Senators Eggleton and Segal: COVID-19 Presents Lessons in How a Guaranteed Basic Income Program Could Work
Fifty senators, including Senator Omidvar, are calling for the implementation of a basic income.
Fifty members of the Senate of Canada, almost half the chamber, are calling for a basic income plan to ensure that, in these challenging times, no one goes without the means to acquire the necessities of life. This is not a new endeavour for Canadian senators. Fifty years ago, Sen. David Croll called for an overhaul of our social safety net, saying: “We are pouring billions of dollars every year into a social welfare system that merely treats the symptoms of poverty, but leaves the disease itself untouched.” True then, true today. From his endeavours came a basic income program for senior citizens. The authors of this article have also worked on advancing the development of a new and simplified income security framework to replace the old broken systems.
Why? Because we still have millions of Canadians living in poverty; half of them have jobs but still can’t make ends meet with low wages. Millions don’t have decent affordable housing; thousands are homeless. Many can’t afford sufficient and nourishing food, and others can’t afford to buy necessary medicines. A wide gap in wealth and income levels has evolved in the past three decades. And our labour market is changing with accelerated automation and more precarious employment: low-paying, part-time, short-term jobs, little or no benefits. Half the population has been living paycheque to paycheque, struggling to make ends meet, experiencing stress and anxiety.
And now comes COVID-19 to make matters worse. Governments in this country have been working cooperatively, admirably, and with speed to help Canadians through this period. However, as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has admitted, there are gaps in these measures, and many Canadians are falling through them. That is bound to happen, and understandable, when a patchwork of programs with different eligibility rules are quickly designed and implemented.
The Canada Emergency Relief Benefit (CERB) is one program that comes close to being a basic income measure. But there are still people falling through the cracks who can’t provide sufficiently for the necessities of life: food, medicines and housing for themselves and their families. For example, people on social assistance or disability allowances who can’t work and haven’t been able to work recently are not eligible for CERB. And yet they are struggling because social assistance and disability allowances are far below any poverty line measurement, and formally discourage work.
Read the full article on the Ottawa Citizen’s website