Thursday, October 31, 2013

SSW106: Poverty Reduction Strategies

Introduction of the BC Poverty Reduction Act 2011


Seth Klein - Ontario's Poverty Reduction Plan


Audio: $2750 a month for every adult, guaranteed? Switzerland's considering it.

PRI's The World, (2013).

Here's a deal: Each month the Swiss government will send every adult a check for about 2,500 swiss francs (roughly $2,750) — no matter their need or income.
In response to growing economic inequality, a grassroots movement in Switzerland collected the 100,000 signatures needed to secure a national referendum on their basic income proposal. Swiss law states any petition that receives at least 100,000 signatures will be voted on nationally.
"It is not as kooky as it sounds," says Karl Widerquist, a Georgetown University professor who has researched basic income policy for a decade. "It's the idea of putting a floor under people's income, the idea that income doesn't have to start at zero."
Basic income is a social security system in which the government regularly gives each citizen a sum of money — with no conditions. 
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Vancouver Rent bank celebrates first anniversary

Since last October, rent bank has approved 137 interest-free loans

Howell, M. (2013). Vancouver Courier. 
At 58, Rene Kwan hoped at this point in his life that he wouldn’t need to seek a loan from the city’s rent bank.
An accountant for 25 years, Kwan was forced to retire because he is losing his vision. His disability and other circumstances have left him living on a Canada pension of $550 per month.
“I worked hard and this is what I ended up with — $550 a month,” he said, noting his rent is $450 per month. “It’s sad.”
Kwan is the youngest of his family, some of whom lived in Canada and others in the Philippines. They’ve all since passed on, leaving Kwan by himself in an apartment at 23rd and Fraser.
He described his situation as being “stuck in the corner.”
Last fall, Kwan was referred to the city’s rent bank after visiting with a seniors advocate downtown. He filled out an application, met the criteria and was given a $500 loan.
It allowed him to avoid eviction. He praised the staff at the rent bank and said the service “saved his life for now.” The arrangement he agreed to with staff was to pay back $20 per month, interest free.
“I know it’s not that much, but it worked out with my problem issue,” he said of the $500 loan. “And the return amount [of $20 per month] is very humane.”
Kwan attended a press conference Tuesday that marked the one-year anniversary of the city’s rent bank. Since October 2012, the rent bank approved 137 interest-free loans, helping 228 people avoid being evicted from their homes. Staff counted 39 children among the recipients.
The total amount of loans was $124,171 and the average loan was $906. So far, 70 per cent of loans are being repaid in monthly instalments, although recipients have a maximum of 24 months to repay. Money is automatically withdrawn from a person’s account.
The reasons recipients have applied for a loan included underemployment, a health crisis, a family crisis, job loss, laid off and delays in receiving Employment Insurance. The majority of loans — 87 per cent — went to single-income households and 43 per cent to people 55 or older.
The highest demand for loans came from residents of the West End, Grandview-Woodlands, downtown, Hastings-Sunrise, Strathcona and Mount Pleasant. The average household income was $18,056.
The rent bank was established to operate for three years. Its loan budget, which is funded by The Radcliffe Foundation, is $365,000 over three years. The City of Vancouver committed to $148,00 over three years for operating costs. The Vancouver Foundation contributed another $90,000 for operating costs. 

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Description:These two significant reports showcase what we have learned so far about the Housing First approach, one of the recommendations for action featured in Changing Directions, Changing Lives: The Mental Health Strategy for Canada. As we continue to provide housing and services for nearly one thousand homeless people living with mental health issues in five cities across Canada, we are gathering significant evidence about what works and what does not.
Through our Interim Report, you will learn more about housing outcomes, service use and costing. You will find evidence for the following main findings:
  • Housing First improves the lives of those who are homeless and have a mental illness
  • Housing First makes better use of public dollars, especially for those who are high service users
  • Housing First can be implemented across Canada
  • A cross ministry approach that combines health, housing, social services with non profit and private sector partners is required to solve chronic homelessness.
  • Solving chronic homelessness can create dramatic improvements for Canadian communities

Through our Early Findings Vol. 3 report, you will learn more about some of the qualitative findings related to how the lives of project participants have changed in key areas such as:
  • Social and family relationships
  • Control over personal lives
  • Disruptions due to illness
  • Contributions to community
  • Educational opportunities












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Homelessness In Canada Is Shrinking, Candice Bergen, Social Development Minister Says

Canadian Press/HuffPost (2013).           

