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Youth
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 Sask.
wage earners lagging
Neil
Scott, Saskatchewan News Network, Gerry Klein, The StarPhoenix,
March 12, 2003
There are more full-time workers
earning a measly wage in Saskatchewan than in any other province,
thanks in part to the high number of farmers.
Census figures released by
Statistics Canada Tuesday show Saskatchewan has the highest percentage
of full-time workers earning $20,000 a year or less.
Across Canada, 1.5 million
workers, or 17 per cent of the workforce, earned $20,000 or less
per year. In Saskatchewan, 73,400 workers, representing 27 per
cent of the full-time labour force, earned less than $20,000.
Saskatoon had among the highest
number of full-time employees working year-round and earning
less than $20,000 annually.
"Of all individuals who
worked full-year, full-time in Saskatoon, 20.7 per cent -- or
13,600 -- had earnings of less than $20,000 in 2000."
More than 128,900 men and women
in Saskatoon received employment income during 2000, according
to the census, and they earned, on average, $28,174 -- below
the national average of $31,757 for all earners.
More than 51 per cent of all
wage earners in Saskatoon worked full-time for the year, earning
on average $39,315 a year. This compares with the national average
of $43,231, the Statistics Canada report says.
Farmers were more likely to
be low-income earners than those employed in any other occupation,
a written analysis provided by Statistics Canada indicated.
The data, which was for the
year 2000 but collected as part of the 2001 census, indicates
there were 84,920 people across Canada who had full-time jobs
as farmers or farm managers but earned less than $20,000 per
year.
Larry Hubich, president of
the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour, said the information on
low incomes isn't surprising. Businesspeople -- who sometimes
complain about a lack of skilled workers in Saskatchewan -- need
to raise wage rates to attract workers and to provide them with
a better standard of living, Hubich said.
The report also noted there
are large differences in incomes among farmers and some make
in excess of $100,000.
In Saskatoon, about 1.9 per
cent of the 128,900 people reporting employment income had earnings
of $100,000 or more, compared with the national average of 2.7
per cent, it says.
The report also indicated that
the higher one's education, the more money that person is likely
to earn. University educated, full-time workers earned an average
of $61,823 in 2000, compared to $41,825 for college graduates
and $36,278 for people with high-school diplomas. Twenty-six
per cent of Saskatoon's workforce claims a university education.
The good news for Saskatchewan
and Saskatoon is that the percentage of young women, between
the ages of 20 and 34, with a university degree has grown compared
to their male counterparts. While 23.7 per cent of the population
in this age category claimed a university degree, 26.5 per cent
of the women had convocated, compared with 20.7 per cent of the
men.
© Copyright 2003 The StarPhoenix (Saskatoon)
Average
earnings top $30,000
By TERRY WEBER, Globe
and Mail, Mar. 11, 2003
- Canada's average annual earnings
topped $30,000 for the first time in 2000 as the nation felt
the pull of globalization, an aging work force and more highly
educated workers, Statistics Canada said Tuesday.
Drawing on its latest census
data, the government agency also found that - despite a narrowing
gap - men still make more than women and that a startling number
of Canadians work full-time all year but still pull in only $20,000
or less annually.
At the other end of the spectrum,
ranks of the $100,000 plus club swelled by more than two-thirds
in the 10 years ending in 2000, with Alberta seeing the biggest
boom in that category.
According to figures from the
2001 Census, the government agency said annual earnings for Canadians
aged 15 and over averaged $31,757 apiece, up from $29,596 in
1990 and $29,229 in 1980.
Over the past decade, Canadians'
average annual earnings have risen by 7.3 per cent, owing to
three key factors:
· The demand for highly skilled workers in the face of
advancing technologies and globalization
· An aging work force of baby boomers who experienced
substantial gains in earnings during the decade
· More working people with university education.
As well, the most recent numbers
also indicate the number of Canadians raking in big bucks is
soaring, rising almost 70 per cent between 1990 and 2000.
In 2000, just under 447,000
people earned $100,000 or more, the government agency said. That's
up 68.8 per cent from 264,500 a decade earlier.
"Nationally, the number
of all earners increased by only 10.1 per cent," Statscan
said.
