Poverty in Canada.

[Durgan]

The Hamilton Spectator has started a series on Poverty.Here are some extracts, all from the newspaper 29 Oct 2005.
95,865 people live in poverty in Hamilton
24% are children
24% are seniors
15% disabled
26% are working
11% are ready for work and need a job.

More likely candidates for the poverty label are: single, single mom, a recent immigrant, aboriginal, disabled, a senior , a child.

I out of 4 children in Hamilton under 15 years of age are poor.More than 22,000 children live in poverty.6000 show up at food banks every month.
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This is a main story in the Toronto Star 31 Aug 2005.
Canada will open its doors to up to 255,000 immigrants next year...
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This is Hamilton, Canada. What about the rest of Canada? What is the solution? Food for thought, and comment.

Durgan

 

[#juan]

Just a few questions

how old are the twenty odd thousand children? Are they living at home? 15 year olds should be at home or in foster homes.

What level of income is the poverty level?

If people are disabled, they are entitled to a disability pension

 

[Durgan]

This was the first article in the Hamilton Spectator. They are going to do something they have never done before:namely, examine poverty for the next three years.

The aim is to determine the true cost of poverty in Hamilton. At present it appears they are trying to get a handle on just what it means to be poor. Possibly how to define it, which is probably of interest with most people.

The Spectator article that, I am perusing has four profiled cases, an immigrant studying ($14,000), a senior couple ($22,000),a disabled person ($12,000), a panhandler(?) ($520).From first look it would appear that rent eats up most of their money.

Apparently none define their income as a yardstick. I think in Canada under 20 Grand is considered below the poverty line, but this simple statistic apparently doesn't define poverty adequately.

I assume the children have parents of some sort.

I am new to this so have no facts of my own, at present all I can do is research from News Stories,etc. The subject has often been of interest, because it is hard to imagine how such "miserable" conditions can exist in such an affluent society as Canada. In other words not being in the circle of poor, I simply know little about it.

Durgan.

 

[#juan]

There was a study in Vancouver

a few years ago that put the poverty level at just under thirty thousand a year. I remember feeling a bit insulted because my pension was only a few thousand higher than that. On the other hand my house was paid off and so was my car, and we did have savings.

Having said that, a person making forty thousand a year would be really strapped to buy a house within reasonable commuting distance from Vancouver.

 

[Karlin]

I can add something here, as I qualify...

First, I can say that just because a person is diabled doesn't mean they will be successfull in getting a disability cheque fromn the government. Maybe if they have lost limbs, but the "medically disabled" have a much tougher time trying to qualify.

Jondly, just because people get a Disability cheque thru the welfare dept. doesn't mean they live above the poverty line. In fact, in B.C. and Alberta, disabled people living in pain must also endure the harships of living on less than $1000 per month.The poverty line is around $2500 per month. Wow, that would be an amazing amount to have each month. Do you guys know anyone who takes in that much?

Medicines are often paid for, not allways. The doctor signed the form for medical marjuana, and I got the Federal Exemption from Section 56 for pot, but I have to pay "street prices" for it. {yes, it is very helpfull for my condition].[and yes, I am high now].

One interesting thing about poverty is smoking.
Cigs are taxed for the poor at the same rate as everybody else.
Bascially, the taxes mean that anyone who is poor cannot smoke.
What kind of world is that? Smoking is not an "expensive luxruy" in itself - without the taxes it is cheap. It was once the only pleasure of the poor and disabled.
Really, a person in poor health or pain, unrelated to any smoking illness, might as well smoke - why do we need to live a long life in pain?

Addicted poor people will spend money on cigs despite it being unbudgetable, addictions are just like that.

I got addicted when smokes were $1 a pack, now it is $10 a pack. Isn't that like the drug pusher who gives out dope and then starts charging when people are addicted? Yes.

 

[Durgan]

I can add something here, as I qualify...

First, I can say that just because a person is diabled doesn't mean they will be successfull in getting a disability cheque fromn the government. Maybe if they have lost limbs, but the "medically disabled" have a much tougher time trying to qualify.

Jondly, just because people get a Disability cheque thru the welfare dept. doesn't mean they live above the poverty line. In fact, in B.C. and Alberta, disabled people living in pain must also endure the harships of living on less than $1000 per month.The poverty line is around $2500 per month. Wow, that would be an amazing amount to have each month. Do you guys know anyone who takes in that much?

Medicines are often paid for, not allways. The doctor signed the form for medical marjuana, and I got the Federal Exemption from Section 56 for pot, but I have to pay "street prices" for it. {yes, it is very helpfull for my condition].[and yes, I am high now].

