it is Rand's atheism or her philosophy of socipathy that is most responsible for her now becoming radioactive on the right is an important one, the deeper question is how she was ever an acceptable figure for elected politicians to cite approvingly?  It's not like Ryan is an aberration, the list of prominent Republicans in high office who have praised Rand is pretty long.  Never mind merely praising her or just having read her books, let's not forget former Federal Reserve Chair Alan Greenspan, who was actually part of Rand's little cult-of-personality of acolytes.  How did that ever happen?

Think of the reverse:  Try to find an elected or office holding Democrat who would even credit say, Chomsky or Marx as being influential on their thinking, never mind bragging that they made their staffs read their works.  Unlike Rand, Marx of course is a colossal figure in the intellectual history of the world, and anyone of any ideological persuasion is wise to at least be familiar with his ideas.  I won't even get into the ridiculous demonization of Saul Alinsky (and back to Greenspan, let's just ponder what would happen if Obama appointed a member of Alinsky's inner circle to some prominent post). 

If Rand really is being driven to the ash heap of bad ideas, it is none too soon, and while I'd prefer it be over the awful content and consequences of her ideas, I'll settle for it being over her atheism if it means Objectivism and everything it represents becomes an electoral millstone.  I'm sure it doesn't represent the actual death of her ideas among conservatives, but even having them feel uncomfortable using her name is progress.  At last we have a right edge to the bounds of acceptable thought among the powerful.   Rand is one hell of a far right edge, but before this it really wasn't clear there was a limit at all. 

CPP is Completely Sustainable Too

While the cuts to OAS and GIS are my biggest objection to the budget, I want to take a moment to rebut the common belief among Canadians of my age group and younger that CPP "won't be there" for them when they retire.  That belief is a self-fullfilling prophecy because disingenuous neoliberal (try here for a half decent description if you're not sure about the term) politicians, mainly in the Conservative party (though lamentably some Liberals too) will use that to cut, privatize or otherwise end the program.  After all, their ideology doesn't like the idea of the government ensuring a basic floor for citizens anyway, and if we all believe the program is unsustainable, we won't raise a fuss for ending it.  Hell, if the belief really gets lodged deeply enough, we may thank them for "acting responsibly" by taking away our retirement security before it causing the impending doom we baselessly believe it will cause.

Here's what you need to know:  Every 3 years, the Chief Actuary of Canada publishes an Actuarial Report on the financial health of the CPP fund.  These reports follow the same sorts of actuarial methodologies that for-profit life insurance companies employ to confirm that they are charging appropriate rates for their life insurance customers.  Of course such reports require dealing with many unknowns about the future, but short of inventing a flux capacitor and pumping 1.21 gigawatts through it, this is the best anyone can do.

What The Report Says:

The latest report (the 25th) is from December 31, 2009, (well into the Great Recession/New Depression) and can be found here (sorry, PDF).  You're encouraged to read it, but let me jump to the conclusion, from page 12:

Thus, despite the projected substantial increase in benefits paid as a result of an aging population, the Plan is expected to be able to meet its obligations throughout the projection period and to remain financially sustainable over the long term.

(Emphasis added because this statement needs to be said over and over until people get it).   The "projection period" by the way is 75 years (p10), which means that by the best professional projection techniques available, CPP is believed to be healthy until 2084.  I'm 36, and I fully expect CPP to be there for me when I retire sometime between maybe 2036 and 2046.  Babies born today can rely on CPP being there.

Note as well the line about the increase in benefits paid due to the aging population.  I included that because things like the aging boomers, the rise in retirees to workers expected, or smaller family sizes are frequently cited by ordinary people in explaining why they "know" CPP won't survive.  The people running CPP know about these things too, and adjustments have been made over the years to guarantee the health of the program in the face of changing demographics.  Note above this is the 25th actuarial report, CPP's non-partisan officials have been checking into this for quite some time. 

How Credible is the Report?

I'm not an actuary so of course I won't offer a personal opinion on the techniques employed in writing these things.  Luckily, the authors take steps to get second opinions.  Here's what they did to assess the competency of the 25th report:

A panel of three independent Canadian actuaries, selected by the United Kingdom Government Actuary’s Department (GAD) through an arm’s length process, reviewed the Twenty-fifth Actuarial Report on the Canada Pension Plan. The external panel’s findings confirm that the work performed by the Office of the Chief Actuary (OCA) on the Report meets all professional standards of practice and statutory requirements, and states that the assumptions and methods used are appropriate and reasonable. 

