jobs
Ten points in Canada's real economic update
The minister of finance has made his Fall Economic Update. We wanted to hear what he had to say about government spending -- but we didn't. Why? Because the real story is one of austerity.
The federal finance minister promised Canadians a look at what is happening with the economy. On the surface, the job is fairly straightforward. James Flaherty has to say whether the economy is growing, or not; and he has to say what he intends to do about it.
Waiting for the writ to drop
Parliament is back this week, and its focus this fall will be on what to do about the economy. The first order of business should be reducing unemployment, but the Conservatives are more interested in reducing the deficit.
Want to reduce the government deficit? Raise business investment? Improve the standard of living? Moving to full employment -- a job for everyone who wants one -- is the way to go. Putting more Canadians back to work will ensure the economy improves.
Budget delivers cuts not jobs
The 2010 federal budget stuck predictably to the Conservative dogma that there is no need for a fundamental change of course. One we get past the temporary hiccup of global and national recession, we must return to a world of ever-smaller government to be achieved through continued tax reductions and deep spending cuts.
Despite the fact that unemployment is and will remain very high -- forecast in the budget itself to average 8.5 per cent this year and 7.9 per cent next year -- temporary extensions of EI benefits will expire in September of this year and some 500,000 unemployment claims filed during the Great Recession will be exhausted before claimants can find a new job.
![Karl Nerenberg](http://rabble.ca/sites/rabble/files/imagecache/thumbnail/category_pictures/Karl.jpg "Karl Nerenberg joins rabble to cover news for the rest of us from Parliament Hill. Karl has been a journalist for over 25 years including eight years as the producer of the CBC show The House. He has written scripts for documentary films and long-form television reports for such shows as Le Point and Actuel on Radio Canada television and The Journal on CBC-TV. Karl also founded and, for five years, edited the magazine Federations: What's new in federalism worldwide.
Karl has been awarded a Gemini award, a Best International Documentary Series award (from "la communauté des televisions francophones"), a CBC Radio Award for Best New Series (C'est la vie) among others. As a broadcaster, Mr. Nerenberg produced and directed television series and documentaries in a wide range of genres and on a great variety of subjects -- from civil war in Central America, to the crisis in South Africa's Apartheid system.
Karl works in both English and French, and can be reached at karl@rabble.ca")
February 1, 2012 |
In its submission to the National Energy Board, Canada’s largest energy union says the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline is being built to export more bitumen than we could even produce by 2025.