OTTAWA – A new poll suggests nearly half of Canadians are living paycheque to paycheque as the cost of living crisis continues to squeeze household budgets, and young people are more likely to s...
Lots of chatter in here about not supporting the conservatives. But, there’s no options for Canadians. Liberals are outta gas and haven’t done anything praiseworthy in a while. Conservatives suck and PP would just be a lamer Harper who wants to eat the poor. The NDP need a new leader as J.S. hasn’t made headway in years.
More importantly, theyre all just arguing about how to tweak the broken, oppressive system we live with. No one is advocating for change. It’s just a debate over who thinks they can keep liberal capitalism afloat. But liberal capitalism is the root of the problems. We have no advocates for change.
I vote we all go pull a 1919 Winnipeg and have a Canada-wide general strike in support of truly radical change. Change that pulls us away from rampant neoliberalization and rejects the basic assumptions of liberal capitalism.
Lots of chatter in here about not supporting the conservatives. But, there’s no options for Canadians.
Ok…but why elect a government that we KNOW is going to be worse? That hurts us. They cut revenue, cut services, run up the deficit and the debt, then lose and blame the Liberals for their mess. We would be better off to just stick with the Liberals who are bumbling idiots but at least they aren’t actively trying to fuck us over to give billions of dollars to the wealthy and corporations. That doesn’t make any fucking sense.
I hear you. But I think both are equally damaging, ultimately. One party might accelerate the process, and the other may drag the damage out over decades. But we end up in the same place.
And, just spitballin’ here, maybe an accelerated view of how destructive liberal capitalism is may be exactly what Canadians need to jolt us out of our world-renowned complacency. I dunno what it’ll take to get Canadians fired up enough to seek actual change. Clearly raging forest fires, a housing crisis, a health care crisis, drug addition crisis, rampant depression and anxiety, rampant inflation, ballooning cost of living, and political corruption (both domestic and foreign) isn’t enough. So, maybe shit needs to get even worse before it gets better. Aka. Vote in the conservatives?
Why add losing the social progress we have made over decades to the mix? If what we need is further left why vote far right? Nothing is going to happen quickly. If the US goes authoritarian it will likely take decades to bring it back. How does electing white supremacist, white nationalist, racist, conspiracy theorist supported neo-fascists/christofascists help the average Candian who is socially progressive in the short, mid, and long term?
I think you might be missing the point of what I am saying. I’m not suggesting that “further left” is what we need. The right-left dichotomy is just two sides of the same thing, and it’s that thing that is fundamentally broken. Moving right or left does nothing to change anything. I don’t think we need to move left. I think we need to throw out the whole thing. It isn’t the conservatives that are the source of these bad things you’re naming (white-supremacy, neofacismz intolerance, and hate). That stuffs baked into the whole colonial liberal capitalist “democracy” we have inherited. Any party that supports the continuation of that system is white supremacist, racist, fascist, etc. Our whole economic and political system IS those things. Not any single party. Some just own up to it better (like the conservatives). But liberals and the NDP, too, fundamentally support our democratic and economic systems. But those systems are foundationally to be blamed. We can’t tweak them to be better. We can’t fix the foundationally exploitative nature of capitalism. It’s a feature, not a bug. And we can’t tweak the Westminster style of parliamentary government to be less racists or discriminatory. That’s in-built. It’s what indigenous groups have been saying for decades (centuries?).
Back to my original point, lots of voices in here saying don’t support the conservatives. And, I mean, I agree. They suck. But they all suck. They all wanna perpetuate the nonsense. Sure, some wanna perpetuate it in “nicer” or “more inclusive” ways. But no one actually wants to CHANGE anything. They just wanna tweak and adjust and manage the foundational problems of our systems. So, conservative or not, they’re all perpetuating hate and discrimination and poverty and authoritarianism. My point wasn’t “don’t vote NDP” or “vote conservative”. My point was anyone who actually wants change doesn’t have a voice. There is no party advocating for change.
I’m a socialist libertarian, BTW. I want the smallest government that is necessary to run the country. I don’t want corporations to write laws. I want laws that protect the people, and workers, and consumers, not the wealthy and corporations but I’m also smart enough to know that the only solution to a social problem is a social solution.
I believe that the people who do most of the work, the workers, should enjoy most of the benefit.
No, we don’t end up in the same place. While the liberals are not great, neither the liberals or the NDP will erode our social progress like the conservatives will. Both would also probably be better for the environment if that’s your jam.
Literally the only reason to vote for the conservatives is if you agree with their campaign of hate and intolerance. If you want social regression go vote for them, but you wont’ get anything else out of them.
No we don’t need things to get worse to get better. There’s no guarantee they’ll get better. They could just get worse for decades or centuries. I’m not gonna give up a lot of what I find valuable in my lifetime to test this hypothesis. Especially when we have proven solutions. And so I’ll vote ABC. That means LPC in my riding, at least until the NDP find a leader that can become a PM.
Let’s elect the Conservatives so they can cut taxes on the rich, cut services for the poor, neglect our government systems and infrastructure, drive up the deficit and the debt, then blame the Liberals for trying to fix their mess.
Rinse.
Repeat.
Why are people so fucking dumb? The Conservatives do the same thing every time. Then they lie about what the Liberals are doing and people swallow it hook, line, and sinker.