I suppose if you're the kind of person who believes that 97%+ of the world's Climate Scientists are arrayed in a massive conspiracy to rig the science to keep their government research grant gravy river flowing, you might believe that Canada's actuaries are conspiring to hide evidence of CPP's imminent downfall from us, but really aside from rampant reality rejection, I don't see how you can do much better than this.

CPP is healthy.  Don't let anyone tell you differently, and if that person is a supposed expert (like some think tank analyst or a politician involved in the pension file) and they don't deal with the Actuarial Reports, you should recognize they are liars trying to con you out of your retirement safety.  By all means, save for retirement if you have the luxury of an income that supports doing so (yes, a "luxury":  half of Canadians live on less than $29,000 a year, which doesn't usually leave much room for RRSPs and TFSAs) but remember CPP is vital to providing a dignified to many Canadians and there's no sound economic reason to take that away from them.

CBC Posts a Funny April Fool's Joke: Flat Tax

Ha ha ha, good one CBC:

5 benefits of a flat-tax system, and why it still isn't likely in Canada

Graduated income tiers a disincentive to work, economist says

 I know you're laughing already, but wait, there's more:

For Niels Veldhuis, senior economist with the Fraser Institute, the argument for changing the tax system isn't about burdens but about productivity. He says a flat tax would increase the incentive for Canadians to work, earn more money and, in turn, invest that money back into the economy.

The current system of graduated rates takes a larger percentage of a person’s income the more money they make, and this is a disincentive for hard work, he says.

“You’re sending a signal to young, aggressive Canadians who want to take risks, who want to start businesses, who want to save and invest. And what you’re telling them is the more successful you become, the more and more we’re going to penalize you,” Veldhuis says.

See, Canada is chalk full of little John Galts, sitting idly in their own private Galt Gulches just waiting to unleash their productivity if only the big mean old government would stop punishing them for success (because Taxes aren't actually how we pay for civilization, no, they are actually a criminal penalty!) 

Now some silly people on the left will tell you that eliminating progressive taxation will starve government of revenue needed to maintain vital programs and services, but no, Mr. Fraser Economist will set you straight:

Unleashing that entrepreneurial spirit, so the argument goes, will create more investment, jobs and opportunities which will, in turn, increase government tax revenues.

See, cutting taxes will raise revenues!  Just like it did...well, Mr. Fraser doesn't say anywhere this has actually worked out, but the theory was proposed by a guy named Laffer so we know it's a great idea. 

Now I know we all want to rush out and tell our MPs to implement this fantastic idea on Canada, but we really should be prudent and check some references, just to cover our bases.  Tell us, where has this fantastic idea been tried?  It must be sweeping the world, because it all sounds so great!

A number of countries, including Russia, Czech Republic and Slovakia, have instituted single-rate systems over the past decade or so. 

I also hear that Ogdenville, North Haverbrook and Brockway love their new monorails.

For some actual worthwhile discussion on the radical flat tax experiments underway in various former Communist eastern eurpoean nations, see here, and here and here.  Quote from the last one:

The positive effects of the flat tax are at least ambiguous. There are no Laffer curve signals, a correlation proved between the fiscal relaxation through the flat tax and the increase in the budgetary revenues (Keen et al, 2006). Moreover, the budgetary revenues do not automatically get increased as a result of this measure. For example, in the case of Estonia, even under the terms of a high rate of economic growth, the share of the returns
from the direct taxes got decreased from 12% (in 1994) to 7.5% in 2008. Also, in the case of Slovakia, there have been made estimates that the revenues from the income
taxes and from the taxes on profit were up to 1% lower than under the terms of not introducing the tax reform (Odor, 2007).

You'll also learn that Flat Tax countries also find it necessary to institute hefty 20% VAT (sales taxes) and keep substantial payroll taxes to fund their minimal social safety nets.

OAS and GIS Cuts Are a Travesty

The Harper's government's first majority budget is being portrayed as some kind of "moderate" or "compromise" budget because it doesn't gut as deeply as the wingnuts in Harper's caucus and Canadian wingnut welfare think tanks like C.D. Howe, Fraser and the Candian Taxpayers Federation have been calling for.   Good job moving the 50 yard line of moderate centrism, wingnuts.  The US political playbook continues to work here.  Canada's "paper of record" the Globe and Mail, calls the budget "prudent."   It's not.  It's a travesty that seeks to reduce the deficit on the backs of poor (future) seniors by delaying eligibility for Old Age Security (OAS) and the Guaranteed Income Suppliment (GIS) retirement income programs (and very little attention is being paid to the GIS cuts, even though they're actually more disturbing). 