OTTAWA - Cities across the country are seeing their homeless populations shrink thanks to efforts by the federal government and its partners to provide permanent housing to those languishing on the streets, says Canada's social development minister.

Homelessness in Edmonton dropped by 20 per cent between 2008 and 2010 and about 4,000 people in Toronto have moved into permanent housing in the last eight years, Candice Bergen told the National Conference on Homelessness on Tuesday.

 "Moving forward, we will be looking for even more ways to support communities in developing local solutions to homelessness and we'll help them capitalize on the effectiveness of Housing First," she said.

Those efforts will involve requiring communities with the worst homelessness problems to invest much of their federal government funding into Housing First.

An estimated 30,000 people are homeless on any given night while as many as 200,000 Canadians a year confront homelessness.

The Conservative government surprised anti-poverty advocates in its March budget by announcing a five-year renewal of funding for the Homelessness Partnering Strategy.

The budget cited evidence from a massive Housing First pilot project, run by the Mental Health Commission of Canada, that helped find and pay for homes for mentally ill homeless people in five cities. The pilot also provided recipients with as many social services as they needed to stay housed.

"The policy shift that the federal government announced in its budget this year is going to radically overhaul Canada's response to homelessness," said Tim Richter, head of the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness.

 "It changes our efforts from simply a response to an emergency situation to one that focuses on permanent housing for chronically homeless people. We've not seen anything like it in the past. It's really going to shape how communities respond to homelessness in the future."

The mental health commission estimates about half of homeless people in Canada have severe mental illnesses. A study in Toronto found that 71 per cent of people in shelters have a mental illness, an addiction or both.

Bergen says she's committed as minister of state for social development to eradicate the problem.
"I'm here today to tell you that my goal is not to be the minister who tries to manage homelessness," she said. "I'm here to be the minister who put us on the track to end homelessness in Canada."
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Wednesday, October 30, 2013

SSW106: First Nations People & Poverty

Infographic: Aboriginal Poverty




Aboriginal Poverty - Canada


Michael Champagne

Filmmaker Wab Kinew profiles a young Aboriginal man, Michael Champagne, who pulled himself out of a childhood of poverty and violence in downtown Winnipeg.
DOC ZONE | Season 2011- 12, Episode 1 | Dec 8, 2011

Wab Kinew on George Stroumboulopoulos Tonight: BIO and Interview


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Aboriginal Children's Village opens in East Vancouver

Housing development built for foster children and their families.

Howell, M. (2013). Vancouver Courier. 

