CBoC reports this wage gap will cost our economy approximately $7.5 billion over a 10 year span. It also forces some youth to remain dependent on welfare which will cost all levels of government about $126,000 per former foster youth.

This is Canada’s first comprehensive look at the lack of social and economic opportunities available to those leaving a children’s welfare system. Despite Canadians requesting a deeper analysis of the issue and better support of it for years.

In early March, York U professor Stephen Gaetz wrote a report titled “Coming of Age: Reimagining the Response to Youth Homelessness in Canada.” His research specializes around national homelessness solutions.

“Difficult transitions from care often result in a range of negative outcomes,” he wrote, “such as homelessness, unemployment, lack of educational engagement and achievement, involvement in corrections, lack of skills and potentially, a life of poverty.”

He explained these transitions occur because many youth “age out” of foster care without a safety net.

The Ontario Association of Children’s Aid Societies released a survey in 2010 stating that 44 percent of foster children leaving the system at age 18 graduated from high school. Compare that to the 81 percent of the “average Canadian”. Those numbers tend to swap in mental health scenarios with foster youth needing more support than their peers.

This is something many other Canadians noticed a while ago. And something many Canadians have been living. Finally, we have the data behind it.

Louis Thériault, CBoC’s executive director of economic initiatives, believes our nation needs a substantial strategy for youth in foster care organized by the federal government and supported with data collected at all government levels.

The conversation has begun. Let’s make sure we act on it.

Remember the good old days when Canadians used to think the government was supposed to help everyone share in economic prosperity and prevent anyone from shouldering the brunt of economic adversity? We thought we’d learned the bitter lessons about the perils of the free market from the Great Depression. A welfare state was needed to moderate the harsh forces of the market, with government programs that entitle all citizens to certain social and economic rights.

Today, the welfare-state programs of the 1960s and 1970s seem like a distant memory. Free marketeers have attacked everything from employment insurance to welfare to education funding.

One response of progressives to the shredding of the social safety net is the impulse to go back to where we were before the bad stuff happened. Remember the good old days, when most unemployed people could actually qualify for unemployment insurance? When the discussion was about how to fix or improve public services, not what price the government could get for auctioning them off? After losing so many fights over the decades to protect social programs, you can appreciate this nostalgia for the way things used to be. Wouldn’t it be great to have adequate income support programs again instead of having to rely on the not-so-tender mercies of seedy payday loan joints?

But nostalgia for the past overstates the virtues of the welfare state. Carleton University sociologist Janet Siltanen’s research shows that—even on its best days—the welfare state paradigm was far from paradise. Even in the “golden age” of the Canadian welfare state, politicians were long on rhetoric and short on substance. Income security programs were modest, and social programs were often not extended to everyone. Plus, a weak commitment to full employment meant that the Canadian government fell far short of placing the rights of citizens above market forces.

Some might argue that—despite its flaws—the Canadian welfare state of a generation ago is still preferable to today’s neo-liberal nightmare. But Siltanen argues that viewing the welfare state with rose-coloured glasses is not a great starting point for a new vision for Canada.

The welfare state paradigm was predicated on an agenda of redistribution: the idea that the government should take from the affluent to help out those who are struggling.

Under such a redistribution scheme, socially marginalized groups must fight over whose agendas will be supported from a limited pot of tax revenues. Groups that battle racism, sexism, homophobia or other forms of discrimination are badly disadvantaged when it comes to determining who are the deserving beneficiaries. For them, the welfare state is not a paradise lost.

Not that redistribution is a bad thing—far from it. And maybe we could sort out our oppressive prejudices enough to ensure that welfare state programs are not designed around the heterosexual male breadwinner household, and to ensure that many more groups (women and First Nations come to mind) receive the benefit of this redistributive vision.

But there are other problems with welfare-state-style income redistribution as a political agenda. Taking from the haves and giving to the have-nots occludes a bigger question: Why is it that the economy produces haves and have-nots?

This is a question about more than just income redistribution. Rather than relying solely on government to try to improve on an economic system that reinforces inequality, wouldn’t it be better if we had a more egalitarian economic system? If the economy weren’t creating such gulfs between rich and poor, there would be less damage for the government to fix.

This line of reasoning leads in a number of interesting directions—directions we don’t pursue if we are stuck in the past with the same redistribution mindset we had a generation ago. Siltanen poses her own provocative question: Who said markets are sacred? The market economy, with all of its imperfections, is not some force of nature; it is socially created. So for Siltanen and others, we should not just set our sights on a return to some imaginary, glorious past, but on creating a future where the economic system itself is up for debate.

Although Flaherty claims to have introduced a budget that is “Canada’s response to the challenge of our time,” many groups, including the Centre for Policy Alternatives, are saying Flaherty’s plan is “too little too late.”

This had us wondering if anyone, or anything, will benefit from the almost $40 billion stimulus package being pumped into our economy over the next two years. Here’s what we found.

