Politics and Transformation: Welfare State Restructuring in Canada

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Politics and TransformationWelfare State
Restructuring in Canada

• WENDY MCKEEN AND ANN PORTER
• Ryan Whittick

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Welfare State and Social Reproduction

• Welfare State A country with highly developed
  social services
• What does a welfare state do?
• A welfare state provides
• Health
• Education
• Income for those who are unable to support
  themselves (elderly, ill, or people
  that cant find work)

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• Social Reproduction A Process where by peoples
  basic needs are met.
• Needs
• Ensuring people have a minimum to survive on
• The requirement for long term development and
  education are met
• People are cared for or have the means to look
  after themselves if they become sick

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• Who takes responsibility for societies
  needs? State, Market,
• Institutions (Family, Church, Trade Unions,
  Benevolent Associations, Charities, Food Banks)
• Contested Issues
• Division of responsibility
• The standard set for how income security is
  provided and care is given

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What shapes these Issues?

• Changing economic issues
• Evolving family structures
• Federal provincial institutional arrangements
• Conflicting Ideas and political struggles

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What shapes these Issues?

• BECAUSE Early in the century responsibility for
  human welfare was left to Family, market,
  religious organizations, civil society, Not to
  the government

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During and after WW 2

• WFS expanded, and the state assumed greater
  responsibility for Social reproduction
• Provision of
• Health, Education, Welfare
• Was assigned at confederation to the provinces,
  while the federal government was granted the
  major means of revenue.

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Result How Does This System Work?

• Negotiations and struggles between different
  levels of government
• Provinces compete for funding from the
  government

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Federal Government

• Provides provinces with the appropriate amount of
  funding
• Establishes programs involving the transfer of
  income directly to individuals
• Including programs related to
• Pension
• Unemployment
• Child or family benefits
• Canadian millennium scholarship

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Two Major Questions of This Chapter

• What form has this transformation taken, and what
  are the implications for individuals and groups
  within society?
• Which social forces and groups of actors have
  pushed for welfare state restructuring, and in
  what direction?
• These Questions relate to the Nature, and extent
  of the transformation, as well as the politics

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The Argument

• The new welfare state is characterized by
  employability emphasizing re-entry into the
  work force, by the shift from universality to the
  targeting of benefits from adults to children
• More generous system compared to what the
  neo-liberals described as tough love
• The Aim Help WF dependants Kick the Habit

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The result of the new system

• More punitive (punishing) model
• The Result
• Increased
• Poverty
• Inequalities
• Hardship among some groups

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• Downloading of responsibilities for meeting
  social needs to individuals and the homes
• Social groups have become marginalized in WFS
  discussions

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Comparative and theoretical approaches

• New WFS-based not on universality, but by the
  selective targeting of benefits base on income.
• -In An Effort To increasing work
  incentives, reducing expenditures,
• and increasing benefits to the poor

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Clayton and Potusson Argue

• Significant WFS occurred, but changes have not
  been positive
• Poverty, and inequality have increased,
• security of employment and income has diminished
• Growth per capita social spending has failed to
  keep up with per capita GDP
• Some people are running schemes with the money
  they receive from social assistance

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Sociological Imagination

• Potussion What needs to be taken into Account
  when assessing politics of change?
• Social Interest
• Coalitions between different sectors
• Long term mass unemployment

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Feminist Analysis / Argument

• WFS cannot simply be evaluated in terms of the
  relationship between states and markets. We must
  take into account
• Unpaid work in the home, and its contribution to
  human welfare
• Services that relieve house holds of caring work,
  and thus provide all members with access to paid
  work are of fundamental importance
• Moreover, the relationships between
  States-Markets-Families is critical

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Analysis from the perspective of
Families-Markets-and States

• A range of other institutions have played a role
  in WFS restructuring
• Churches, food banks, ect
• The relationship between F-S-M was key welfare
  state nexus in the period after WW 2,

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Critical Element Assessing the Welfare State

• Not simply having the income to support an
  autonomous house hold, but the ability to
  create networks of support that can provide a
  sense of community and reduce isolation which is
  often a part of caring activities

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Political Voice

• The need for care or to give care affects ones
  ability to earn income and both receiving and
  giving care affects ones ability to participate
  politically
• Equally Important a sense of effectiveness of
  the more marginal political coalitions and actors
  pushing for WFS change in other directions
• Macro level trends and developments
• Struggles at the policy community level

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Political Voice

• Much of the struggle over welfare state occurs as
  the debate over policy-whether it be poverty,
  health or education
• Usually, debate only involves narrow groups of
  political actors, not the entire political
  community
• Result plenty of voices and concerns are never
  heard, and therefore never considered

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From Keynesian to a Neo Liberal Welfare State

• The period from WW 2 until the mid nineteen
  seventys was one of welfare state expansion in
  Canada, and else where in advanced capitalist
  countries.
• During WW 2, two key programs of the Canadian
  welfare state were introduced
• Unemployment Insurance 1940
• Family Allowance 1944