Aboriginal foster children are placed in units with foster parents. But if the parents and children don’t prove to be a good match, it’s the parents who have to move on — not the children, as Stewart did when he was a child.
“The whole foster system needs an overhaul and this is a good start,” he said.
The 24-unit building is set up so a foster child could conceivably remain a resident for many years. Some of the units are so-called transition apartments designated for children once they become adults.
Counselling and support for families and children is available at the building, along with training for foster parents and respite workers. An aboriginal art mentorship program, which has welcomed celebrated artist Robert Davidson, is on site.
While Stewart is proud of the new building, he said the public should not lose sight of the fact that thousands of aboriginal people are on waiting lists for suitable and affordable housing in Vancouver and the Lower Mainland.
Lu’ma Native Housing Society, which owns and manages the building, has a waiting list of 4,500 people wanting housing. Other First Nations societies such as Vancouver Native Housing Society also have long waiting lists, Stewart said.
The City of Vancouver’s release last month of its March 2013 homeless count also showed aboriginal people comprised 30 per cent of the city’s homeless population, although Stewart believes the number is higher. He suggested some of those homeless were likely foster children at one point in their lives.
“There’s such a high correlation between being a foster child and homelessness and something like this [building] will hopefully get people another option,” he said.
But, he acknowledged, getting more housing complexes built in Vancouver is an expensive venture, noting the new building cost $17 million and took seven years of wrangling with all three levels of government to get it built.
Lu’ma contributed $10.6 million, with the provincial government kicking in $5.2 million and the federal government adding $710,000. The City of Vancouver provided $240,000 in addition to levy reductions of more than $214,000.
Marjorie White, the vice president of Lu’ma Native Housing Society, said the lack of funding committed to more affordable housing makes it difficult to meet the needs of people without decent homes or living on the street. Lu’ma already has 380 apartments spread over 15 buildings.
The building was named after Dave Pranteau, who was described by White and others as a tireless leader in the aboriginal community who pushed for more housing and improving social and economic conditions for aboriginal people. He died last year.
“Dave was well known to many of us here in Vancouver and elsewhere in British Columbia for his leadership, teachings and compassion,” White said. “He has been by our side and we believe he still is in helping our cause to advocate for safe, culturally appropriate and affordable housing for aboriginal peoples.”
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MacDonald, D. & Wilson, D. (2013). Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. 

Based on data from the 2006 census, this study disaggregates child poverty statistics and identifies three tiers of poverty for children in Canada. In particular, it finds that Indigenous children in Canada are over two and a half times more likely to live in poverty than non-Indigenous children. According to the report, Indigenous children trail the rest of Canada’s children on practically every measure of wellbeing: family income, educational attainment, crowding and homelessness, poor water quality, infant mortality, health and suicide. 

Olson, A. (2013). The Associated Press. 

UNITED NATIONS -- Canada is facing a crisis over aboriginal issues despite years of efforts to overcome tensions and address social problems, a UN expert who recently visited the country said Monday.

James Anaya, UN special rapporteur on indigenous rights, said Canada has not narrowed social disparities between aboriginal and other Canadians in recent years. He said disputes over land and natural resources continue to be a source of tension and distrust.

In a statement following his visit to Canada, Anaya said aboriginal peoples live in conditions comparable to much poorer countries.

He said one in five indigenous Canadians live in dilapidated and often overcrowded homes and "funding for aboriginal housing is woefully inadequate." He said the suicide rate among Inuit and First Nations youth on reserve is more than five times greater than that of other Canadians. One community Anaya visited had suffered a suicide every six weeks since the start of the year.

Anaya said such problems persist even though Canada was one of the first countries to extend constitutional protection to the rights of indigenous people, has taken notable steps to repair the legacy of past injustices and has develop processes for land claims "that in many respects are models for the world to emulate."

Anaya, who is planning to present a full report to the UN Human Rights Council, had several recommendations for Canada's government.

He encouraged the government "to take a less adversarial" approach to land claim settlements "in which it typically seeks the most restrictive interpretation of aboriginal and treaty rights possible."

He also cautioned the government "not to rush forward" with a proposed First Nations Education Act that indigenous leaders have opposed. The law is meant to allow indigenous communities to establish their own education system and proposes standards for "school success plans," but indigenous leaders say it denies the primary importance of First Nation languages and cultures and fails to affirm First Nation control over their education.

Indigenous leaders have cited legacy of Canada's now-defunct residential school system, in which aboriginal children were removed from their communities and placed in schools intended to strip them of their culture, as an argument for allowing First Nations to control their own education. Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued a historic apology to survivors of the schools in 2008.

In response to Anaya's statement, Canadian Minister for Aboriginal Affairs Bernard Valcourt said the social well-being of aboriginals is "at the center of Canada's preoccupations and explains why the government has taken, and continues to take, effective incremental steps to improve the situation."

More jail won’t solve Canada’s aboriginal incarceration problem

Mason, G. (2013). Globe & Mail. 

