Our Time at the September 27 Global Climate Strike (photo by Laura Cameron)
Inequality and poverty
Photo by Hugo Morales, Wikimedia Commons
The Monitor starts off 2020—the CCPA's 40th anniversary year—with a direct attack on the Trudeau government's contradictory climate plans and the close connections between public officials and the fossil fuel sector. Will minority status and a rising Green New Deal movement change the government's course, or will it be just more business as usual?
Illustration by Remie Geoffroi
Since 2005, the State of the Inner City research project has collaborated with Winnipeg community-based organizations (CBOs) working in the inner city. The project researches issues that matter to CBOs and the communities they serve. It connects the personal struggles of the people who live in the inner city with the ‘big picture’-the structural and political realities that affect their lives. While socio-economic marginalization exists outside the boundaries of the inner city, the inner city is an area that has been historically divided by class and race. This demands dedicated attention.
The 2019 State of the Inner City report “Forest for the Trees: Reducing Drug and Mental Health Harms in the Inner City” finds that there is no clear strategy in how the recommendations from the VIRGO Report and the Illicit Drug Task Force Report are being implemented. Analysis by University of Winnipeg criminologist Dr. Katharina Maier finds the rhetoric of a meth ‘crisis’ intensifies a law, order, and security response. This is counter to evidence-based approaches, which find that dealing with the conditions of problematic substance use are what is needed.
This report uses 2016 Census data to compare work and income trends among racialized and non-racialized Canadians. Overall, the report finds significant barriers remain entrenched along racial and gender lines, with little change between 2006-16. The paper also looks beyond the labour market more broadly at economic inequality including differences in income from investments and capital between racialized and non-racialized Canadians.
Un résumé en français est disponible ci-dessous
TORONTO ET OTTAWA — Malgré une population de plus en plus diverse, un nouveau rapport publié aujourd’hui révèle que peu ou pas de progrès ont été réalisés dans la réduction du racisme sur le marché du travail.
TORONTO & OTTAWA — Despite an increasingly diverse population, a new report released today reveals that little-to-no progress has been made towards reducing racism in labour market outcomes.
First published in the Winnipeg Free Press December 5, 2019
The Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) scores were released this week, and once again Manitoba ranked poorly relative to other provinces and the Canadian average. Some will say, “What is wrong with our educational system?” However, the better question is, “why do we allow such very high levels of poverty to persist,” when the statistical evidence is so absolutely clear that there is a causal relationship between poverty and low educational outcomes.