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Major Expansions of the 1960s, and early 70s

• Intro to Universal health insurance
• Two new pension programs
• The Canadian Pension Program
• The Guaranteed Income Supplement, and the
  Canadian Assistance Plan
• These two programs provided federal and
  provincial cost sharing for social assistance and
  social services.
• provincial health and education expanded

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Key Factors of the WFS of this Period

• The state had come to assume greater
  responsibility than it had previously for social
  reproduction
• The state realized
• Economic systems could result in unemployment
  through no fault of ones own
• Federal Government had to keep unemployment
  relatively low, and provide income security for
  those who fell through the cracks
• Welfare state programs were considered important
• Maintain social well being of the aggregate
  demand
• Beneficial to the economy as a whole

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Universality

• Universality of benefits was granted as a right
  based on participation in the labor force, or as
  a right of citizenship, and was based on a family
  wage. Moreover, social welfare became more firmly
  centered on a core state-family-market nexus
  (connection)

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Universality

• Ultimately, this resulted in reinforced
  structural inequalities for large numbers of
  Minorities, and women (especially, those not in
  full time employment were excluded from the
  benefits of welfare state)

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Mid 1970s Expansion Period Comes to an End

• Number of factors faced reevaluation of the WFS
  model
• Growing economic crisis
• Fiscal pressure on the welfare state
• Changing labor market
• Family forms
• Political struggles

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1990s-The Most Substantial WFS Restructuring
took place

• Budget was particularly significant in both
  reducing expenditure and restructuring federal
  involvement in social policy
• The Canadian Assistance Plan and Established
  Programs Financing Act were replaced by The
  Canadian Health and Social Transfer
• This provided transfers of funds to provinces
  with fewer conditions

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2000

• A new Neo Liberal Welfare State had been
  consolidated
• The 80s and 90s were more concerned with
  inflation rather than unemployment

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2000 Shift in Neo Liberal Philosophy

• The shift in the new neo liberal philosophy was
  that high unemployment was the result not of
  market failures but of individual behavior,
  attitudes towards work, and the nature of welfare
  state programs themselves further influenced the
  shape of welfare state programs

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2000 Shift in Neo Liberal Philosophy

• Income security programs were seen as creating
  dependency and disincentives to work
• Redesigned to be compatible with economic growth
  with an emphasis on Individual behavior

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New Philosophy Towards Dependency

• Incentives to enter and remain in the work force
• Subsidize low wage employment
• active programs encouraging re-entry into the
  labor market

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Shift Away From Universality

• Increased Targeting of benefits to the poor who
  are defined in terms of family income level
• Social Assistance Core Model Key Areas
• Child Benefits
• Old age security

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Shift In Eligibility

• From Individual gt to Family
• From Adult gt To Child
• From Labor Force Status gt to Family income as a
  basis for receiving benefits
• These shifts are in a wide range of programs of
  federal and provincial levels

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Unemployment Insurance / Employment Insurance

• UI-key Labor market based state program providing
  benefits to unemployed according to their past
  participation in the labor force
• Amendments between 1975-78 Focus shift
• From Market Failures gt to individual attitudes
  towards work

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Goal of Amendments

• Reduce disincentives to work
• Encourage workers to stay employed
• There by reducing their dependency on UI

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Qualifications

• Reforms Increased the penalty for those who left
  their employment early, and increased the number
  of weeks needed to qualify
• Anyone who Quit, turned down a job, or was fired
  for misconduct was eliminated from receiving UI

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1997 Amendments (most dramatic changes)

• Major with drawls from the social safety net for
  the unemployed
• Receiving UIgt 83 70s, 80s, down to 42 by
  1997
• The Result a major source of federal revenue
• The program name changed from UI to EI
• Previously all paid occupants of the work force
  were insured against the risk of unemployment
  while only a minority are now.
• These changes greatly encourage growth and
  maintenance of low wage, exploitive working
  conditions, because they left low wage contingent
  workers no options
• Finally, these changes represented an erosion of
  universality

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Federal Family / Child benefits

• The family Allowance
• Child Tax Exemption
• Child Tax Credit program
• Supplement for those with employment Income

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National Child Benefits (NCB)

• NCB-provides benefits to low and moderate income
  families through an income tested tax credit with
  eligibility and amount being based on family
  incomes reported on previous years tax credit
  form
• Also referred to as NIT- Negative Income Tax

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Changes In The Philosophy of the program

• Disposable incomes of those families with
  children and those without should be equalized
  (Horizontal Equalization)
• Family Allowance was universalized
• Old program-set an amount and paid monthly
• New program-oriented primarily to children at
  risk

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Goal of FA

• To alleviate the poverty of parents who have
  failed as individuals to support themselves and
  their children