There seem to be few people who think the answer to solving the abysmally high incarceration rate for aboriginals is to make it easier to throw them in jail and keep them longer. But that’s what many believe the federal Conservative government is intent on doing.
Last week, B.C.’s provincial health officer, Perry Kendall, added his voice to a burgeoning group of public officials worried about the increasing role that prisons are playing in the lives of First Nations, Inuit and Métis people. His report suggested that the Safe Streets and Communities Act – passed last year – will only intensify the problem.
A few weeks before him, Howard Sapers, Canada’s prison watchdog, was critical of Ottawa for doing little to address a situation he said continues to get worse. In the past five years alone, the population of aboriginal inmates in federal penitentiaries increased by 43 per cent. Today, aboriginal people make up 23 per cent of all inmates in federal institutions despite representing just 4 per cent of Canada’s population.
Before Mr. Sapers, former Supreme Court justice Frank Iacobucci issued a report that suggested Ontario’s justice system is in crisis as it concerns the province’s First Nations community. He found that aboriginal people are subjected to systemic racism in the courts, prison and jury process.
In Saskatchewan, which has the highest native incarceration rate in the country, the person who’s been handed the job of trying to change this grim picture told the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police that we aren’t going to “arrest our way” out of it.
The Safe Streets Act introduced new mandatory minimum sentences for some offences and increases existing minimum penalties in other areas. It also makes changes to the Youth Criminal Justice Act to allow the courts to keep young people in custody while awaiting sentencing. It’s the contention of Dr. Kendall and others that the act also undermines a section of the Criminal Code that asks judges to consider all possible options for sentencing before choosing prison, especially for aboriginal people.
And this, despite a plethora of studies that have shown that prison and longer sentences don’t act as deterrents or reduce the likelihood that a person will reoffend. In fact, studies have demonstrated that more prison time can actually increase crime.
Most of us are familiar with the litany of reasons why our First Nations people end up in jail. They’re societal, historical and deep rooted in scope. They link to poor health, poor education and the less visible, but no less damaging, influences of colonialism and racism.
In B.C., aboriginal people represent about 5 per cent of the general population but nearly a quarter of the admissions to the province’s correctional centres. Dr. Kendall believes this statistic has the potential to become much worse.
Incarceration rates are highest among those 20 to 34. Dr. Kendall reasonably presumes that the more people you have in that demographic, the greater the likelihood of a higher crime rate. In B.C.’s aboriginal population, there’s an abnormally large number of people in the under 19 group. As this cohort moves into the 20-to-34 category, there’s the real risk that this will increase the already unacceptable overrepresentation in the adult criminal justice system.
Dr. Kendall is urging the federal government to revoke or amend those sections of the Safe Streets Act that he and others believe will only exacerbate an already terrible condition. Rather than locking up aboriginal people and throwing away the key, Dr. Kendall believes we’d be better off providing more resources for rehabilitation and setting off in the more enlightened direction that Saskatchewan has taken than in building more space in our prisons.
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Monday, October 28, 2013

SSW106: Homelessness in BC and Canada

Homelessness in Canada


Streets Of Plenty - 1 of 7 - Vancouver Homeless Doc

The Completely Obvious Way To Solve Homelessness

@home: Housing First - Solution to End Homelessness

This video features Mark Horvath from Invisible People and Dr. Sam Tsemberis, who pioneered the housing first model along with the organization Pathways to Housing in New York City. 


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Report Card on Housing & Homelessness in Vancouver

The 2012 report card on the City’s Housing and Homelessness strategy shows Vancouver is currently exceeding all of its short-term targets for protecting and expanding affordable rental housing, building new supportive housing, and ending street homelessness. Vancouver has already met and exceeded its 2015 target for new secured rental housing, achieved 84% of the 2015 goal for new supportive housing units, and is on track to meet or exceed the 2015 targets for new secondary rental units and new social housing. Street homelessness is also down 62% since 2008, from 811 individuals to 306 in 2012.

