Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Cameron Dearlove laments the fact that Canada is failing to recognize and replicate other countries’ successes in using the social determinants of health to shape public policy: Today we know that social and financial inequities — particularly the experience of poverty — has
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Accidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – James Baxter discusses why there’s no reason to buy into the Harper Cons’ fearmongering in the first place: Let’s accept a basic truth: There’s only so much money we’re willing to ‘invest’ in having the government to protect us from bad things and, when you
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: On changing reputations
Following up on this post as to the value of a common message in countering the Cons’ campaign spin, let’s test out Stephen Maher’s theory as to what the opposition parties need to offer: For years, Harper has missed no opportunity to portray himself as the only leader who can
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your weekend reading. – Gerald Caplan writes that we all bear some responsibility for growing inequality – and how we’ll need to use our electoral power to reverse it: (S)elf-sacrifice is not going to be the key to reducing inequality, with all the great damage it inflicts
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Afternoon Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Lana Payne discusses how we can bring about change in the new year by demanding that our political leaders recognize and use the power of collective action: Social justice requires a collective response and political action. It is at the root of wonderful
Continue readingPolitics and its Discontents: He May Have Hidden In A Closet …..
But that likely isn’t stopping Stephen Harper from manipulating the narrative surrounding the Parliament Hill tragedy to his own political advantage. At least, that is the speculation of Stephen Maher. Crack addict Michael Zehaf-Bibeau, who killed Cpl. Nathan Cirillo and who was then himself killed in a barrage of shots
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
This and that for your weekend reading. – Geoff Stiles writes that instead of providing massive subsidies to dirty energy industries which don’t need them (and which will only have more incentive to cause environmental damage as a result), we should be investing in a sustainable renewable energy plan: (W)hereas
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Robert Reich discusses how our economic system is set up to direct risk toward the people who can least afford to bear it (while also directing the spoils to those who need them least): Bankruptcy was designed so people could start over.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your Monday reading. – David Graeber writes that unfettered capitalism will never tame itself, but will instead need to be countered by a sufficiently strong counter-movement to seriously question its underpinnings. And Thomas Frank follows up with Graeber about the warped incentives facing workers as matters stand
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – David Atkins highlights how public policy and corporate strategy have both instead been directed toward squeezing every possible dime out of the public: The less noticed but potentially more consequential way that policymakers across the industrialized world set about accomplishing this goal was
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content for your Sunday reading. – Joe Conason discusses the increasingly widespread recognition that inequality represents a barrier to growth. And Heidi Moore takes a look at Thomas Piketty’s place in making that point: This is a deep point. Many American households, if they are lucky, will grow their
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Mitchell Anderson discusses Canada’s woeful excuse for negotiations with the oil sector – particularly compared to the lasting social benefits secured by Norway in making the best of similar reserves: Digging through the numbers, it seems Norway is considerably more skilled at negotiation.
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Monday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material to start your week. – Matthew O’Brien is the latest to pick up on the connection between pre-transfer income equality, redistribution and sustainable economic growth: Redistribution overall helps, and at least doesn’t harm, growth spells. That’s because the positive effects of less inequality add to or offset the
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your weekend. – Nick Kristof writes that the growing gap in income reflects a similarly growing gap in social perception – and that there’s plenty of need to reduce both: There is an income gap in America, but just as important is a compassion gap. Plenty
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Bill Kerry writes that extreme inequality serves to reinforce itself – and points out what needs to be done to counter the temptation to kick others down: One of the major difficulties in tackling inequality is the way it coerces many people into accepting
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Saturday Morning Links
Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Robert Reich laments the indecency of gross inequality (and the economic policies designed to exacerbate it): (F)or more than three decades we’ve been going backwards. It’s far more difficult today for a child from a poor family to become a middle-class or wealthy
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This and that for your Sunday reading. – Ellen Roseman writes about the need to recognize the value of public services – and to ensure that they’re properly funded: Canadians value their high-quality public services, such as education and health care. Many understand that public services democratize consumption and help
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Morning Links
This and that for your Sunday reading. – The Economist discusses research by Miles Corak and others on intergenerational inequality. And interestingly, other studies seem to suggest Corak has actually underestimated the barriers to social mobility: THE “Great Gatsby curve” is the name Alan Krueger, an economic adviser to Barack
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Sunday Afternoon Links
This and that to end your weekend. – Daniel Goleman writes about the role of wealth in undermining empathy: (I)n general, we focus the most on those we value most. While the wealthy can hire help, those with few material assets are more likely to value their social assets: like
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Paul Kershaw highlights what’s most needed to support Canada’s younger generations: Even with all this personal adaptation, most in Gen X and Y can’t work their way out of the time and income squeeze when they start families. Since two earners bring
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