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Two Goals of the NCB

• To address poverty
• To reinforce work incentives
• Underlying goal is to maximize private
  responsibility for the care of their children
• NCB also serves a purpose to ensure parents they
  are better off working

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NCB 1970s, 80s, and 90s

• 70s it was important for checks to be written
  directly to women
• By the early 90s the focus shifted to child
  poverty, and any concern for the financial
  concern of women was lost

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The Consequences of Restructuring WFS

• Erosion of
• Social Solidarity
• Social Equality
• Downloading of Responsibility for social
  reproduction from state to family, market,
  institutions

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Currently

• Poverty rate as 96 went up from 13 to 17.6
• The majority of unemployed have to rely on family
  or provincial social service
• Employment Insurance is 55 of earnings

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Women

• In addition, The consequences of the increased
  reliance on the family for caring responsibility
  combined with the assumption that women should be
  in the full time labor force has made pressure
  high women especially minority women
• Juggling jobs, day care and a fragile position
  within the labor market

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Single Mothers

• Disadvantaged when it comes to attaining material
  resources
• Targets for being neglectful parents, caretakers,
  workers
• Makes achieving autonomy and access to
  independent income more distant than ever

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Negative Facts about WFS restructuring

• Has had Negative consequences for the social
  citizenship status of adults and for their
  ability to exercise a political voice
• Implications of growth of low wage contingent
  work and increased responsibility for unpaid care
  work are increasing gaps between those who have
  the time and energy and resources and those who
  do not
• Children are becoming the new deserving citizens,
  and increasingly adults entitlement is based on
  the fact that they are attached to at least one
  child

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Understanding The ChangesThe Politics of
Welfare State Change

• After WW 2 the changes facing Canada as a
  developed nation became more dynamic
• Women entered the work force
• Internationalization
• Economic crisis

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The Construction of Neo Liberalismas a Hegemonic
Paradigm

• Ideological Struggle that took place over 20
  years
• Supported by business organizations, think tanks,
  such as the Frasier Institute, economic officials
  within the state
• Shift of power away from labor, and a shift of
  power towards capital
• Entitled strategies to take power away from
  organizations representing marginal social groups
  and progressive social movements

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Strategies included

• Eliminating Both
• State funding for advocacy groups within social
  society (including womens groups)
• Advisory bodies within federal state that
  represented marginalized groups to the government
• A Range of other social groups that have been
  further marginalized by labeling them Special
  Interest

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Neo Liberal Cut Backs

• The focus on the individual rather than the state
  or collective responsibility was a first
  important step away from social solidarity
• Who was affected?
• Single mothers
• Married women
• Youth

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Neo Liberal Cut Backs

• Cost are disproportionately borne by women
  and the poor and the lack of social provision
  Creates new forms of social inequality
• The possibilities for having policies that foster
  the reconciliation of paid work and domestic
  responsibility have become even more remote, as
  concerns of adults, and especially women are
  becoming side stepped in favor of focus on
  children
• Policy making institutions have been restructured
  in a way that marginalizes opposition voices
• Goals Have Shifted To
• Meet international economic competitiveness
  rather than domestic well being

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The Social Policy Community and the Response of
Left Liberal Actors

• Responsible For
• Targeting Child Poverty, and those deemed
  Needy, Elderly, Single Mothers, Women, Children
• Provision on helping only those who have fallen
  through the cracks

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The Social Policy Community and the Response of
Left Liberal Actors

• Responsible for Legitimizing
• Neo Liberal Model
• Marginalizing the values of Universality
• Horizontal Equity
• Social Solidarity
• Personal Autonomy for women

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SummaryDimensions of a Welfare State in Canada

• Significant reduction in state responsibility for
  social reproduction
• Shifts
• Major function to encourage people remain
  employed
• Restructuring has resulted in
• Targeting poor
• Privilege of an upper tier of full employed
  workers
• Shift benefits from adults to children
• Has encourage the growth of low wage industries

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Impact of Restructuring

• Increase in Poverty
• Inequality
• Hardship
• Especially for
• Women
• Poor Women
• Minorities and their families
• Increased pressures and poverty

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In Design and Impact

• Policy shifts work against the possibility of
• Women gaining autonomy or independence from
  exploitative situations
• Reduced space for individuals to exercise a
  political voice or public engagement
• Targeting the marginalization of more radical
  voices and visions

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Questions

• Should the Federal Government be responsible for
  social reproduction?
• Is it possible for people to lose the motivation
  to work if they have the ability to rely on
  social assistance?
• Have people lost the motive to work as a result
  of social assistance?
• What is so important about reducing isolation,
  and having a sense of community with respect to
  social services provided by the government?
• Why are women and minorities the ones mostly
  affected by the neo liberal hegemic paradigm
• Is engaging in more HARDSHIP a really bad thing
  for the nation when It forces people to strive?
• Should people have a choice as to where their tax
  money goes, with respect to social reproduction?

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Questions
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