Youth Homelessness in Canada: Implications for Policy and Practice 

Youth homelessness is a seemingly intractable problem in Canada. In communities across the country, people are increasingly aware of the sight of young people who are without a home, sleeping in parks, sitting on sidewalks or asking for money. What do we know about these young people, and what should we do? 

This report aims to fill a gap in the information available on homelessness by providing an accessible collection of the best Canadian research and policy analysis in the field. In this book, leading Canadian scholars present key findings from their research on youth homelessness. In an effort to make this research accessible as well as relevant to decision-makers and practitioners, contributing authors have been asked to address the 'so whatness' of their research; to make clear the policy and practice implications of their research so as to better inform the efforts of those working to address youth homelessness.

 LBGT youth make up chunk of ‘invisible’ homeless numbers 
Thuncher, J. (2013). Vancouver Courier. 
Kicked out of his family home at 17 for being transgendered, Eireann Day struggled to find a stable place to live and dropped out of high school.
He spent time homeless and battling schizophrenia on the streets of Vancouver. All he wanted was a place to stay where he would be accepted but found that hard to come by.
“For a trans guy like myself if I were to access a shelter [… ]I would be forced into a woman’s room and I would be really uncomfortable and they face a lot of violence and bullying in regular shelters,” said Day.
According to Aaron Munro, manager of community development at RainCity Housing and Support Society, Day’s experience is not uncommon. “Studies in the U.S. and Canada have found that LGBTQ2S+ youth make up 30 to 50 percent of homeless youth in major urban centres, that is significant when research also tells us that people who identify as LGBTQ2S+ only represent 10 percent of the general population,” Munro told the Courier by email.
Judy Graves, the longtime City of Vancouver homeless advocate who recently retired, will also be on the Invisible Night panel. She recalls a time when youth homelessness wasn’t a big issue in this city.
“In 1967 it was very easy to find housing if you were young because for a quarter of minimum wage you could rent a housekeeping room in the West End or Kitsilano or Commercial Drive area,” she said.
She blames the cost of land and zoning restrictions that favour single-family homes for locking youth out of the rental housing market.  
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The rental-housing shortage is now a national disaster. It needs Ottawa’s help

Balkissoon, D. (2013). The Globe and Mail. 

What would a Canadian rental-housing disaster look like?
Would it look like 42 per cent of young adults between 20 and 29 living with their parents, up 10 per cent from the early 1990s?
Would it look like 156,358 people waiting for affordable housing in Ontario? Or Vancouver seniors on $1,200 monthly pensions trying to afford that city’s average one-bedroom rent of $982?
... a full third of Canadians are renters, many of them students and newcomers whose journey to stability is made difficult by crowded living situations and constant moving.
Those who follow the rental market daily don’t hesitate to call the situation disastrous. Vacancy rates are dismal across the country. Only 10 per cent of the shiny new buildings that have gone up during the past decade’s housing boom were built expressly to house renters. Many older rental buildings have been demolished in favour of condominiums, while those that still stand have often been left to crumble.
Arguing that housing is a human right doesn’t get much traction with the federal government. Neither, it seems, do economic facts, like the usefulness of a mobile labour force not tied down by mortgages and heavy household debt. Also pointless is linking traffic congestion to the inability of workers to find housing they can afford close to their jobs. “The incremental nature of the problem is what stops us from seeing it as a crisis,” says Steve Pomeroy, a senior research fellow at the University of Ottawa Centre on Governance.
In 2011, Regina instituted a bold five-year, 100 per cent tax exemption for new rental developments. Since 2007, any builder wanting to demolish rental housing in Toronto must include the same number of rental units in a new project, contributing to a slower rate of rental erosion than in Calgary.
These initiatives are well-meaning and they may have success, but without broad, federal action, they’re merely stop-gaps. This is a country-wide problem that goes back decades: purpose-built rental housing delivers a measly return to investors, and tiny tax breaks don’t shield landlords from ever-shifting rules and laws. This impasse isn’t for lack of ideas, since everyone from builders to academics to actual renters have ideas about tax incentives, the best use of capital cost allowances and inclusionary zoning. There just isn’t any interest at the national level at finding a solution.
It seems that we won’t act on Canada’s rental disaster until it’s really ugly, and in our faces. Thirtysomethings who hate their roommates or seniors eating canned food in basement apartments just don’t make a dramatic enough story.
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Study Details Canada's 'Perfect Storm' Housing Problem

Eroding incomes and plunging rental stock leave 380,600 households in 'severe' need.
By David P. Ball, 20 Jun 2013, The Tyee. 