The problem is we’re facing a crisis where once in the entire stupid goddamned history of economic crises, this the one time where small-government libertarianism actually really would help. Municipal government overrestriction of housing-construction (also a few federal housing regs like single-stair construction) is a massive chunk of the problem. And both the Liberal and NDP parties have a very tight relationship with municipal governments and so they want to keep their friends there. Meanwhile, Pierre Poilievre isn’t a “friends” type of person, so he’s able to call out the “let them eat cake” politics of municipal governments.
Of course, (a) there’s a substantial chance that PP is lying about his plans to strongarm municipal governments, and (b) while he may help solve the crisis with that action, he will also likely help exacerbate it on the other hand by slashing supports for the poorest Canadians, and he’ll also create a few new crises related to climate change and LGBTQ rights, and possibly vaccines.
So yeah, no love for him.
But I’m not looking forward to the day when a Conservative federal government is kicking municipal asses and I have to go to bat for an absolute shitheel like Poilievre on the principle that he is right exclusively on this one very specific issue.
Even if he was hypothetically not lying about wanting to address housing in the way he suggests, I still wouldn’t be able to support him because eroding our social protections and freedoms is not worth it.
But I also think the likely hood that he upsets his rich suburban supporters and friends by allowing condos to be built next to their nice houses is close to zero. So it’s probably one of those bullshit planks like the liberals saying they were going to potentially get rid of first past the post. There are zero consequences for our politicians lying like this.
It would be nice if our elections laws defined a class of promises where if they are broken an election is forcibly triggered.
He might go through with it, but he specifically targets “cities of over a half-million people”. Here in Hamilton, most suburbs have fantasies about de-amalgamation, and with Conservative provincial governments in charge I could see that happening to pander to them. I mean, while it’s not directly applicable here, note how Ford is accommodating Mississauga’s exit of the Peel region – not directly comparable because it’s above the limit and the members of Peel that are below the limit are already their own cities and towns since it’s just a regional government and not a municipality. But still, it shows how the door is open for this conversation.
Basically, PP will pander to his base by making urban intensification something he does to the cities on behalf of his suburban supporters. I mean, his biggist threat against these cities is to cut transit funding… do most crappy stand-alone exurbs even have transit?
And as grotesque and craven as that is, it’s somehow still a better plan than anything his opponents have offered.
He will never get my vote. I can hear the transphobic dog-whistles and have people I need to protect. But I won’t blame others for choosing differently, and I do blame the entire political centre and left for carving out the bottom of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to decorate the top when it comes to housing, which created the policy vacuum that PP stepped into.
The problem is that every single thing a Conservative does is designed to look like is helping the common man when its actually helping the wealthy and corporations. Dig for us going to make land available for 50,000 units of urban sprawl? Million dollar houses that only the upper middle class can afford and 8 billion dollars of benefit to his wealthy friends. They weave a good story that the least of us believe while the entire time funneling billions and billions of dollars of the tax money paid by the least of us to the wealthiest of us and corporations. What we need is good management and good social programs. We’re not going to get that combination from either party so I would rather have social programs while they try to figure it out.
The problem is, as I said, this is one of the few times where “letting dead-eyed mobbed up property developers make a goddamned mountain of money” will actually help everyone. I mean, even the abominable and corrupt crap Ford is doing to the greenbelt will help - every house, even million-dollar mcmansions, helps fight the crisis.
It’s a game of musical chairs where the chairs are allocated by money instead of by speed. Adding more chairs to the game helps more people win regardless. Even if you’re adding more thrones, that means there’s more milking-stools left-over for the poor instead of those milking-stools getting flipped and upgraded into artisanal urban kneeling seats to sell to the people who have the money for thrones.
And not only that, but PP’s stated plan: kick municipal asses until they start hitting housing targets? That would force municipalities to allow more housing. And assuming greenbelts remain in place (fingers-crossed), that would mean that cities would by necessity have to upzone and implement better, more urbanist, more intesification-friendly planning policies. That’s way better than Ford’s greenbelt crap, but then Ford didn’t campaign on the greenbelt crap.
But yes, assuming PP is being honest about his plan: It’s sneaky and yet still far better than not doing it and I’m mostly angry at his opponents for getting us to this point.
We have a limited number of builders and resources. It’s not helping by having them build a ton of mcmansions when they could be building high density condos instead.
We don’t really know what they’d build given the choice since one of those options is generally illegal (you can get special executive permission that makes it legal, but you could say the same about murdering people in countries that have a pardoning system).
Right but I’m talking about federal and that’s provincial. In fact, Ford put together a Housing Affordability Task Force a few years back and that’s exactly what they recommended! He just… y’know… didn’t do any of it. Not sure why he even asked them in the first place.
every house, even million-dollar mcmansions, helps fight the crisis.
This is incorrect. Unsustainable housing developments make municipalities poorer which worsens their ability to provide housing. We need to densify our populated places, not build new low-density developments in the middle of nowhere which will inevitably require costly highway expansions for the people there to get anywhere for work or amenities.
The fact that American sprawl cities have affordable housing shows that sprawl does help. Yes, sprawl is bad economics and worse environmentalism, but it does control housing prices.
For example, Zillow pegs the median home price in Houston, TX at $260k USD. It’s a suburban hellscape, but a reasonably-priced one.
Housing cost doesn’t matter on its own. Cost of living is what matters. If you get a cheap house but you need to spend a lot on transportation to get anywhere and do anything you’re still fucked. Houston suburbs are gonna be more expensive to live in than a small apartment in urban Montreal.
