|
Proposing a practical solution to decrease poverty in Alberta |
|
|
|
September 30, 2004
Back to Main News Releases Page
“Practically speaking, low income Albertans would be better off tomorrow if the Market Basket Measure was adopted today,” says the Edmonton Social Planning Council in its newest publication.
The Council is releasing an 18 page Position Paper today in which it explains why it has challenged the Alberta government to adopt a practical measure that would help take 350,000 Albertans out of poverty.
“Alberta is missing an opportunity to be pragmatic and address the needs of those living in poverty,” says Phil O’Hara, ESPC Research and Policy Analyst and author of the paper: More Money in Their Pockets: Pragmatism, Politics and Poverty in Alberta. The paper tracks how the government backed off on its earlier support of the MBM as a tool to “ensure that Albertans who need support get it”. “If Alberta began using that objective tool today,” says O’Hara, “everyone receiving social assistance (including Alberta Works and AISH) and those working for minimum wage would have their basic needs provided for.”
“As it is, current welfare and minimum wage rates do not reflect the actual cost of living in Alberta,” says O’Hara quoting from the paper, “whereas the newest low income measuring tool, the Market Basket Measure, does give us that benchmark.”
And so, the Council is unveiling its arguments for why the Alberta government should adopt the MBM as the measure of low income in Alberta and use it as the instrument to set welfare and minimum wage rates. The Council had earlier this year made this proposal to the government’s Standing Policy Committee on Learning and Employment. But today it is providing detailed analysis of why such a policy change is necessary.
We welcome all questions and inquiries.
Back to Main News Releases Page
|
Sunday, 05 February 2012 