New research into Canada's housing crisis has yielded some disturbing conclusions, including findings that 200,000 Canadians experience homelessness every year, and three-quarters of that group is forced to stay in shelters at some point.

Researchers released their State of Homelessness in Canada 2013 report yesterday, billing it as the first comprehensive look at a growing problem on a national scale. The document also concludes that 380,600 Canadian households are in "severe housing need," and that on any given night there are 30,000 homeless across the country.

The crisis is particularly acute for aboriginal people, as well as gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender youth, the report found.

"The worrying thing is, the numbers may actually be a lot higher than we're estimating... You see eroding incomes for the poorest Canadians, and 10 per cent of households living in poverty. That's very worrying. Homelessness is a lot bigger than who shows up in the shelters and on the streets."

According to The Economist magazine, Vancouver is the most unaffordable city in North America and one of the most expensive in the world. But homelessness, compounded by declining incomes, is "plaguing" cities across Canada.

"The building industry has shifted from building apartments to building condos. We've seen that across the country," he said. "The supply of low-cost rental housing has diminished at the same time that incomes have diminished. It's the perfect storm."

One ongoing problem the report identifies is the increasing reliance on emergency shelters as a solution to homelessness. Those temporary services were never intended as a long-term fix to the problem, Gaetz said. In the end, shelters wind up costing significantly more in services such as health care, mental health and policing.
That's why one of the report's key recommendations is to expand the Housing First approach, which has been tested successfully in Vancouver, Gaetz said.

Such a strategy has proven successful, because when an at-risk person "touches the system" -- for instance, by accessing an emergency shelter, being released from hospital, or interacting with police -- the whole system responds, rather than having that person just move from shelter to shelter, he said. Housing First's integrated systems can work in any community, Gaetz argued.

"If you take most chronic, hardcore homeless person with complex issues, and give them housing and the supports they need -- there's an investment there -- then their health improves, as well as their engagement with the community. That's a strategy we know works... but it needs to be scaled up and accompanied by investment in expanding the affordable housing supply."

"At the end of the day, we're not going to get anywhere without significant new investment in market rental housing and social housing," he added. "There is a fairly serious housing crisis in our country. The economics show it doesn't make financial sense for our country to ignore that problem."
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Saturday, October 26, 2013

SSW106: Youth Poverty

Video: Bridging the Poverty Gap - 2010 Champions for Children and Youth Summit


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Covenant House Vancouver opened its doors in September of 1997 in response to a study that revealed that there were over 10,000  (now around 8,500) runaways in BC annually. 
Covenant House Vancouver provides food, shelter, clothing and counselling to the estimated 700 (believed to be an undercount but no other number is deemed more reliable) street youth living in Vancouver at any given time.  Most of the young people we help have fled abuse at home or have aged out of the foster care system. Last year, over 1,500 young people accessed our services.
  • 39% of our youth present with a mental health diagnosis
  • 50% of our youth present with an addiction problem
  • 70% of our youth have witnessed family violence
  • 40% of our youth have been in government care
  • 95% of our youth report that Covenant House has helped them
  • 75% of youth feel more confident about their future after staying at Covenant House

Other findings (from McCreary Centre Society):

  • Marginalized and street-involved youth are three times more likely to be physically and sexually abused than youth the same age in school.
  • More than one in three of the youth report having been sexually exploited.
  • Aboriginal youth are disproportionately represented, comprising 38-75% of Vancouver’s homeless youth population.