Tax Cuts

Personal income tax reductions will give Canadians of all economic stripes between $21 to $53 a month extra to play with. But this $2 billion per year in tax cuts is essentially just a shallow crowd-pleaser that’s widely seen as an ineffective way to jump-start the economy. Instead, the government should have pumped that money into health care, for example, where it could have created more than three times as many jobs as broad-based tax cuts.

Mid- and upper-class homeowners

The 15 percent home renovation tax credits, for renos between $1,000 and $10,000 and available only until February 2010, will benefit only those who happen to have extra money to spend on redecorating.

Infrastructure

The government plans to throw $12 billion over the next two years into infrastructure, mostly through construction projects. But while this is a major job-producing move, it benefits sectors that are still largely dominated by men, leaving women out in the cold in terms of job creation. And while the government likes to boast that its stimulus package equals 1.9 percent of the GDP, CPA economist David MacDonald points out that that figure includes the matching funds that provinces and municipalities are expected to put up for infrastructure, meaning the feds are effectively counting “what other people are spending.”

Unemployed Canadians

Though only 40 percent of unemployed Canadians can access EI, no really significant EI reforms were made in the budget, with the stimulus package granting a mere five extra weeks of available benefits for the unemployed. And of the 1.5 billion set aside for retraining, only one third is available to unemployed Canadians not accessing EI.

Parents needing childcare

Under the stimulus package, low-income parents are able to earn a little more under the Canada Child Tax Benefit, but those earning less than $20,000 will see none of the increases they might have hoped for.

First Nations groups

Although the $1.4 billion allotted to First Nations communities for skills training and on-reserve housing might seem impressive, off-reserve First Nations people won’t benefit from much of this cash.

Affordable housing

Although the government is putting $1 billion over two years into social housing renovation projects, accessing these funds requires a 50-50 commitment from the provinces, a demand that may be difficult for poorer provinces to meet and may mean they miss out on housing they need the most. This money also can only be spent on already in-place affordable housing units—no new units are part of the stimulus plan.

It is because of cases like this that a group of activists is lobbying Toronto council to adopt a policy that would prevent city workers, including police, from inquiring about the immigration status of people seeking services. It would also prevent them from passing on information about immigration status to any federal or provincial agency. “We felt it was essential for a lot of people we were working with to be able to access services without fear,” says Sima Zerehi, a campaign organizer with No One Is Illegal.

Zerehi says the idea came about in 2003, after organizers heard of a similar policy in New York City and began to realize how many of the non-status people they worked with in immigration detention centres had ended up there as a result of trying to access city services. Non-status persons, sometimes called illegal immigrants, are people who entered the country legally but lost their right to remain here, either because their refugee claim was denied or they overstayed a tourist visa. Until they are ordered deported or granted status, they are stuck in a legal limbo, with no official immigration status. And with an estimated 20,000 to 200,000 non-status persons living in Canada—half of those in the Toronto area—Zerehi says it’s imperative the city make it easier for them to access essential services without fear of being reported to immigration authorities.

Campaign organizers say non-status persons are entitled to services because the Canadian economy benefits from their labour. “Communities without status do contribute in a positive way to our economy. There really isn’t any reason why they shouldn’t be offered adequate services,” says Zerehi.

Police routinely ask about immigration status when investigating unrelated matters, such as domestic violence complaints. “If, through the normal course of an investigation, we find people with various immigration statuses, obviously we communicate that to Immigration Canada,” says Sergeant Jim Muscat of the Toronto Police Service.

That’s precisely the kind of situation organizers would like to change. But they realize that even having a policy might not make a difference immediately. For example, schools in Ontario are required to admit children whose parents are “unlawfully in Canada.” Yet, according to Martha Mackinnon, executive director of the Justice for Children and Youth Legal Clinic, about 100 children were denied access to Toronto schools this past year, even though the school board has a policy of admitting non-status children. “We took action, and to our knowledge, everyone was admitted,” she says. “Unfortunately, I think that we need more work on the implementation of the policy, especially at a local school level,” concedes school board trustee Bruce Davis.

With the campaign still in its early days, organizers are hopeful. Mayor David Miller supports the principle that all city residents should have access to city services: “The general policy in our administration is that, unless legally obliged, city workers do not ask about immigration status.” But despite his tacit endorsement and the fact that a variety of community organizations and three city councillors have come on board, the city’s official position is that non-status persons already have access to some services, such as public health nurses and homeless shelters, and that the city is prevented by provincial legislation from providing other services, such as social housing. Under the Social Housing Reform Act, for example, every person in the household must have legal status in order for the entire family to be placed on the waiting list.

Organizers say their next step is to hold a public forum this fall. The sooner council addresses the issue, the better, says Cindy Cowan, executive director of the women’s shelter Nellie’s, who sees first-hand what happens when women at risk are afraid to call the police and why a policy is necessary. “It would reduce the fear,” she says, “and enable women to get the support and services they need.”