…without actually thinking about the consequences of that other option. Basically how every Conservative government has gotten elected in the last few decades.
Yes exactly. People are stupid. They only see red team and blue team. Blue team says low taxes. They will pick blue team if they are running out of money because they don’t know what taxes are for or how economies work.
I don’t understand how people can complain of “no options” or act like there are no other parties, just Coke or Pepsi. There are other parties, and even independents. Voting isn’t supposed to be a popularity contest for the most slick and charismatic candidate, nor is it a game where you try to match who you think everybody else is voting for.
It just feels to me like everyone is doing what they think they’re supposed to do (as if our votes are public?), instead of trusting themselves to really look at what they believe should happen and find a party that is willing (or at least more likely) to fight to have it done. 😟
In Alberta there’s a disgustingly large amount of people who simply vote blue because that’s what their dad did, and what his dad did. If you ask them WHY they hate Trudeau, you can’t get a coherent answer because they don’t actually know.
My dad made a comment one day about how the “ruined” economy was all Trudeau’s fault. I asked what he’d done and he couldn’t think of anything to say.
Hard agree… They just spew rhetoric because they think it’s what they’re supposed to say… it’s like a cult.
I’m not convinced this issue has an easy solution. Most people who voice their opinions here always seem to have a silver bullet to the housing problem yet in most cases I can’t find any evidence supporting what they are proposing will work. People seem to just be guessing what the problem is based on anecdotal evidence. The only thing I can find evidence for is there is not enough housing being built in Canada but this seems like a tough problem to solve.
I’m also not even convinced this is a purely national problem. It seems like a lot of countries are dealing with the same problem right now. This isn’t to say there is no answer but it seems to suggest this is a tough problem and no one has a great solution to it.
The difference is other countries are at least trying things. The federal Liberals have only done things that actively make things worse (boosting demand via savings plans or RRSP withdrawals).They are all in on subsiding the landowners via the youth. It’s disgusting and I’m sick of it. It has destroyed the economic outlook of this country for decades IMO.
You’re right. It’s not a purely Canadian problem, and the solution is not easy.
But we’ve long since left behind any semblance of a world where easy solutions are enough. We need politicians who will embrace hard choices.
The hard choice behind housing comes down to one simple fact; for housing to be an investment, there must be a housing crisis. The scarcity of housing is what forces home prices to continuously rise. Any solution that doesn’t end the utility of housing as an investment will ultimately be insufficient. And no one wants to seriously talk about the idea that housing shouldn’t be an investment anymore.
And we need to be absolutely clear that the Conservatives have even less interest in tackling investment property than either the Liberals or NDP. Taking care of the wealthy is always their number one priority.
What we should be talking about is something like this. That’s the kind of big idea that would make a real difference.
Part of the problem is that none of the parties address the real problems created by their actions. Liberal introduce a nation-wide carbon tax that should in theory tax large companies.
In reality: Companies don’t pay taxes, they raise their prices to cover the tax increase which “trickles down” (the only time trickle down economics actually “works”) to the people.
So without dealing with that scenario when implementing the taxes, the ordinary Canadian gets hosed.
But now lets say PP becomes prime minister and reduces the taxes. Is he going to force companies to drop their prices to make up for that? Probably not. Companies will just use that as profit. So Canadians are still getting hosed.
And now after that lets say Liberals rise to power again. And re-implement these taxes. Once again, the companies will just pass those added costs onto the consumer again.
I wish I knew what the solution is here but I really don’t. It feels like no matter what the government in charge does, companies just keep using it as an excuse to hose us one way or the other.
I do need to point out that the carbon tax is a bad example here, because the tax is rebated directly back to individual Canadians. So even if companies are folding the tax into their prices, we’re not paying for it. They’re effectively raising the price, then paying us the difference.
Of course, companies that can find ways to reduce their carbon footprint can simply avoid paying the tax altogether, allowing them to obtain more profit at the same price point. This incentivises climate friendly behaviour.
It’s not a perfect solution, but within the neo-liberal paradigm that we’re currently stuck in its at least making a difference, and a lot of climate experts agree that carbon taxes are an effective strategy (they shouldn’t be the only strategy, but that’s a separate discussion).
Point is, companies raising prices in line with carbon taxes isn’t hurting your wallet, because you’re getting that money right back. The designers of the policy already knew that would happen and factored it in.
In all fairness, I’m getting nowhere near the amount back on rebates that prices have increased for me. One check doesn’t even cover 1 month of utility increases let alone the several months that go by in between. And there’s grocery, clothing and fuel costs on top of that.
That’s fair. But as an ordinary person what I see is this: no matter which government is in charge, I’m getting poorer and no government is willing to do anything to help people like me. They just keep blowing smoke up my ass and pretending like they’re actually doing something.
What makes you more of an ordinary person than anyone else here? We’re all ordinary people.
And you’re not wrong. We’re being continually fucked over by the combination of corporate greed and weak governments who either do nothing to reign that greed in, or (in the case of the Conservatives especially), actively encourage it.
Which brings me right back to my previous point; if we want to solve the real problems then a lot more people need to get real cozy with the word “socialism.”
And in the meantime, where governments fail, the people need to step up. Join a union; if your workplace doesn’t have one, find one that does, or talk to your coworkers about starting one. Alone we are powerless, but together we can bring whole industries to their knees. If your union isn’t doing enough for you, get involved in finding better leaders who will fight for what you need.