Sources:

“Against the Odds:  A profile of marginalized and street-involved youth in BC”; The McCreary Centre Society,  2007.
“Rehousing Vancouver’s street youth”, Heather Millar, Canadian Policy Research Network, 2009.
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Youth Unemployment Canada: 420,000Jobless, Not In School, CIBC Says
Clancy, C. (2013). HuffPost Canada. TORONTO - Young Canadians are at risk of chronic unemployment as growing numbers are graduating well-educated, but with no work experience, a CIBC report suggests.

 About 420,000 youth aged 15 to 24 — or nearly one in 10 young Canadians — are neither employed nor enrolled in school, the report found.
The economic reality for young Canadians today is very different than that of previous generations, said CIBC deputy chief economist Benjamin Tal, the report's author.
"They are basically on the sidelines doing nothing," he said in an interview. "They will not be able to penetrate this very competitive labour market."
In a market where previous experience is essential, youth aren't able to find the summer jobs and part-time work required to build a resume, Tal said.
"Now, while more education is positive, increasingly, students are completing their education without any work experience and are more likely to be caught in the no job–no experience, and no experience–no job cycle," he said in the report.
One in five unemployed youth, aged 15 to 24, has never held a job, Tal found. That's 40 per cent higher than the long-term average and close to the record high of the 1990s.
"The current environment of part-time work, temporary jobs, corporate and government restructuring and downsizing is especially tough on young people whose lack of experience and seniority make them much more vulnerable to labour market changes," Tal said in the report.
Youth are more educated than ever before. While the percentage of youth aged 15 to 19 who are enrolled in school is relatively static, students seem to be in school longer. Enrolment rates in the 20- to 24-year-old age group are rapidly increasing, with 44 per cent currently in school, the report found.
Policy-makers need to create options in which education and work-related training are combined, Tal said. This would allow youth to find jobs while in school and close the learning gap that exists when students transition into the work world.
A university degree in any subject is no longer enough, he said. Instead, youth need to choose disciplines that offer practical experience and long-term employment opportunities. Taking advanced courses and networking with people are two ways that high school students can distinguish themselves.
The youth unemployment rate is more than double the unemployment rate for Canadians aged 25 and older — a record-high ratio that needs to be addressed, Tal said.
"For Canada's economy to grow and our standard of living to remain high, this is an imperative," he said in the report.
The Canadian education system must find ways to incorporate skills that enhance students' employability directly into the curriculum, Tal said.
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 Ligaya, A. (2013). Financial Post. 

The youth unemployment rate in 2012 was 2.4 times that of adults — marking the biggest gap since 1977, the report released Tuesday suggested.
“Part of what you’re seeing is a slow recovery from the last recession,” said Jim MacGee, associate professor of economics at the University of Western Ontario. “It really hits the creation of new jobs. And the groups that are going to be impacted the most by those types of events are always those people who are new to the labour market, and that’s going to be disproportionately younger workers.”
Another contributor to the widening gap between youth and adult unemployment rates is more younger people opting out of the workforce in their early 20s to pursue higher education than they did 30 years ago, he said. Meanwhile, Mr. MacGee said, young people today who choose to enter the workforce without formal training face more job hurdles than their predecessors.
“The set of people who choose not to go on to education … on average are going to have a much harder time in the labour force,” he said.
André Bernard, of Statistics Canada’s analytical studies branch, said Generation “Y” workers — those between the ages of 15 and 24 — are twice as likely than adults to be laid off.
Last year, the youth unemployment rate in Canada was 14.3%, compared with 6.0% for both workers between the ages of 25 and 54 and those 55 and older, Statistics Canada says.
The gap between youth and adult unemployment rates has long been a problem in many countries. In 2011, the average youth employment rate across OECD countries was 16.2%, with Switzerland faring the best at 7.7%. Among G7 countries, the largest gaps between youth and adult unemployment rates were in Italy, the U.K. and France.
Historically, labour force participation by young people is lower than that of adults because many go to school, Statistics Canada said.
But, as employment rates among young people continue to lag and the growing burden of student debt reaches an average of $28,000, difficulties are mounting for the next generation of workers.
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SSW106: Child Poverty

Income Inequality and Child Poverty in Canada: from Poor No More

BC Has the Highest Rate of Child Poverty in Canada

Child Poverty is a Serious Problem


Dr. Clyde Hertzman's key messages 
Clips were taken from various videos projects originally produced by the Canadian Institute for Advanced Research, the Dalai Lama Center and the Human Early Learning Partnership.

