“Flaherty said Friday the federal government is concerned about increasing CPP contributions at the current time because it would slap an additional financial burden on employers during fragile economic times, potentially threatening their ability to hire workers. The federal government can’t unilaterally change the CPP; amending it requires the backing of two-thirds of the provinces representing two-thirds of the population. “This is not the time to put another burden on employers and dampen employment prospects for Canadians. That’s my view. Not everyone agrees with that view,” Flaherty told reporters Friday in Ottawa.
Showing posts with label pensions. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pensions. Show all posts
Saturday, December 15, 2012
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
Most Commentators and Economists Say Threshold Change for OAS is Unnecessary
Surveying recent media coverage including economists referenced or interviewed, one will discover that a substantial majority of commentators argue that the age threshold for OAS does not require changing to maintain sustainable funding for the program despite swelling seniors' ranks and a decreasing Canadian population. Neither the argument that seniors are living longer now nor the claim that the age threshold should be raised because other countries have done it is carrying much weight with economists or thoughtful journalists. Even Jack Mintz, frequently referenced by the Harper Regime itself, says it's unnecessary. It's clear, then, that it's not good fiscal management that's driving this agenda item, but, as I've argued, good old neoliberalism.
Four recent markers we have witnessed along the road to Canada's incremental destruction: 1) proposed changes to streamline environmental assessment on pipelines and other projects, 2) changing immigration policy to favour those who can contribute more directly to the neoliberal project, 3) abandoning a leadership roll in Health Care, and now 4) re-engineering our pensions. What next?
Four recent markers we have witnessed along the road to Canada's incremental destruction: 1) proposed changes to streamline environmental assessment on pipelines and other projects, 2) changing immigration policy to favour those who can contribute more directly to the neoliberal project, 3) abandoning a leadership roll in Health Care, and now 4) re-engineering our pensions. What next?
Monday, January 30, 2012
The Assault on the OAS is the Beginning of an Attempt to Strengthen Neoliberal Principles
Yesterday on CTV Question Period, Dan Gardner's argued that it a was good thing to raise the entry level for the OAS by at least two years because everybody else has done it. Well, Dan, just because everyone else has done it doesn't make it right, especially when the reasons for doing so are the same old neoliberal ones that are always an implicit assault on social programs. It would seem, old chap, you got sucked in by the sustainability spin.
Do a little research, Danny boy, and you'll see that beginning around 2020 OAS gross funding will begin to decline when babyboomers begin dying off - a decreasing trend that will rapidly accelerate in 2030. In other words, this is not the problem the Harper Regime has made it out to be, and in fact the percentage of increased funding is a mere 5.6% per year over this time period, and the ratio of expenditures to GDP will increase from 2.4% to to a mere 3.2% - hardly the catastrophic amount Harper pretends it is. Of course lying has always been a political tactic for the Harper Regime, so we really shouldn't be surprised to discover the reality beneath the spin once again.
Bob Fyfe was right when he said on yesterday's QP show that the Harper Regime's agenda is not a social one, but an economic one. What he didn't say is that the basis of this economic agenda is a concentrated effort to strengthen the already established Harper Regime's neoliberal principles through the usual neoclassical economic tools. We can see only the beginning of this process now, but the coming changes will amount to the destruction of a socio-economic foundation on which we have sat for 50 years or so. They may be impossible to reverse in four to ten years' time.
Do a little research, Danny boy, and you'll see that beginning around 2020 OAS gross funding will begin to decline when babyboomers begin dying off - a decreasing trend that will rapidly accelerate in 2030. In other words, this is not the problem the Harper Regime has made it out to be, and in fact the percentage of increased funding is a mere 5.6% per year over this time period, and the ratio of expenditures to GDP will increase from 2.4% to to a mere 3.2% - hardly the catastrophic amount Harper pretends it is. Of course lying has always been a political tactic for the Harper Regime, so we really shouldn't be surprised to discover the reality beneath the spin once again.
