Fording the Swamp

Posted on October 29, 2018 by JimBennett

Here you will find a Chatelaine article summarizing the damage done by our fine Provincial Premier to Ontario and Toronto.

I will content myself with two quotes. Emphasis mine.

On October 2, Doug Ford announced in the Ontario legislature that his government would be “getting rid” of Bill 148. Introduced by the Liberals, it’s an employment and labour reform bill that:

• guarantees part-time workers will be paid the same rate a full-time workers doing the same job
• orders employers to pay workers for three hours if their shift is cancelled with less than 48 hours notice
• gives workers three weeks of vacation after five years of employment, as well as 10 personal days a year—two of which must be paid

It’s also the same bill that introduced the minimum wage increase to $14/hour in 2018 (from $11.60), followed by an increase to $15/hour that was scheduled to happen on January 1, 2019. (Scrapping the $15 minimum wage was a campaign promise that provincial finance minister Laurie Scott said the PCs would keep in a September 14 opinion piece in the Financial Post.)

Ford’s justification for scrapping Bill 148? He considers it to be a “job killer” that he alleges has already cost the Ontario economy 60,000 jobs.

(IMHO there is no basis for Ford’s statement. Ontario’s employment rate improved when this bill went in.)

On August 1, Children, Community and Social Services minister Lisa MacLeod announced that the PCs would be ending the Liberal government’s pilot project looking into providing Ontarians with a no-strings-attached “basic income.” The pilot involved 4,000 people earning less than $34,000 annually who were given up to $17,000. Unlike traditional welfare, the payment was not conditional upon employment status. Couples would receive up to $24,000; those with disabilities were eligible for up to an additional $6,000. The experiment began in April 2017 and was set to last three years.

In her announcement of the pilot cancellation, MacLeod said that it was scrapped because it wasn’t working, although she was unable to provide any data to clarify what that meant. There were also no details on how the program would be wound down for those currently supported by it. This comes on the heels of another announcement on July 31, when MacLeod said the government would increase disability support rates by 1.5% instead of the 3% promised by the Liberals before the election.

(There’s more, but you can use the hotlink above to see the entire article.)

Have a nice day.

Trumping the Facts

Posted on October 29, 2018 by JimBennett

Here you will find an Atlantic article on Donald Trump.

I will content myself with a small quote.

Ordinarily, a politician cannot be held responsible for the actions of a deranged follower. But ordinarily, politicians don’t praise supporters who have mercilessly beaten a Latino man, as “very passionate.” Ordinarily, they don’t offer to pay supporters’ legal bills if they assault protesters on the other side. They don’t praise acts of violence against the media. They don’t defend neo-Nazi rioters as “fine people.” They don’t justify sending bombs to their critics by blaming the media for airing criticism. Ordinarily, there is no historic surge in anti-Semitism, much of it targeted at Jewish critics, coinciding with a politician’s rise. And ordinarily, presidents do not blatantly exploit their authority in an effort to terrify white Americans into voting for their party. For the past few decades, most American politicians, Republican and Democrat alike, have taken care not to urge their supporters to take matters into their own hands. Trump did everything he could to fan the flames, and nothing to restrain those who might take him at his word.

Have a nice day.