10 THE WESTERN CANADIAN LUMBER WORKER It’s time to talk about... The federal government’s controls legis- Jation has played havoc with Canada’s econ- omy. It has stifled economic growth; in- creased unemployment; worsened regional disparities; weakened the standards of social services, health services and education and severely restricted the purchasing power of wage and salary earners. Working parents, women, the old, the sick, the handicapped are among those hard- est hit by the fallout resulting from the con- trols. The federal government's anti-inflation program is up for review on March 31 and the provinces are being asked to renew their. agreements to extend the life of the pro- gram. The program does not deserve to live on. The sooner Canada gets rid of it, the better off we'll all be. 8 ORO. ARE 4e0s) AR oS ) YVc7 es @ v : Controls have caused a level of unemploy- ment never experienced since the early sixties or the dirty thirties. According to official figures, this January, a total of 889,000 Canadians were job- less. On a seasonally adjusted basis, the propor- tion of the workforce unemployed was 7.5 per- cent. This frightening level of unemployment was caused in great part by restrictive policies imposed by the federal government: high interest rates and wrong fiscal and monetary policies, at a time when the economy is grinding to a halt. Actually, these official statistics do not tell the whole truth. They ignore the thousands of unemployed Canadians who have become so dis- couraged with looking for vanished jobs that they have given up seeking employment and are no longer officially listed among the unemployed. In some regions the situation has become disas- trous: in Newfoundland the official figure in December was 13.6 percent; in New Brunswick 13.2 percent; in Quebec 9 percent (the same as the previous month); and British Columbia increased to 8.8 percent. There were 54,700 job- openings in the third quarter of last year (latest available)—no match for the official number of unemployed men and women: there were only eight vacancies for every 100 Canadians looking for work. So, even if all those seeking work had the skill and experience to grab the few jobs availa- ble, 834,000 people would still be looking for jobs that just aren’t there. The hardship experienced by these hundreds of thousands of unemployed Canadians cannot be measured in human terms. But in economic terms, this terrible waste of human resources amounts to $1.9 billion per 100,000 unemployed per year. Reducing unemployment to three per cent would add close to $8 billion a year to total output. This in turn would increase incomes and govern- ment revenues, and lower the cost of unemploy- ment insurance. And things will get worse. In the third quarter of 1976, the Gross National Product has declined to 0.8 per cent in real terms, non-residential con- struction by 5.3 percent, and investments in busi- ness machinery and equipment by six percent. The results will be slower economic growth and higher unemployment this year. Unless the controls are lifted. And soon. cae 48 Tis CEPA IAZEEC As a result of their participation in the federal anti-inflation program, many provinces have cut back on health services. Some hospitals have been closed down; elsewhere, whole wards or rtments have been eliminated. housands of hospital employees have been laid off, adding to the numbers of jobless, their skills and training wasted to society. Cutbacks have resulted in lower standards, higher medicare premiums and reduced services. Canada’s medicare system had been among the best in the world. No more... It’s time to end the controls. The sooner the better. UNEMPLOYMENT. WAGES, PRICES AMIN DRAEITC In spite of the claims and promises made by the federal government when it imposed its anti-infla- tion program more than a year ago, controls are only effective in the area of wages and sala- ries. ; Almost three million employees have already been affected by the Anti-Inflation Board's activi- ties; at least 850,000 were robbed of hundreds of millions of dollars as a result of rollbacks of wages negotiated in good faith. In contrast, as of December 9, 1976, only 169 corporations have been charged with ‘excessive revenues” for a total amount of only $15 mil- lion! Compounding the situation is the unfair, arbi- trary, arrogant and often mindless manner. the controls are enforced by the AIB and its adminis- trator. Some northern communities have been in danger of becoming ghost towns; a group of employees was rolled back below the minimum legal wage; and other groups have been forced to work at substantially lower rates than those in identical occupations nearby. Among the worst hit by AIB rollbacks are the low-paid workers, many of them women and young people. AIB rulings are based on percent- age rates. Guidelines based on percentages, rath- er than actual money, increase the gap between the people at the bottom and the top of the pay scale, and unfair wage disparities become more blatant. And things will get even worse. Administration is being steadily tightened. Maximum increases have been reduced to six