But for God’s sake, don’t vote for the scorpion and expect not to get stung. Pollievre can talk out the side of his mouth all he likes about what he’s going to do for us regular people, but it’s entirely clear where he stands, because it’s where his party has always stood. Conservatives are, from their inception, the defenders of institutional power, and today that means being the defenders of the wealthy, no more, no less.
The price jump has nothing to do with the carbon tax. The carbon tax is $0.14 per litre, so it’s only about 10% of the price of gas. That means it can only be blamed for 10% of the price-jump at an absolute upper limit, and that’s only if your diet consists of chugging gasoline (hey, I don’t judge).
If prices were only up 10% since last year I’d be goddamned ecstatic.
It’s not. It’s supply-chains, shockwaves from covid-shutdowns, pandemic-spending, a massive war in Asia between the world’s biggest gas and grain providers, and anti-globalist on-shoring driving up prices. The last one of those isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it has a cost just like carbon pricing has a cost.
Okay yes, at the pumps it may be, but what I’m saying is:
Company 1 increases their prices 10% to offset the CT costs.
Company 2 takes that 10% cost increase + their 10% increase and raises their pricing.
Company 3 has an increase from Company 2 + 10% increase of their own and raises their prices accordingly.
Every level raises the prices that much more and in the end the consumers get stuck with all of that. So we’re paying the carbon tax for each company down the supply chain.
That would only make sense if 100% of company 1’s costs were gasoline. Also, the carbon tax has been going up every year since it first appeared in 2019. The price spike started last year. And the same price spikes are happening in every country, and most countries don’t have carbon taxes.
As long as they can blame liberals, they’d be ok with making things worse.
The fact is, all the hardship that most people are going through is likely down to their provincial leadership. Surprise, surprise, the majority are conservative.
I believe only Newfoundland and Labrador has a liberal premier, and their cost of living is below average.
The problem isn’t even with Canada, it is a global phenomena. If you check news sites in other western democracies, they all have very similar struggles. The problem is wealth distribution is concentrated in too few people, and their wealth is such that like a black hole, it greedily consumes everything. The only solution is a readjustment of the global wealth pie, and break up many of these overly large monopolistic corporations. A vote for the cons is a doubling down of what we are already getting.
While our politics is not technically two party, in terms of parties which have held power it is, and people seem stuck in that mindset. They know they are unhappy with the status quo, they know they want change, and the only change a lot of people are willing to consider is the one with the history of austerity.
So here’s the issue. I align more with NDP but I don’t want conservatives to win. I don’t want to split the vote between NDP and liberals so I end up voting for the more popular candidate which ends up being the Liberals.
This is the issue with the current voting system. If only there was a different voting system proposed. Maybe one party could even back it. Maybe we can vote that party in power and then can actually change our voting system /s
This type strategic voting against Liberals and Conservative is how Canada has just alternated between two bad parties for the last few decades.
Progress takes time and it doesn’t mean every single moment things have to go in the right direction. Canada can survive the Liberals and Conservatives for a couple more terms it means some type of political progress.
All the Conservatives have to do is wait long enough and they’ll win an election. They literally don’t need to do anything. Eventually enough Canadians will blame the current Prime Minister for their city buses running late and vote in a Conservative.
It’s especially rent, there was an article in Québec about someone who saw her rent increase from 1750$ to 2900$, condo was not re-sold or anything, it’s just the owner who want to eat poors.
A lot of people just want to punish the Liberals for their failings (of which there are… many). The meme that Canada votes against people and not for people seems pretty accurate IMO.
Haven’t half of all Canadians always lived paycheque to paycheque? We can find the same headline going back decades. I thought the news was supposed to deliver that which is… new?
Nothing embarrassing about having those links in my browser history at all. It is not seedy content and I wanted to double check before posting my original comment. That’s just good due diligence.
Honestly, what’s the first thing out of a British person’s lips? “I hate Tories, they’re ruining this country.” Yet they keep getting elected anyway. Can… can you see the problem with this? They pretend to be populist, but invariably steal from the poor and give to the rich. Stop falling for the bullshit and for your own prejudices and vote for people who will actually help the common man. Don’t make the same mistakes we Americans keep making!
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Lots of chatter in here about not supporting the conservatives. But, there’s no options for Canadians. Liberals are outta gas and haven’t done anything praiseworthy in a while. Conservatives suck and PP would just be a lamer Harper who wants to eat the poor. The NDP need a new leader as J.S. hasn’t made headway in years.
More importantly, theyre all just arguing about how to tweak the broken, oppressive system we live with. No one is advocating for change. It’s just a debate over who thinks they can keep liberal capitalism afloat. But liberal capitalism is the root of the problems. We have no advocates for change.
I vote we all go pull a 1919 Winnipeg and have a Canada-wide general strike in support of truly radical change. Change that pulls us away from rampant neoliberalization and rejects the basic assumptions of liberal capitalism.
Ok…but why elect a government that we KNOW is going to be worse? That hurts us. They cut revenue, cut services, run up the deficit and the debt, then lose and blame the Liberals for their mess. We would be better off to just stick with the Liberals who are bumbling idiots but at least they aren’t actively trying to fuck us over to give billions of dollars to the wealthy and corporations. That doesn’t make any fucking sense.
