The Latest

Pathways to a Better Future: Manitoba Renews its Commitment to Address Poverty

On March 4, 2019, The Manitoba government released its latest poverty reduction strategy, Pathways to a Better Future: Manitoba’s Poverty Reduction Strategy. The province’s Poverty Reduction Strategy Act requires the province to implement a poverty reduction and social inclusion strategy, and to review and update the strategy every five years. The new strategy is an 84-page document that includes significant enhancements to the government’s previous 12-page strategy, entitled All Aboard.

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Identifying Everyone’s Stake: Cause & Effect Exercises

Last month, Cities Reducing Poverty members were introduced to facilitating Cause and Effect exercises by Gary Vipond, CEO of United Way Sault Ste. Marie and Algoma District. This blog provides an overview on what we learned as prospective facilitators.

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Cities Reducing Poverty Policy Digest: March 2019

This is the March 2019 edition of the Cities Reducing Poverty Policy Digest, which aims to provide you with timely poverty-related policy updates and resources from across Canada.

Key highlights include significant federal and provincial achievements in poverty reduction based on data released by Statistics Canada from the 2017 Canadian Income Survey, Manitoba’s renewed poverty reduction strategy, and British Columbia’s 2019 budget investments for poverty reduction.

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Launching Modest Canadians’ Savings to the Next Level

Saving for a rainy day let alone saving for future retirement are luxuries few can afford on low and modest incomes. The current system is set up to benefit higher income earners who are greatly rewarded for their contributions in the short and long term to TFSAs (Tax-Free Savings Accounts), RRPs (Registered Pension Plans) or RRSPs (Registered Retirement Savings Plans), of which only 65% of Canadians contribute to.

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The Success of Benefits Program Reflects the Importance of Tax Clinics

The release of the Canadian Income Survey for 2017 came with a welcome piece of news for those working in poverty reduction: fewer Canadians and especially fewer children were living below the official poverty line and the low-income measure in 2017. In fact, Canada has already reached its 2020 target of a 20% reduction in poverty. While there is still significant work to be done to reach a 50% reduction in poverty by 2030, and to ultimately eliminate poverty, it is clear that the work being done by every level of government and by community-based roundtables is having an impact.

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The Cascading Effects of Childcare

The cost of childcare accounts for a significant expense in families. It is a barrier to employment and a barrier to prosperity for many households. Families are faced with the decision of whether it is truly worth it to work. Some opt to not work at all due to the cost cancelling out or even making them worse off financially. This takes them out of the workforce for longer which can make it more challenging in getting back into it. It can take them out of higher education opportunities because of the sheer double cost associated with fees on top of fees. And some are faced with less than ideal childcare arrangements. It trickles out to whether they can pay the rent, it affects the quality of food they eat, whether they go deeper in debt or can save for the future, to having negative consequences on the country’s economic growth.

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