LBmuskoka
The Poverty Age
Posted on: 11/25/2010 08:16
Quoted Directly From the Globe and Mail, November 24, 2010
Number of seniors living in poverty soars nearly 25%
JOE FRIESEN — DEMOGRAPHICS REPORTER
The number of seniors living in poverty spiked at the beginning of the financial meltdown, reversing a decades-long trend and threatening one of Canada’s most important social policy successes.
The number of seniors living below the low-income cutoff, Statistics Canada’s basic measure of poverty, jumped nearly 25 per cent between 2007 and 2008, to 250,000 from 204,000, according to figures released on Wednesday by Campaign 2000. It’s the largest increase among any group, and as the first cohort of baby boomers turns 65 next year, could place increased pressure on families supporting elderly parents.
Economists say women make up as much as 80 per cent of the increase in seniors poverty. Armine Yalnizyan, economist at the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, said more women than men were living close to the poverty threshold before the financial crisis took hold in 2008, and, because their retirement savings tend to be smaller, were more likely to slip below the low-income cutoff. Men over 65 are also twice as likely as women over 65 to have a job. By January, 2009, there were 23,000 fewer women over 65 working than there were seven months earlier, while the number for men changed very little, Ms. Yalnizyan said.
“My guess is that the majority of women [who are still] working over 65 are not carrying on with their career, but trying to have a little more comfort in their lives. They were probably never too far above the poverty line, whatever line you pick. When those jobs are gone, more of them are struggling to make ends meet,” Ms. Yalnizyan said.
The rise in poverty among seniors poses particular problems for their adult children, who will be expected to bridge financial gaps for their parents while supporting their own families. This so-called “sandwich generation” is often caught with the twin pressures of having children in higher education and parents requiring additional care for failing health, according to Laurel Rothman, co-ordinator of the Campaign 2000 report card on child and family poverty.
She said the trend is particularly hard on new Canadians who have sponsored their parents to join them in Canada. Many of those parents have been able to work for only a few years in Canada before retirement, and so receive very little in Canadian pensions.
“In Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, ethno-racial newcomers are particularly a concern,” Ms. Rothman said. “We see it all the time at Family Service Toronto, people who come here that are sponsored [by their family members]. It may be someone who puts in five or 10 years of work [in Canada], but they don’t get full Canada Pension Plan. ... And their cost of living has gone up.”
The jump in poverty among seniors is unusual because Canada’s success in tackling this issue has been cited as perhaps its single most successful policy intervention. According to figures cited in a 2009 Conference Board report, Canada’s rate of seniors poverty was as high as 36.9 per cent in 1971. The government, in an effort to tackle the problem, had a few years earlier introduced the Guaranteed Income Supplement and the Canada Pension Plan. By 2007, the rate of poverty among seniors had plummeted to 4.9 per cent, before rising to 5.8 per cent in 2008.
The Canadian data are at odds with what’s happened in the United States, where the poverty rate of 9.7 per cent among seniors did not change between 2007 and 2008, despite the financial collapse. Ms. Yalnizyan said that could be explained by the time lag between the beginning of the economic upheaval in the United States and its eventual impact on Canada.
The Campaign 2000 report also says 9.1 per cent of Canadian children were living in poverty in 2008, down slightly from the year before, but nowhere near the goal of eliminating child poverty set by Parliament in 1989.
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LBmuskoka
Posted on: 11/25/2010 08:32
For more information on Canada's Child/Family poverty score card check out Campaign 2000
LB
Compassion is not weakness, and concern for the unfortunate is not socialism.
Hubert H. Humphrey
kaythecurler
Posted on: 11/25/2010 10:00
This is sad, but not surprising to me. Does anyone know what the Poverty Line is in dollars?