I hear you. But I think both are equally damaging, ultimately. One party might accelerate the process, and the other may drag the damage out over decades. But we end up in the same place.
And, just spitballin’ here, maybe an accelerated view of how destructive liberal capitalism is may be exactly what Canadians need to jolt us out of our world-renowned complacency. I dunno what it’ll take to get Canadians fired up enough to seek actual change. Clearly raging forest fires, a housing crisis, a health care crisis, drug addition crisis, rampant depression and anxiety, rampant inflation, ballooning cost of living, and political corruption (both domestic and foreign) isn’t enough. So, maybe shit needs to get even worse before it gets better. Aka. Vote in the conservatives?
Why add losing the social progress we have made over decades to the mix? If what we need is further left why vote far right? Nothing is going to happen quickly. If the US goes authoritarian it will likely take decades to bring it back. How does electing white supremacist, white nationalist, racist, conspiracy theorist supported neo-fascists/christofascists help the average Candian who is socially progressive in the short, mid, and long term?
I think you might be missing the point of what I am saying. I’m not suggesting that “further left” is what we need. The right-left dichotomy is just two sides of the same thing, and it’s that thing that is fundamentally broken. Moving right or left does nothing to change anything. I don’t think we need to move left. I think we need to throw out the whole thing. It isn’t the conservatives that are the source of these bad things you’re naming (white-supremacy, neofacismz intolerance, and hate). That stuffs baked into the whole colonial liberal capitalist “democracy” we have inherited. Any party that supports the continuation of that system is white supremacist, racist, fascist, etc. Our whole economic and political system IS those things. Not any single party. Some just own up to it better (like the conservatives). But liberals and the NDP, too, fundamentally support our democratic and economic systems. But those systems are foundationally to be blamed. We can’t tweak them to be better. We can’t fix the foundationally exploitative nature of capitalism. It’s a feature, not a bug. And we can’t tweak the Westminster style of parliamentary government to be less racists or discriminatory. That’s in-built. It’s what indigenous groups have been saying for decades (centuries?).
Back to my original point, lots of voices in here saying don’t support the conservatives. And, I mean, I agree. They suck. But they all suck. They all wanna perpetuate the nonsense. Sure, some wanna perpetuate it in “nicer” or “more inclusive” ways. But no one actually wants to CHANGE anything. They just wanna tweak and adjust and manage the foundational problems of our systems. So, conservative or not, they’re all perpetuating hate and discrimination and poverty and authoritarianism. My point wasn’t “don’t vote NDP” or “vote conservative”. My point was anyone who actually wants change doesn’t have a voice. There is no party advocating for change.
Ok.
You’re right. I agree.
I’m a socialist libertarian, BTW. I want the smallest government that is necessary to run the country. I don’t want corporations to write laws. I want laws that protect the people, and workers, and consumers, not the wealthy and corporations but I’m also smart enough to know that the only solution to a social problem is a social solution.
I believe that the people who do most of the work, the workers, should enjoy most of the benefit.
No, we don’t end up in the same place. While the liberals are not great, neither the liberals or the NDP will erode our social progress like the conservatives will. Both would also probably be better for the environment if that’s your jam.
Literally the only reason to vote for the conservatives is if you agree with their campaign of hate and intolerance. If you want social regression go vote for them, but you wont’ get anything else out of them.
No we don’t need things to get worse to get better. There’s no guarantee they’ll get better. They could just get worse for decades or centuries. I’m not gonna give up a lot of what I find valuable in my lifetime to test this hypothesis. Especially when we have proven solutions. And so I’ll vote ABC. That means LPC in my riding, at least until the NDP find a leader that can become a PM.
Let’s elect the Conservatives so they can cut taxes on the rich, cut services for the poor, neglect our government systems and infrastructure, drive up the deficit and the debt, then blame the Liberals for trying to fix their mess.
Rinse.
Repeat.
Why are people so fucking dumb? The Conservatives do the same thing every time. Then they lie about what the Liberals are doing and people swallow it hook, line, and sinker.
Taxes are too high, government spending is out of hand, too many immigrants, and it’s all the Liberals’ fault.
That’s it, I’m sawing off my legs! That’ll show those Marxist bastards!
The problem is we’re facing a crisis where once in the entire stupid goddamned history of economic crises, this the one time where small-government libertarianism actually really would help. Municipal government overrestriction of housing-construction (also a few federal housing regs like single-stair construction) is a massive chunk of the problem. And both the Liberal and NDP parties have a very tight relationship with municipal governments and so they want to keep their friends there. Meanwhile, Pierre Poilievre isn’t a “friends” type of person, so he’s able to call out the “let them eat cake” politics of municipal governments.
Of course, (a) there’s a substantial chance that PP is lying about his plans to strongarm municipal governments, and (b) while he may help solve the crisis with that action, he will also likely help exacerbate it on the other hand by slashing supports for the poorest Canadians, and he’ll also create a few new crises related to climate change and LGBTQ rights, and possibly vaccines.
So yeah, no love for him.
But I’m not looking forward to the day when a Conservative federal government is kicking municipal asses and I have to go to bat for an absolute shitheel like Poilievre on the principle that he is right exclusively on this one very specific issue.
Even if he was hypothetically not lying about wanting to address housing in the way he suggests, I still wouldn’t be able to support him because eroding our social protections and freedoms is not worth it.