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UNICEF report: Canada ranks 17th of 29 for well-being of children

The latest report on the well-being of children in rich countries ranks Canada 17th out of 29, a score that hasn’t budged in almost a decade, according to United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).


Monsebraaten, L. (2013). The Star. 
If you think Canada is one of the best places to raise a child, think again.
The latest report on the well-being of children in rich countries ranks Canada 17th out of 29, a score that hasn’t budged in almost a decade, according to United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF)United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
The country scored “below average” grades for child poverty and obesity and children’s life satisfaction, says the report to be released Wednesday.
“The fact that our children rank in the bottom half when compared to other industrialized nations simply isn’t good enough,” said UNICEF CanadaPresident David Morley.
“It is clear Canada can do better. Protecting and promoting the well-being of our children must become a national priority.”
UNICEF Canada is calling for a National Children’s Commissioner to report annually on the state of the country’s kids and for every level of government to provide more information on the amount of money they spend on children.
“Considering the size and general health of our economy when compared to the difficult recessions other countries in this report have experienced, it is clear Canada is not doing enough and needs to invest more in our children,” Morley said.
The latest report focuses on five areas including health and safety; behaviour and risk; material well-being; education; housing and environment.
Canada’s relatively high rates of infant mortality for a developed country and relatively low immunization rates are to blame for Canada’s low score for health and safety, the report says.
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BC Ties Manitoba for highest child poverty
Hyslop, K. (2013). The Tyee. 

British Columbia has once again taken the title of province with the highest number of poor families with children. The latest numbers released today by First Call: BC Child and Youth Advocacy Coalition show poverty for families with children rose from 10.5 per cent in 2010 to 11.3 per cent -- or 93,000 children -- in 2011.

Numbers from Statistics Canada show B.C. has tied with Manitoba for the child poverty highest rate in the country. This is the ninth year in the last decade that B.C. has achieved first place in poorest families.
The worst hit families were female-led single parent families, where poverty rates jumped from 16.4 per cent in 2010 to 24.6 per cent -- or 27,000 kids -- in 2011. Poverty in two parent families also increased from 7.7 per cent to 9.2 per cent -- or 61,000 children -- in 2011.

First Call places the blame for the rising poverty levels on a perfect storm of a high cost of living combined with inadequate wages in the province. Regardless of B.C.'s economic performance over the years, the advocacy organization says government has failed to adequately address the government's child poverty problem.

But the ministry of children and family development says child poverty is at one of its lowest rates in more than three decades.

"The child poverty rate has declined by 41 per cent since 2003," Minister Stephanie Cadieux told The Tyee, adding she was "not entirely clear" why the province's numbers remain the highest in the country.
"But the best way to get children out of poverty is to make sure their parents have good jobs. That's why we’re focused on our Jobs Plan and building opportunities for adults to have jobs in the province, and at the same time we've got a number of targeted investments that we're making to try and help put money back in the pockets of families who need it most."

Some of these investments include the BC Early Childhood Tax Benefit, scheduled to come into effect in 2015. But First Call's release says the Benefit, which will provide families up to $660 per year for each child under the age of six, "won't come close to lifting most poor children out of poverty, when depth of poverty figures for lone-parent and two-parent families have shown them to be $10,000 or more below the poverty line."

Last year's Child Poverty Report Card found 43 per cent of children living in poverty had at least one parent with a full-time job. Stats released today also found that the median income for female-led single parent families also dropped from $32,000 in 2010 to $21,500 in 2011 -- almost $2,000 below the poverty line for a single parent family with one child.

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