One interesting thing about poverty is smoking.
Cigs are taxed for the poor at the same rate as everybody else.
Bascially, the taxes mean that anyone who is poor cannot smoke.
What kind of world is that? Smoking is not an "expensive luxruy" in itself - without the taxes it is cheap. It was once the only pleasure of the poor and disabled.
Really, a person in poor health or pain, unrelated to any smoking illness, might as well smoke - why do we need to live a long life in pain?

Addicted poor people will spend money on cigs despite it being unbudgetable, addictions are just like that.

I got addicted when smokes were $1 a pack, now it is $10 a pack. Isn't that like the drug pusher who gives out dope and then starts charging when people are addicted? Yes.

To most people in Canada poverty simply doesn't exist unless you are in the poverty boat. It simply doesn't register.

One time I was taking a lady to an expensive restaurant for about a $100.00 meal for two. We went shopping prior to going out. I noticed her putting two packages in the Food for Poor box. When questioned as to why she mentioned that the people needed that. I suggested we go back into the food store and buy $100.00 worth of good food ,and put in the Food for Poor box, and give up our night of going to the restaurant. We went to the restaurant. So much for the poor-lip service only.

The ultimate human rights violation is having poor in a land of plenty.

Durgan.

 

[Twila]

Addicted poor people will spend money on cigs despite it being unbudgetable, addictions are just like that.

Yep, when I was a single mom on welfare I would forgo a lot of things to have my smokes. I remember 1 day deny my daughter bread and milk to have smokes. The next day I made an appointment with my doctor and got Zyban to quit smoking. It's all about choices......I guess

 

[Durgan]

Re: RE: Poverty in Canada.

Addicted poor people will spend money on cigs despite it being unbudgetable, addictions are just like that.

Yep, when I was a single mom on welfare I would forgo a lot of things to have my smokes. I remember 1 day deny my daughter bread and milk to have smokes. The next day I made an appointment with my doctor and got Zyban to quit smoking. It's all about choices......I guess

It's about being poor. being poor has side effects other than giving up or not having material things.

What being poor means, not all but some.

http://www.scalzi.com/whatever/003704.html

Being poor is knowing exactly how much everything costs.

Being poor is getting angry at your kids for asking for all the crap they see on TV.

Being poor is having to keep buying $800 cars because they're what you can afford, and then having the cars break down on you, because there's not an $800 car in America that's worth a damn.

Being poor is hoping the toothache goes away.

Being poor is knowing your kid goes to friends' houses but never has friends over to yours.

Being poor is going to the restroom before you get in the school lunch line so your friends will be ahead of you and won't hear you say "I get free lunch" when you get to the cashier.

Being poor is living next to the freeway....

The ultimate human rights abuse is having poor in a land of plenty.
Durgan.

 

[Twila]

Well Durgan. I've been poor. I know what being poor is like. I spent 6 yrs on welfare trying to feed/cloth myself and my daughter on less then $1000.00/month.

I know what being poor is. I was commenting on addiction and being poor. Having experience with that also. I was commenting on what it's like to be a single mom and poor.

It is about choices. I chose to take advantage of course offered by welfare. I chose to give up food for myself so my daughter could eat. I didn't get child support. I didn't get money from my parents. We didn't always have television or a phone. I lived in horrible conditions so my daughter could eat.

You said:

In other words not being in the circle of poor, I simply know little about it.

and

It's about being poor. being poor has side effects other than giving up or not having material things.

Well having lived through it myself I can tell you that's exactly what being poor is. Giving up things you all take for granted to provide food (the basics at that) for your kids. It's about choices. That's what being poor is.

 

[Durgan]

Twila:

Been there myself, but didn't realize it at the time. You can judge by yourself just how the poor are ignored in our affluent society. We have welfare to insure you stay poor. A few hundred a month, mostly taken up for slum rental accommodation, ( which is accepted and ignored by most cities). Some people rise out of it, but the damage done is not really considered.

I am always astonished by the food put into food for poor boxes. Periodically I look in. Those that donate must think the poor like kraft dinners. I always hated the dammed stuff, and associate it with being poor.

I am sure many people without the benefits of what an affluent society offers, for whatever reason, can identify with some of thes comments about being poor.

Being poor is knowing exactly how much everything costs.

Being poor is getting angry at your kids for asking for all the crap they see on TV.

Being poor is having to keep buying $800 cars because they're what you can afford, and then having the cars break down on you, because there's not an $800 car in America that's worth a damn.

Being poor is hoping the toothache goes away.

Being poor is knowing your kid goes to friends' houses but never has friends over to yours.

Being poor is going to the restroom before you get in the school lunch line so your friends will be ahead of you and won't hear you say "I get free lunch" when you get to the cashier.