But I also think the likely hood that he upsets his rich suburban supporters and friends by allowing condos to be built next to their nice houses is close to zero. So it’s probably one of those bullshit planks like the liberals saying they were going to potentially get rid of first past the post. There are zero consequences for our politicians lying like this.
It would be nice if our elections laws defined a class of promises where if they are broken an election is forcibly triggered.
He might go through with it, but he specifically targets “cities of over a half-million people”. Here in Hamilton, most suburbs have fantasies about de-amalgamation, and with Conservative provincial governments in charge I could see that happening to pander to them. I mean, while it’s not directly applicable here, note how Ford is accommodating Mississauga’s exit of the Peel region – not directly comparable because it’s above the limit and the members of Peel that are below the limit are already their own cities and towns since it’s just a regional government and not a municipality. But still, it shows how the door is open for this conversation.
Basically, PP will pander to his base by making urban intensification something he does to the cities on behalf of his suburban supporters. I mean, his biggist threat against these cities is to cut transit funding… do most crappy stand-alone exurbs even have transit?
And as grotesque and craven as that is, it’s somehow still a better plan than anything his opponents have offered.
He will never get my vote. I can hear the transphobic dog-whistles and have people I need to protect. But I won’t blame others for choosing differently, and I do blame the entire political centre and left for carving out the bottom of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs to decorate the top when it comes to housing, which created the policy vacuum that PP stepped into.
The problem is that every single thing a Conservative does is designed to look like is helping the common man when its actually helping the wealthy and corporations. Dig for us going to make land available for 50,000 units of urban sprawl? Million dollar houses that only the upper middle class can afford and 8 billion dollars of benefit to his wealthy friends. They weave a good story that the least of us believe while the entire time funneling billions and billions of dollars of the tax money paid by the least of us to the wealthiest of us and corporations. What we need is good management and good social programs. We’re not going to get that combination from either party so I would rather have social programs while they try to figure it out.
The problem is, as I said, this is one of the few times where “letting dead-eyed mobbed up property developers make a goddamned mountain of money” will actually help everyone. I mean, even the abominable and corrupt crap Ford is doing to the greenbelt will help - every house, even million-dollar mcmansions, helps fight the crisis.
It’s a game of musical chairs where the chairs are allocated by money instead of by speed. Adding more chairs to the game helps more people win regardless. Even if you’re adding more thrones, that means there’s more milking-stools left-over for the poor instead of those milking-stools getting flipped and upgraded into artisanal urban kneeling seats to sell to the people who have the money for thrones.
And not only that, but PP’s stated plan: kick municipal asses until they start hitting housing targets? That would force municipalities to allow more housing. And assuming greenbelts remain in place (fingers-crossed), that would mean that cities would by necessity have to upzone and implement better, more urbanist, more intesification-friendly planning policies. That’s way better than Ford’s greenbelt crap, but then Ford didn’t campaign on the greenbelt crap.
But yes, assuming PP is being honest about his plan: It’s sneaky and yet still far better than not doing it and I’m mostly angry at his opponents for getting us to this point.
We have a limited number of builders and resources. It’s not helping by having them build a ton of mcmansions when they could be building high density condos instead.
We don’t really know what they’d build given the choice since one of those options is generally illegal (you can get special executive permission that makes it legal, but you could say the same about murdering people in countries that have a pardoning system).
If they can change the rules to allow building in the greenbelt, they can change the rules to allow higher density residence.
Right but I’m talking about federal and that’s provincial. In fact, Ford put together a Housing Affordability Task Force a few years back and that’s exactly what they recommended! He just… y’know… didn’t do any of it. Not sure why he even asked them in the first place.
This is incorrect. Unsustainable housing developments make municipalities poorer which worsens their ability to provide housing. We need to densify our populated places, not build new low-density developments in the middle of nowhere which will inevitably require costly highway expansions for the people there to get anywhere for work or amenities.
The fact that American sprawl cities have affordable housing shows that sprawl does help. Yes, sprawl is bad economics and worse environmentalism, but it does control housing prices.
For example, Zillow pegs the median home price in Houston, TX at $260k USD. It’s a suburban hellscape, but a reasonably-priced one.
Housing cost doesn’t matter on its own. Cost of living is what matters. If you get a cheap house but you need to spend a lot on transportation to get anywhere and do anything you’re still fucked. Houston suburbs are gonna be more expensive to live in than a small apartment in urban Montreal.
People are upset with Trudeau so they will try another option.
They will try the other option that worked so well the last time and the time before that and the time before that and the time…
…without actually thinking about the consequences of that other option. Basically how every Conservative government has gotten elected in the last few decades.
Yes exactly. People are stupid. They only see red team and blue team. Blue team says low taxes. They will pick blue team if they are running out of money because they don’t know what taxes are for or how economies work.
Pls pick orange team guys. :c
If rural Canada would stop picking the blue one so we could choose between red and orange that would be great.
That’s part of the stupidity OP is talking about.
I don’t like Trudeau either, but PP is way worse.
Its gonna be ok, Canadians. You are all living rent-free in my head!
Thanks, stranger. I don’t know why some people downvoted you (am I missing something here?), but I appreciate your concern and friendly sentiment.
Money printer go brrrrrrrr!
Deficit spending also makes things better!
I don’t understand how people can complain of “no options” or act like there are no other parties, just Coke or Pepsi. There are other parties, and even independents. Voting isn’t supposed to be a popularity contest for the most slick and charismatic candidate, nor is it a game where you try to match who you think everybody else is voting for.