Bob Fyfe was right when he said on yesterday's QP show that the Harper Regime's agenda is not a social one, but an economic one. What he didn't say is that the basis of this economic agenda is a concentrated effort to strengthen the already established Harper Regime's neoliberal principles through the usual neoclassical economic tools. We can see only the beginning of this process now, but the coming changes will amount to the destruction of a socio-economic foundation on which we have sat for 50 years or so. They may be impossible to reverse in four to ten years' time.
Friday, November 18, 2011
Armine vs. Canada's Poster Boy for Capitalism
On last night's Lang and O'Leary Exchange, given that the odds were 3 to 1/2, Armine Yalnizyan held her own against Kevin O'Leary (Canada's poster boy for capitalism), a bank economist, and a corporate CEO. Amanda Lang did her best to make sure that Armine was heard in the din of male, finance-first sputtering from these gleefully drooling mouths: profit first; real people, nothing more than clients. Their only concern was should clients buy in at 3%, 7%, or 10%. But, being the generous folks they are, they're also going to lower their rates. Whew!
There is much to object to in this Pooled Registered Pension Plan proposed legislation, but three things stand out:
1) They are different from RRSPs only in that a small business can set up - with a third party investment agent - automatic contributions from employees (with an opportunity to opt out or not join). Yeah, sure, but there is no obligation to match contributions from an employer, as there is with the CPP, and most small businesses have already claimed that they cannot afford to contribute to such a plan. At one point, Armine asked why are employers being let off the hook? The implied if not fully articulated answer: we've already got a bunch of suckers lined up; we don't need them.
2) They're voluntary. So how many people of the 60% demographic without pensions are going to opt in when many are living paycheck to paycheck as it is, already up to their proverbial eye balls in debt, a record 62% of the economy in mortgage and credit-line debt? (god [yes, Pat, my homage to you: a small g] help them if housing prices decline significantly or interest rates climb appreciably.) Compulsory participation in the CPP based on income level is the only way to enhance pensions effectively, and there is nothing, so far as I know, preventing any business, small or otherwise, from buying into that except the proft motive.
3) Pooling both expands the asset base and presumably diversifies or lessens investor risk, but, as Armine pointed out, there is no better diversified asset based and risk secured pension operation in Canada than the CPP. Why not take advantage of it?
The provinces have still to buy in on the legislation, but it seems clear then that this is another for profit, market-driven, capitalist, private sector scheme hatched by the Harperites to favour their sometimes friends in finance, though, to be fair, they did try to float a CPP enhanced proposal earlier this year only to be shot down by, as Armine reminded us, Alberta and subsequently Quebec, both of whom feared the political ramifications of increased CPP premiums. This is really no surprise, for almost all policy decisions on taxes or the economy are investor or financial sector driven ones in the Harper Regime. And we should also remember on occasions like this to take what any bank economist says on a talk show with a full sack of salt, for they have an undeclared conflict of interest and speak essentially not for the general economy but the financial sector. CEOs of course should axiomatically be viewed with scepticism on such shows.
Incidentally, The Taxpapyer Federation of Canada wants the government to shift away from CPP support for government employees to PRPP plans on the grounds of projected pension liabilties. Isn't that just ducky?
Lang and O'Leary Novmber 17
There is much to object to in this Pooled Registered Pension Plan proposed legislation, but three things stand out:
1) They are different from RRSPs only in that a small business can set up - with a third party investment agent - automatic contributions from employees (with an opportunity to opt out or not join). Yeah, sure, but there is no obligation to match contributions from an employer, as there is with the CPP, and most small businesses have already claimed that they cannot afford to contribute to such a plan. At one point, Armine asked why are employers being let off the hook? The implied if not fully articulated answer: we've already got a bunch of suckers lined up; we don't need them.