Being poor is living next to the freeway.

Being poor is coming back to the car with your children in the back seat, clutching that box of Raisin Bran you just bought and trying to think of a way to make the kids understand that the box has to last.

Being poor is wondering if your well-off sibling is lying when he says he doesn't mind when you ask for help.

Being poor is off-brand toys.

Being poor is a heater in only one room of the house.

Being poor is knowing you can't leave $5 on the coffee table when your friends are around.

Being poor is hoping your kids don't have a growth spurt.

Being poor is stealing meat from the store, frying it up before your mom gets home and then telling her she doesn't have make dinner tonight because you're not hungry anyway.

Being poor is Goodwill underwear.

Being poor is not enough space for everyone who lives with you.

Being poor is feeling the glued soles tear off your supermarket shoes when you run around the playground.

Being poor is your kid's school being the one with the 15-year-old textbooks and no air conditioning.

Being poor is thinking $8 an hour is a really good deal.

Being poor is relying on people who don't give a damn about you.

Being poor is an overnight shift under florescent lights.

Being poor is finding the letter your mom wrote to your dad, begging him for the child support.

Being poor is a bathtub you have to empty into the toilet.

Being poor is stopping the car to take a lamp from a stranger's trash.

Being poor is making lunch for your kid when a cockroach skitters over the bread, and you looking over to see if your kid saw.

Being poor is believing a GED actually makes a goddamned difference.

Being poor is people angry at you just for walking around in the mall.

Being poor is not taking the job because you can't find someone you trust to watch your kids.

Being poor is the police busting into the apartment right next to yours.

Being poor is not talking to that girl because she'll probably just laugh at your clothes.

Being poor is hoping you'll be invited for dinner.

Being poor is a sidewalk with lots of brown glass on it.

Being poor is people thinking they know something about you by the way you talk.

Being poor is needing that 35-cent raise.

Being poor is your kid's teacher assuming you don't have any books in your home.

Being poor is six dollars short on the utility bill and no way to close the gap.

Being poor is crying when you drop the mac and cheese on the floor.

Being poor is knowing you work as hard as anyone, anywhere.

Being poor is people surprised to discover you're not actually stupid.

Being poor is people surprised to discover you're not actually lazy.

Being poor is a six-hour wait in an emergency room with a sick child asleep on your lap.

Being poor is never buying anything someone else hasn't bought first.

Being poor is picking the 10 cent ramen instead of the 12 cent ramen because that's two extra packages for every dollar.

Being poor is having to live with choices you didn't know you made when you were 14 years old.

Being poor is getting tired of people wanting you to be grateful.

Being poor is knowing you're being judged.

Being poor is a box of crayons and a $1 coloring book from a community center Santa.

Being poor is checking the coin return slot of every soda machine you go by.

Being poor is deciding that it's all right to base a relationship on shelter.

Being poor is knowing you really shouldn't spend that buck on a Lotto ticket.

Being poor is hoping the register lady will spot you the dime.

Being poor is feeling helpless when your child makes the same mistakes you did, and won't listen to you beg them against doing so.

Being poor is a cough that doesn't go away.

Being poor is making sure you don't spill on the couch, just in case you have to give it back before the lease is up.

Being poor is a $200 paycheck advance from a company that takes $250 when the paycheck comes in.

Being poor is four years of night classes for an Associates of Art degree.

Being poor is a lumpy futon bed.

Being poor is knowing where the shelter is.

Being poor is people who have never been poor wondering why you choose to be so.

Being poor is knowing how hard it is to stop being poor.

Being poor is seeing how few options you have.

Being poor is running in place.

Being poor is people wondering why you didn't leave.



The ultimate human rights violation is how the poor are ignored in an affluent society.

Durgan.http://www.scalzi.com/whatever/003704.html

 

[Durgan]

Defining poverty in Canada by absolute income terms is difficult. At best the level of income is a rough yardstick used for planning or budget purposes, far from reality in many cases.
Maybe there is no such thing as poverty in Canada. It is simply that some people have less than say the average, or less than the first quentile, or second quentile, or some other line drawn in the income sand.

There is no doubt that a certain level of income is required to have basic food, clothing and shelter. This basic income allows one live much like a pet dog kept in a kennel or tied up.I suspect this is the welfare income level.

At some particular level of income people do not think that they are living in poverty.They have a litle left over for a luxury they desire. This may be an individual thing depending upon one's circumstances,wants and desires.

We all know about public subsidized housing, and generally most will agree that those places have a degree of "poverty" by fact or perception. Most Canadian's would not like to live there, given a choice. Is this poverty?

I suspect the view of poverty is quite different from someone in the boat and another looking at that boat; also by those who have never had any experience of deprivation.