Jobam
Posted on: 11/25/2010 11:15
The poverty line where I live is $15,000.00 The most a family on Ontario Works (Ontario's name for welfare) can recieve is $8,000.00 With Ontario's energy cost (hydro) going up by 50 percent in the next 5 years we will see a lot more OW and seniors at food banks and looking for "emergency funding".
kaythecurler
Posted on: 11/25/2010 11:52
Thanks Jobam. Are there stats on the rest of the provinces? The ones you show here made me weep a bit - surely in a country as rich as ours we should arrange it to have everyone with sufficient money to keep themselves fed and sheltered.
LBmuskoka
Posted on: 11/26/2010 06:21
Kaythecurler, if you click the link for Campaign 2000, it has links for the specific provinical reports and statistics.
In the BC report there is an interesting comment about looking at how the stats break down ....
Hidden within the overall statistics are groups of children with even higher risks of poverty. Children under six years of age had a poverty rate of 19.6 percent in 2008. This is particularly alarming given the vital importance of the early years for children’s development. Income data collected during the last three federal census counts shows lower family incomes and higher poverty rates for children in lone-parent families, children in immigrant families who recently arrived in Canada, children in racialized or visible minority families, and children in Aboriginal families living off reserve. Statistics Canada does not tabulate poverty statistics for persons living on reserve.
This BC Child Poverty Report Card
I believe that even to the untrained eye, one can see the correlation between employability and poverty. Those under six children's parents would be hard pressed to find adequate day care that would allow them steady full time employment. The same indicator can be seen for immigrants, visible minorities and single parents. I suspect if one breaks the stats by region and rural vs urban similar patterns will emerge.
In my ever so humble opinion, this country needs to make radical changes to how we look at assisting marginalized individuals. We need a movement, similar to that for physically disabled people, that removes barriers to obtaining sustainable employment. Poverty affects us all, not just those living it. It prevents able and willing individuals from participating and contributing to society. It increases the burden on health care and other services.
LB
Money is like manure; it's not worth a thing unless it's spread around encouraging young things to grow.
Thornton Wilder
LBmuskoka
Posted on: 11/26/2010 08:23
Well Beshpin, considering the stats show that women are still the largest segment of those living in poverty and this country reaps the benefits of their unpaid labour, would addressing their sacrificial destitution not be repaying a debt?
From a 1992 Stats Can report
The base net opportunity cost estimate of the value of household work was $210.8 billion, which represents 30.6% of GDP or 44.2% of personal disposable income in 1992. The annual average net opportunity cost of household work was $9,870 per person, $11,920 for women and $7,730 for men.
The base gross opportunity cost estimate of the value of household work was $318.8 billion. This equals 46.3% of GDP in 1992. The annual average gross opportunity cost of household work was $14,930 per person, $16,860 for women and $12,920 for men.
The base replacement cost estimate of the value of household work for 1992 was $284.9 billion. This equals 41.4% of GDP and 59.7% of personal disposable income. On a per capita basis, the annual average replacement cost of household work was $13,340. It was $16,580 for women and $9,960 for men.
The Value of Household Work in Canada, 1992
(Note: the loss of the long form census will have an impact on recording this type of data in the future)
From another article
Social institutions suffer when the total demands on work time—paid and unpaid—become so great there is no time left for volunteer or civic activities. A recent study carried out in Nova Scotia, for instance, found that people under financial or time stress first cut back on voluntary commitments. And while the number of people volunteering in Canada increased between 1987 and 1997, the average volunteer contributed 25 percent fewer hours than a decade earlier. The value of this loss in services has been estimated at $1.83 billion a year.
Putting a value on unpaid work
So I agree Beshpin, you and this country do like their free labour but there is, or should be, a price paid for it.
kaythecurler
Posted on: 11/27/2010 18:20
The only thing that pays bills is money - if a person's only income is from smiles and clean laundry at home pretty soon the family will be on the streets.
crazyheart
Posted on: 11/30/2010 12:52
Besh, I don't know what you plan on doing when you grow up but I don't think you live in the real world. Women, over the years, should have been paid to stay at home and then maybe they wouldn't have needed jobs after 65.