It just feels to me like everyone is doing what they think they’re supposed to do (as if our votes are public?), instead of trusting themselves to really look at what they believe should happen and find a party that is willing (or at least more likely) to fight to have it done. 😟
In Alberta there’s a disgustingly large amount of people who simply vote blue because that’s what their dad did, and what his dad did. If you ask them WHY they hate Trudeau, you can’t get a coherent answer because they don’t actually know.
My dad made a comment one day about how the “ruined” economy was all Trudeau’s fault. I asked what he’d done and he couldn’t think of anything to say.
Hard agree… They just spew rhetoric because they think it’s what they’re supposed to say… it’s like a cult.
Trudeau has struggled to make housing a serious issue so Pierre is doing a lot better.
Is he?
I’m not convinced this issue has an easy solution. Most people who voice their opinions here always seem to have a silver bullet to the housing problem yet in most cases I can’t find any evidence supporting what they are proposing will work. People seem to just be guessing what the problem is based on anecdotal evidence. The only thing I can find evidence for is there is not enough housing being built in Canada but this seems like a tough problem to solve.
I’m also not even convinced this is a purely national problem. It seems like a lot of countries are dealing with the same problem right now. This isn’t to say there is no answer but it seems to suggest this is a tough problem and no one has a great solution to it.
The difference is other countries are at least trying things. The federal Liberals have only done things that actively make things worse (boosting demand via savings plans or RRSP withdrawals).They are all in on subsiding the landowners via the youth. It’s disgusting and I’m sick of it. It has destroyed the economic outlook of this country for decades IMO.
You’re right. It’s not a purely Canadian problem, and the solution is not easy.
But we’ve long since left behind any semblance of a world where easy solutions are enough. We need politicians who will embrace hard choices.
The hard choice behind housing comes down to one simple fact; for housing to be an investment, there must be a housing crisis. The scarcity of housing is what forces home prices to continuously rise. Any solution that doesn’t end the utility of housing as an investment will ultimately be insufficient. And no one wants to seriously talk about the idea that housing shouldn’t be an investment anymore.
And we need to be absolutely clear that the Conservatives have even less interest in tackling investment property than either the Liberals or NDP. Taking care of the wealthy is always their number one priority.
What we should be talking about is something like this. That’s the kind of big idea that would make a real difference.
Hey now, at least one party has the balls to put forth a policy that both makes sense and will have a material impact.
Part of the problem is that none of the parties address the real problems created by their actions. Liberal introduce a nation-wide carbon tax that should in theory tax large companies. In reality: Companies don’t pay taxes, they raise their prices to cover the tax increase which “trickles down” (the only time trickle down economics actually “works”) to the people.
So without dealing with that scenario when implementing the taxes, the ordinary Canadian gets hosed.
But now lets say PP becomes prime minister and reduces the taxes. Is he going to force companies to drop their prices to make up for that? Probably not. Companies will just use that as profit. So Canadians are still getting hosed.
And now after that lets say Liberals rise to power again. And re-implement these taxes. Once again, the companies will just pass those added costs onto the consumer again.
I wish I knew what the solution is here but I really don’t. It feels like no matter what the government in charge does, companies just keep using it as an excuse to hose us one way or the other.
I do need to point out that the carbon tax is a bad example here, because the tax is rebated directly back to individual Canadians. So even if companies are folding the tax into their prices, we’re not paying for it. They’re effectively raising the price, then paying us the difference.
Of course, companies that can find ways to reduce their carbon footprint can simply avoid paying the tax altogether, allowing them to obtain more profit at the same price point. This incentivises climate friendly behaviour.
It’s not a perfect solution, but within the neo-liberal paradigm that we’re currently stuck in its at least making a difference, and a lot of climate experts agree that carbon taxes are an effective strategy (they shouldn’t be the only strategy, but that’s a separate discussion).
Point is, companies raising prices in line with carbon taxes isn’t hurting your wallet, because you’re getting that money right back. The designers of the policy already knew that would happen and factored it in.
In all fairness, I’m getting nowhere near the amount back on rebates that prices have increased for me. One check doesn’t even cover 1 month of utility increases let alone the several months that go by in between. And there’s grocery, clothing and fuel costs on top of that.
You’re getting back the increase in price that’s directly attributable to the tax. The rest is corporate greed my friend.
If we want to tackle that then a lot of people need to start getting really comfortable with the word “socialism.”
That’s fair. But as an ordinary person what I see is this: no matter which government is in charge, I’m getting poorer and no government is willing to do anything to help people like me. They just keep blowing smoke up my ass and pretending like they’re actually doing something.
What makes you more of an ordinary person than anyone else here? We’re all ordinary people.
And you’re not wrong. We’re being continually fucked over by the combination of corporate greed and weak governments who either do nothing to reign that greed in, or (in the case of the Conservatives especially), actively encourage it.
Which brings me right back to my previous point; if we want to solve the real problems then a lot more people need to get real cozy with the word “socialism.”
And in the meantime, where governments fail, the people need to step up. Join a union; if your workplace doesn’t have one, find one that does, or talk to your coworkers about starting one. Alone we are powerless, but together we can bring whole industries to their knees. If your union isn’t doing enough for you, get involved in finding better leaders who will fight for what you need.