Poverty is probably best defined by the feeling of misery that the people in that situation experience. Certainly much of it can be alleviated by having access to a higher income.

URL to the Fraser Institute babble on the issue.
http://dumkhady.notlong.com

Durgan.

 

[missile]

I can relate to every word you two have posted. I was born into extreme poverty at a time before there was a welfare system, and have spent most of my life as a working poor stiff. Not until I retired did this situation seem reversed,but today I almost feel wealthy.

 

[Durgan]

At one time in my life when I felt discouraged with my social level. I would.

Flip the electric light on an off.
Turn the tap on and get a drink of water.
Flush the toilet.
Run the shower for a few minutes.
Adjust the thermostat to increase the temperature.

Since at one time in my life I used to spend about 3 or 4 hours or more each day of hard physical work,trying to get a combination of all of the above, having them available with no effort made me feel wealthy.

Durgan.

 

[missile]

Being poor in Canada just makes you one of the majority,but we're still "richer' than most of the world.

 

[NSA]

"I am always astonished by the food put into food for poor boxes. Periodically I look in. Those that donate must think the poor like kraft dinners. I always hated the dammed stuff, and associate it with being poor"

I usually put in canned fruit, fancy jam, granola bars etc. I usually throw a big box of mini chocolate bars in around Halloween. Pancake mix and syrup. Not exactly nutritionally balanced but how many people give that kind of thing? And top it up with a check mailed to the food bank. I never put in anything I wouldn't eat myself, that's for sure.

Incidentally, giving your local food bank money instead of food you bought yourself is a good idea. They can get better deals than you can (I asked).

Durgan, I'll remember that method the next time I'm annoyed that my MSc isn't bringing me a higher salary. Because thankfully, I've never been unable to pay the bills.

 

[Durgan]

URL to the full story.
http://bulreias.notlong.com

In 1985 the federal government responded to the issue of child poverty by introducing a resolution in the House of Commons:

" . . . seek(ing) to achieve the goal of eliminating poverty among Canadian children by the year 2000."

A decade after the House of Commons passed this resolution, Canada is further than ever from achieving this lofty goal.

Durgan.

 

[missile]

A single male on welfare gets a cheque for less than 300 dollars per month.

 

[TenPenny]

Interesting contrast. A single male on welfare gets $300 per month. Yet, there's a huge demand for seasonal agricultural workers at $7.70 per hour, which apparently is slavery. And these migrant workers come here from thousands of miles away to be slaves.

Now, I'm no Harperite, but isn't there something wrong here? People are too lazy/stupid/uninterested to go to work, but they have an awful lot of energy to spend complaining about how they should be given more.

Life is hard. So what? It's hard for all of us. Get off your ass and start changing your own life. The rest of us did.

 

[#juan]

Missile wrote:

Reply with quote
Being poor in Canada just makes you one of the majority,but we're still "richer' than most of the world.

I'm not sure what you are saying here but I do know that a majority of Canadians are not poor. Not even close to it. I am not poor and I don't know anyone I would consider poor. Having said that, I read about 12 to14 year olds going hungry because they ran away from home and they have no money to buy food. In most cases these kids could go home. Children with problems at home should be put in foster care. Children who run away from good homes should be taken home and given a talk about what they are doing to their parents, and to their lives.

In my estimation the welfare system is being run stupidly. They should pay a decent wage to the people on welfare and get those persons in courses at BCIT or other so they can get a decent job. Some courses might take a year or two but some people right now have been on welfare for ten years.

There are always going to be "poor" people. A lot of these people have made poor choices in their lives, in that they have no qualifications to get anything but minimum wage jobs. We should make it possible for them to get training that would get them out of the minimum wage rut.

Our kids complained that I nagged about schoolwork all the time but both children finished highschool and went on to college.

 

[Reverend Blair]

Interesting contrast. A single male on welfare gets $300 per month. Yet, there's a huge demand for seasonal agricultural workers at $7.70 per hour, which apparently is slavery. And these migrant workers come here from thousands of miles away to be slaves.

Most people who are welfare for the long term are on it for a reason though, Karlin. Most have disabilities of one sort or another, ranging from visible physical disabilities to to hidden ones like FAS or mental illness.

Consider our systems though. You are making $300 a month on welfare. You can go do farm work, which you are unfamiliar with; is physically brutal; and your require a way to get to. You also need cloths, gloves, boots, etc. Chances are that you don't even know this work exists. If you do find the work and get what you need to perform it, you have work for a few months a year. Because of changes to our pogey rules, chances are that you won't qualify. So you have to survive the whole year on roughly what you would have made on welfare, but now you have to do brutal work just to get that money.