The COVID-19 pandemic is not going away any time soon so people need to accept this new reality if we are to overcome and get on with things. The co-operation of every single one of us is critical to that end.
What the pandemic has done is blow the lid off Pandora’s box with evidence of all manner of inequalities spilling out; front and center are the deficiencies in the lives of our children — they are our future, right? Why are we not doing more to ensure that they get the future they deserve — the kind the ‘haves’ don’t worry about too much because they’re already on track to a life that won’t experience a lot of worry about where the next meal is coming from, can Mom pay the rent this month? or will Dad still have a job in the fall? Children in financial crisis, because their family lives on the edge day in and day out, worry about things young people should not have worry about.
My brain is boggled. Yes, it is! I just cannot understand how so many people are stuck on the notion that a universal basic income is tantamount to paying people to do nothing. How very wrong they are. Frankly, it’s an insult to those who, very often through circumstances out of their control, have lived on the financial edge for years; for decades. You’ve heard the statement — most people don’t have $400 to cover an emergency.
The single mother working two minimum wage jobs trying to keep a roof over her head and food on the table for herself and 4 kids is the one working for nothing, if we define working primarily in dollars and cents. Stop and think about that. After all the costs of necessities of life are met there is very little left over for even one of the things most of us take for granted. Her 4 children are missing out on lots of experiences and tools that could enhance the quality of, for example, their learning life. How many children in this province do not have access to the internet let alone a computer, laptop or tablet? The call for organizing distance learning so children can keep up during the COVID-19 pandemic effectively shuts out huge chunks of our population - not just in this province, but across the country.
We’re too quick to make the bold statement that women (and men) who don’t work outside the home to earn money are not working, are lay-abouts, are milking the system, are abusing resources that they don’t deserve to access. That self-entitled attitude espoused by those who already ‘have’ is insulting on so many levels. It’s got to change if we have any hope of coming out the other side of this hellish nightmare with our souls and sanity intact. All of us are in this together. Let’s not forget that now, and let’s not forget it when some semblance of normal starts to return to our world.
Our current social assistance programs essentially put recipients into a forced/government state of poverty out of which there seems to be no climbing. There’s no incentive to rise above when even basic needs are not met on a consistent basis, with the underpinnings of stress and fear driving every move. No way to live, it’s not surprising that people living in poverty are sick, physically, emotionally and spiritually.
During the weeks of being tossed and tumbled in the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown, there have been lots of kitchen table discussions about guaranteed basic income also known as universal basic income. More and more people are coming to the conclusion that it may be the most efficient/effective way to assist those who are trapped in poverty and living on the fringes. Fortifying their financial base will improve health and wellness which will reduce stress on the health care system.
Based on a 2018 study, providing a nationwide safety net for low-income Canadians in the form of a guaranteed basic income would cost roughly $43 billion a year, a report from Parliament’s fiscal watchdog suggested. “The guaranteed income for disability would range between $3.2 billion and $3.5 billion.”
The school closures across the country very clearly illustrates huge gaps between the haves and have nots as breakfast programs, school lunch programs, after school programs, designed to offer relief to families of limited means, were stopped. As best as they could corporations, local businesses and community groups came together to ensure that children didn’t go hungry, while they, too, are struggling to make family and business ends meet. Some will not be successful. That’s the reality of what COVID-19 has done to our world, our lives, our sense of self.
In the coming weeks, perhaps representatives of the various branches of government will do the math on universal basic income and say YES to success.
Carla MacInnis Rockwell is a freelance writer and disability rights advocate living outside Fredericton, NB with her geriatric Australian silky terrier and a rambunctious Maltese. She can be reached via email at carmacrockwell@xplornet.ca
Why, you sound just like V.I. Lenin speaking on November 8,1917 before the Congress of the Soviets:
ReplyDelete"We shall now proceed to construct the Socialist order."
The wall that came down 72 years later on that evil Soviet empire when President Reagan uttered those world-transforming words,
'Mr.Gorbachev,tear down that wall',you want to raise up again???
Disagree. Your references are absolutely inapplicable here and are a specter that I hear people throw up when their critical thought processes are not calibrated to our current/modern reality. Universal Basic Income is not some kind of throwback, it is a progressive measure in a society that has transcended the need for busy work due to technological advances in a culture that has also mastered agriculture. This is not my original idea. Those not in agreement are usually only those who want to explicitly make money off the labour of others or those who have drank the kool aid that convinces them that there is no other way except to labour for a paycheck without questioning what kind of value their labour is actually adding to the world. Many of the current "jobs" today are in industries that are not necessary for society to thrive and survive. They are manufacturing distractions and creating havoc on our ecological systems and guaranteeing us a future planet that is uninhabitable. If people were freed up from doing this busy work they would have more time for meaningful contributions to society. Aside from that there have been a plethora of studies that show how a Universal Income would save a great deal of money in administration (monitoring costs) because every social program tied to conditions comes with its own hefty price tag to administer those programs. Thanks for a great article and a great perspective. We need to have these kind of conversations to be able imagine better futures for ourselves and for those who come after us.
DeleteI'm with you, Carla. Anybody who thinks that helping people is comparable to a murderous communist regime is somebody who knows nothing of history. Good name for this poster - "Unknown." Too funny.
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