But for God’s sake, don’t vote for the scorpion and expect not to get stung. Pollievre can talk out the side of his mouth all he likes about what he’s going to do for us regular people, but it’s entirely clear where he stands, because it’s where his party has always stood. Conservatives are, from their inception, the defenders of institutional power, and today that means being the defenders of the wealthy, no more, no less.
The price jump has nothing to do with the carbon tax. The carbon tax is $0.14 per litre, so it’s only about 10% of the price of gas. That means it can only be blamed for 10% of the price-jump at an absolute upper limit, and that’s only if your diet consists of chugging gasoline (hey, I don’t judge).
If prices were only up 10% since last year I’d be goddamned ecstatic.
It’s not. It’s supply-chains, shockwaves from covid-shutdowns, pandemic-spending, a massive war in Asia between the world’s biggest gas and grain providers, and anti-globalist on-shoring driving up prices. The last one of those isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it has a cost just like carbon pricing has a cost.
Okay yes, at the pumps it may be, but what I’m saying is: Company 1 increases their prices 10% to offset the CT costs. Company 2 takes that 10% cost increase + their 10% increase and raises their pricing. Company 3 has an increase from Company 2 + 10% increase of their own and raises their prices accordingly.
Every level raises the prices that much more and in the end the consumers get stuck with all of that. So we’re paying the carbon tax for each company down the supply chain.
That would only make sense if 100% of company 1’s costs were gasoline. Also, the carbon tax has been going up every year since it first appeared in 2019. The price spike started last year. And the same price spikes are happening in every country, and most countries don’t have carbon taxes.
Governments mandating lower prices when taxes are raised won’t go well either. They’ll simply lower the quality of the goods and the same price
Absolutely agree. “Shrinkflation” is already a real problem used by many companies to give the appearance of not raising prices.
Also ‘skimpflation’ - like reducing the proportion of expensive ingredients or reducing the quality of ingredients
Cool, so people are interested in making it worse? Lol.
It worked in Ontario!
Wait…
I hate Rob Ford so fking much.
As long as they can blame liberals, they’d be ok with making things worse.
The fact is, all the hardship that most people are going through is likely down to their provincial leadership. Surprise, surprise, the majority are conservative.
I believe only Newfoundland and Labrador has a liberal premier, and their cost of living is below average.
But yeah, let’s have more pain and suffering.
BC has an NDP premier.
The problem isn’t even with Canada, it is a global phenomena. If you check news sites in other western democracies, they all have very similar struggles. The problem is wealth distribution is concentrated in too few people, and their wealth is such that like a black hole, it greedily consumes everything. The only solution is a readjustment of the global wealth pie, and break up many of these overly large monopolistic corporations. A vote for the cons is a doubling down of what we are already getting.
also, we all lived through a pandemic which of course gave a big blow to the economy.
While our politics is not technically two party, in terms of parties which have held power it is, and people seem stuck in that mindset. They know they are unhappy with the status quo, they know they want change, and the only change a lot of people are willing to consider is the one with the history of austerity.
So here’s the issue. I align more with NDP but I don’t want conservatives to win. I don’t want to split the vote between NDP and liberals so I end up voting for the more popular candidate which ends up being the Liberals.
This is the issue with the current voting system. If only there was a different voting system proposed. Maybe one party could even back it. Maybe we can vote that party in power and then can actually change our voting system /s
This type strategic voting against Liberals and Conservative is how Canada has just alternated between two bad parties for the last few decades.
Progress takes time and it doesn’t mean every single moment things have to go in the right direction. Canada can survive the Liberals and Conservatives for a couple more terms it means some type of political progress.
All the Conservatives have to do is wait long enough and they’ll win an election. They literally don’t need to do anything. Eventually enough Canadians will blame the current Prime Minister for their city buses running late and vote in a Conservative.
It’s especially rent, there was an article in Québec about someone who saw her rent increase from 1750$ to 2900$, condo was not re-sold or anything, it’s just the owner who want to eat poors.
If we want rent control, tories aren’t the answer.
They’re never the answer.
A lot of people just want to punish the Liberals for their failings (of which there are… many). The meme that Canada votes against people and not for people seems pretty accurate IMO.
I thought Quebec had strict rent control? That shouldn’t have been possible. It’s the kind of thing I would expect to hear out of BC or Ontario.
BC has rent control set by the province. They set raises below inflation for a few years now too.
With many, many loopholes.
Not if the apartment is less than 5 years old, there’s no limit in this case
Haven’t half of all Canadians always lived paycheque to paycheque? We can find the same headline going back decades. I thought the news was supposed to deliver that which is… new?
Do you have any links to perhaps back up that assertion? I have my doubts that it’s always been as high as 50%.
Yes, it looks like I may have some links in my browser history.
Thanks for sharing your doubts.
How embarrassing for you.
Nothing embarrassing about having those links in my browser history at all. It is not seedy content and I wanted to double check before posting my original comment. That’s just good due diligence.
It’s been almost 100 fucking years and yet this is still relevant.
STOP. SUPPORTING. TORIES. GODDAMN IT.
Honestly, what’s the first thing out of a British person’s lips? “I hate Tories, they’re ruining this country.” Yet they keep getting elected anyway. Can… can you see the problem with this? They pretend to be populist, but invariably steal from the poor and give to the rich. Stop falling for the bullshit and for your own prejudices and vote for people who will actually help the common man. Don’t make the same mistakes we Americans keep making!