Unfair–Pavement

Leave it to a conservative paper to talk about inequality the way I think it we should talk about it and the way, I think, this issue would resonate best with Canadians. Inequality is at its most debilitating, not when we’re talking about material inequalities–although we shouldn’t ignore the negative impacts of material inequalities–but when we’re talking about inequalities of opportunity: when people can work hard and not get ahead. From Armine Yalnizyan in the National Post (via Margaret Atwood’s twitter):

For most Canadians, the issue isn’t that the rich are getting richer. The dilemma they face on a daily basis is getting and staying in the middle class. Canadians rightly believe that hard work should lead to upward mobility. They believe most people won’t need help if the market is fair and they play by the rules – get educated, work hard.

It’s the promise of their own upward mobility that has many Canadians willing to brush aside the handsome gains enjoyed by the rich in the past 20 years. But rising inequality, in good times and bad, makes it increasingly feel like the game is rigged, destabilizing foundational values and expectations.

And she backs it up with staggering numbers as well:

Back in 1979, it took six weeks working the minimum wage full-time to cover my fulltime undergraduate tuition in Toronto. Working all summer, I covered my books, administration fees, rent and food and even had some beer money left over.

Today’s typical student in Ontario has to work 16 weeks at the minimum wage to cover just the cost of tuition, let alone anything else. Yet most are still frozen out of the job market, with 180,000 fewer 15-24-year-olds employed across Canada than when the debt crisis broke in 2008.

Oddly, there’s no comment section open on the article. I’d be interested in seeing how readers of the National Post would respond to an article like this. Although, people who comment on articles in any forum don’t seem to very representative of the whole in any case.

(Image source: thinkaboutpoverty.com)