percent. Next year they will be four percent—unless controls are lifted. Looking. at prices, governments at all levels finally must acknowledge that these have been scarcely affected by controls. Leading economists confirm that recent reductions in the rate of growth of the Consumer Price Index are not attrib- utable to the AIB. They result mainly from a drop in food prices which are not controlled at ~ the farm gate, and from a slowdown in the rise of import prices, particularly from the United States, which are also independent of the program. The slowdown in_ inflation would have occurred even without the anti-inflation pro- gram and without the inequities and hardships it has caused. There is no excuse for the continuation of con- trols. They must go. And soon. The children, the old, the poor, the women, the handicapped and the unskilled are the first victims of cutbacks in social services caused by the controls program. - Reductions in budgets of agencies providing child care have meant the decrease or the elimi- nation of treatment for emotionally disturbed children. Many of them will become emotional- ly crippled adults. Cutbacks have also resulted in increased costs elsewhere—both financial and social. An agency providing housekeeping services may, be required to refuse resident care. Thus children in a single- parent family must be placed in foster homes while a parent is in hospital. Senior citizens, who could cope in their own residences with regular visits from a social service worker, must forego this relative freedom to accept placement in group residences. Daycare, already inadequate, has been further reduced. And user fees have been increased or newly introduced, This creates an added burden for working mothers. It’s time for controls to go. The sooner the bet- ter. Reprinted from a Canadian Labour Congress brochure APRIL-MAY, 1977 RECIAL AL NICH, Rivne One of the great achievements of Canada as a confederation has been the help offered the poor- er provinces by the richer ones, by means of equal- ization or transfer payments channelled through the federal government. The federal government has reduced these pay- ments, particularly in the fields of energy, post- secondary education and medicare. This has decreased the inflow of funds into the hands of the provincial governments, placing severe con- straints on their ability to spend and to create jobs. Of course, the poorer provinces have suffered more than the richer ones. And thus the controls propia is widening the gap between them. The controls program threatens, the econom- ic and social balance of the nation. It must go. The sooner the better. ; ie Arica “Cost-cutting’” by governments directly affects the quality of education in many ways: higher pupil-teacher ratios reduce (and often eliminate) the time for individual attention. Some school boards have cut back on special classes and other services, such as counselling required by students with physical or mental handicaps. In several provinces, governments have cut their grants to school boards, thus shifting the fiscal burden to the local level. This results in higher municipal taxes and a lower quality of education. In post-secondary institutions, cutbacks have resulted in crowded classrooms, overflowing resi- dence buildings and more and more enrolment ceilings. Tuition fees are rising, and growing unemployment makes it increasingly difficult for students to earn the money they need to attend college. And upon graduating, they often find themselves without job prospects. It’s high time controls are lifted. The sooner the better. CALLITIA IC The anti-inflation program, imposed by the federal government, has been totally negative. for Canada and Canadians. A complete reversal in policy is essential—one which will put Canadi- ans back to work and the battered Canadian econ- omy back on its feet. Therefore: 1. The controls program must be ended immediately. The money taken out of the economy by wage rollbacks is sorely need- ed to create purchasing power. This in turn will create badly-needed jobs. The distor- tions and uncertainties created by the con- trols also are causing business investment to be less buoyant than it should be, and this we cannot afford. 2. Personal income taxes for people in the middle and lower income groups must be reduced. This will allow them to spend the extra disposable income and thus stimu- late the economy. Such a move will also contribute to redress the unacceptable rec- ord of income distribution in our country, where the poor are becoming poorer, and the rich richer. These measures will not cause new inflation, since for the pe two years the economy has been operating well below its capacity. Controls have been a costly mistake. Canadians are fed up with being victims of a half-baked program imposed upon them by the federal government for purposes of political expediency. _ On March 31 the scheme is up for review. The time has come for the elected representatives of the people of Canada to say No to its continua- tion. Both in the provincial legislatures and in Ottawa. Controls are hurting Canadians. They must go.