Everyone younger than 54 has just had approximately $12,000 in OAS ($6,000/yr) and potentially another $12,000 in GIS taken away from their retirements.  That's $24,000 in 2012 dollars, of course by the time people aged 53 hit 65, assuming 2% inflation, that figure is over $30,000.  The people who qualify for GIS are of course those least able to sustain the loss of this income, and particularly so at age 65, where the potent mix of health issues and workplace age discrimination mean it will be particularly hard for these seniors to find paying work.  There are just only so many Walmart greeter jobs, and for even those you have to be in reasonable health to work them.

Let's be clear that people receiving GIS are poor pushing on destitute.  The income cutoff to receive GIS in 2012 is just over $16,000.  That figure doesn't include OAS benefits, but CPP payments (which max out at about $12,000 a year anyway) would count.  However not everyone qualfies for CPP and you don't necessarily get the maximum depending on your work history contributions to the program.  Also, the numbers aren't trivial, in 2011, over 1.6 million Canadians received GIS. 

The arguments for the OAS changes are the usual stew of mistruths and tendenicious rationalizations:  People live longer ("People" here meaning: "middle to upper class" people; working age poverty has a dramatic effect on life expectancy), there's more retirees per worker than when these programs were created, the boomer bulge (you can safely ignore anyone citing this since boomers are cynically exempted from this cut) and so on.  For GIS, there are no good arguments for cutting it, as this progressive economist notes.  In general, I don't buy any of these arguments, for this basic reason:  Canada today is a much wealthier country than the Canada that created OAS in 1951 under Liberal PM Louis St. Laurent. 

OAS is Completely Affordable if We Want To Afford It

A little math here:  Canada's GDP per-capita in 1970 was $4047 (using 1970 dollars).  I couldn't find a figure for 1951, but 1970 is far enough back and yet modern enough that we had most of the same modern safety net programs in place, and found them evidently affordable at the time.  Using the bank of Canada's inflation calculator that leads to a figure of $24,282 in 2012 dollars.  Canada's actual 2010 GDP per capita?  $46,236.  That's 1.9 times higher even after the biggest recession since the Great Depression.  We're almost twice as wealthy as a society than our 1970 cousins.  According to this, we may actually be more than twice as wealthy (not sure how the difference emerges).  Why could those 1970 Canucks afford OAS but not us?   
This is the Big Picture 

All the sophist minutia about the number of seniors per working age Canadian, the deficit, the percentage of the federal budget this stuff eats and stats on how long people live after 65 cannot withstand this basic fact.  Yes, you can persuade me that OAS will become modestly more expensive as a percentage of our GDP in the coming years, but not that it isn't, at a very fundamental level, affordable.  We're simply allowing this government to make the choice not to afford a decent and humane retirement for all Canadian seniors.  We decided more than a generation ago that leaving seniors in poverty was unacceptable (in fact income programs for seniors pre-date the Great Depression in Canada).  How can we afford this?  Clearly there are people who can pay more taxes.  The answer really is that simple.  Raise the taxes of those who are doing best, who are far wealthier than their 1970 peers were and maintain this basic social intergenerational compact.  We don't need another complicated neoliberal four letter (RRSP, TFSA etc) Rube-Goldberg scheme.  Tax the people with the most money and ensure the poorest seniors aren't left relying on foodbanks and soup kitchens. 

I'm also not moved by arguments around what our OECD/First World peers are doing with pensions.  Neoliberal dogma has infected the whole rich world, and a bunch of other neoliberal government unwilling to tax the rich appropriately to maintain the social contract are just proof the problem is very big, not that reducing retirement guarantees is some kind of hard economic necessity. 

I am looking for the two main opposition leaders to promise to overturn this decision.  Ian Welsh likes what he is seeing from Mulcair on this, so I'm optimistic.  Rae perhaps cannot make promises given that he is supposedly only the interim leader, but NDP supporters should pressure Mulcair and when it comes time to pick a Liberal leader, voters in that process should ask the candidates to commit to reversing this.  It doesn't have to be this way.