2) They're voluntary. So how many people of the 60% demographic without pensions are going to opt in when many are living paycheck to paycheck as it is, already up to their proverbial eye balls in debt, a record 62% of the economy in mortgage and credit-line debt? (god [yes, Pat, my homage to you: a small g] help them if housing prices decline significantly or interest rates climb appreciably.) Compulsory participation in the CPP based on income level is the only way to enhance pensions effectively, and there is nothing, so far as I know, preventing any business, small or otherwise, from buying into that except the proft motive.
3) Pooling both expands the asset base and presumably diversifies or lessens investor risk, but, as Armine pointed out, there is no better diversified asset based and risk secured pension operation in Canada than the CPP. Why not take advantage of it?
The provinces have still to buy in on the legislation, but it seems clear then that this is another for profit, market-driven, capitalist, private sector scheme hatched by the Harperites to favour their sometimes friends in finance, though, to be fair, they did try to float a CPP enhanced proposal earlier this year only to be shot down by, as Armine reminded us, Alberta and subsequently Quebec, both of whom feared the political ramifications of increased CPP premiums. This is really no surprise, for almost all policy decisions on taxes or the economy are investor or financial sector driven ones in the Harper Regime. And we should also remember on occasions like this to take what any bank economist says on a talk show with a full sack of salt, for they have an undeclared conflict of interest and speak essentially not for the general economy but the financial sector. CEOs of course should axiomatically be viewed with scepticism on such shows.
Incidentally, The Taxpapyer Federation of Canada wants the government to shift away from CPP support for government employees to PRPP plans on the grounds of projected pension liabilties. Isn't that just ducky?
Lang and O'Leary Novmber 17
Saturday, October 29, 2011
Envy and Resentment about DB Pensions: Do Something About It
Pension envy grows as boomers retire
Here we go again. Instead of acknowledging how unfairly to varying degrees workers in the private sector are frequently treated by their employers, how exploited they are in the name of profit since they are the most vulnerable component in the production process -commodities, as Marx noted, owners of only saleable labour - these writers, like so many on the right spectrum of economics, once again choose to resent the just achievements of collective bargaining in both the private and public sector. Teachers, firefighters, police officers, armed forces, government workers: our esteemed authors - probably graduates of the CD Howe Institute Neo-liberalism - are saying they do not deserve their defined benefits pensions. Why? Because most of the private sector employees don't get the same sort of benefits, and such benefits dig too deeply into government coffers, where austerity of course should rule.
Okay, all you folks in the private sector without DB plans who feel that way do something about it by confronting your employers instead of resenting the negotiated achievements of collective bargaining. I know that's a tough thing to do when almost everyone in the private sector is in effect a just-in-time worker living in fear, who can be axed at any moment. This is the established culture of neo-liberalism. You are instantly replaceable, and you know it. You feel powerless and your are, caught in the vicious web of capitalism. So join the occupy movement, wear a mask if you have to, and check out senior mangement's paycheck if you still want to feel envious and resentful.
Here we go again. Instead of acknowledging how unfairly to varying degrees workers in the private sector are frequently treated by their employers, how exploited they are in the name of profit since they are the most vulnerable component in the production process -commodities, as Marx noted, owners of only saleable labour - these writers, like so many on the right spectrum of economics, once again choose to resent the just achievements of collective bargaining in both the private and public sector. Teachers, firefighters, police officers, armed forces, government workers: our esteemed authors - probably graduates of the CD Howe Institute Neo-liberalism - are saying they do not deserve their defined benefits pensions. Why? Because most of the private sector employees don't get the same sort of benefits, and such benefits dig too deeply into government coffers, where austerity of course should rule.
Okay, all you folks in the private sector without DB plans who feel that way do something about it by confronting your employers instead of resenting the negotiated achievements of collective bargaining. I know that's a tough thing to do when almost everyone in the private sector is in effect a just-in-time worker living in fear, who can be axed at any moment. This is the established culture of neo-liberalism. You are instantly replaceable, and you know it. You feel powerless and your are, caught in the vicious web of capitalism. So join the occupy movement, wear a mask if you have to, and check out senior mangement's paycheck if you still want to feel envious and resentful.
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