100K level
"These high-earning individuals
represented 2.7 per cent of all earners in 2000, compared with
1.8 per cent in 1990."
The majority of people earning
at that level were university educated men in their prime working
years, although the proportions shifted slightly between 1990
and 2000.
"While men accounted for
about 84 per cent, or 373,000, of the 447,000 people in this
earnings bracket, this figure was lower than in 1990 when men
accounted for 89 per cent of this same group," Statscan
said.
The number of women making
$100,000 plus increased 2.5 fold between 1990 and 2000.
The most common occupational
category among male high earners was sales, marketing and advertising
manager, accounting for 5.1 per cent of the total. The top two
categories for women were lawyers and general practitioners-family
physicians. Combined, they accounted for more than 10 per cent
of high-earning women, the agency said.
By province, Alberta had the
most growth in the top earnings category, with the ranks in that
bracket doubling in 10 years. About 51 per cent of people raking
in $100,000 or more lived in Ontario, Canada's most populous
province.
Down a tier, an estimated 386,200
people had average annual earnings of between $80,000 and $100,000,
up 47.5 per cent over the same period. People in that bracket
accounted for 2.4 per cent of all earners in 2000, compared with
1.8 per cent in 1990.
The number of people making
between $60,000 and $80,000 rose 25 per cent during the same
10-year span.
$20,000 income or lower
On the other end of the scale,
however, the number of people making less than $20,000 a year
also swelled, although they accounted for roughly the same proportion
of earnings in both years.
In 2000, about 6.7 million
Canadians had an average annual earnings of less than $20,000,
up 5 per cent or about 316,000 from 1990's levels.
At the start of this decade,
earning below that level accounted for nearly 41 per cent of
all earners, roughly the same proportion as in 1980, the government
agency said.
About a fifth of the total
making less than $20,000 annually - roughly 1.5 million Canadians
- were working in full-time, year-round positions.
Fifty-four per cent of people
in that category were women.
"To put this in perspective,
$20,000 represents less than one-half of the average earnings
of all Canadians working full-year, full-time [$43,231],"
Statscan said.
"Or, to put it another
way, $20,000 in earnings is the equivalent of a wage of $10 an
hour for an earner working 50 weeks a year and 40 hours each
week."
Of the 795,000 women making
below $20,000 while working full-time, all year, more than 50,000
were retail salespeople and clerks while another 33,000 were
retail trade managers.
"Among female low earners,
the fastest growth among occupational categories during the decade
occurred in early childhood educators and assistants," the
agency said.
Their numbers more than doubled
in the 10 years between 1990 and 2000.
For men, the most common occupational
category for those making less than $20,000 was farmer and farm
manager.
"This reflects the fact
that many farmers are self-employed and may experience large
revenue fluctuations from year to year," the agency said.
"However, the number of low-earning farmers fell during
the decade."
In that category, however,
there were big differences in earnings with farmers and general
farm workers ranked 26th out of 507 categories as an occupation
for men taking in $100,000 or more.
Wage gap
Although the latest data show
the wage gap between the sexes is closing, there remains a big
disparity between how much men and women take in.
On average, Statscan said,
women earn 64 cents for every dollar men make, compared with
52 cents in 20 years earlier.
"The gap reflects differences
in hours of work, job and work experience, and occupations and
wage rates," Statscan said.
"The earnings differential
resulting from differences in hours of work was about seven cents
on the dollar in 2000. Women working on a full-year, full-time
basis made just over 70 cents for every $1 earned by their male
counterparts."
However, Tuesday's report also
noted that the gender difference was significantly less among
younger women, which those aged 25 and 29 earning slightly more
than 81 cents for every dollar earned by men in the same age
category.
"This group of young women
had higher relative earnings than women overall because they
were less likely to have experienced career interruptions due
to family responsibilities," Statscan noted.
"In addition, they had
a wider breadth of occupations to choose from than women historically
have had."
For recent arrivals in this
country, the earnings picture has deteriorated sharply.
Immigrant earnings
In that year, male immigrants
who had been in Canada for a full year were making 63 cents for
every dollar made by those born in this country. That compared
to the 80 cents made by immigrants who had been in Canada for
10 years.
In 1990, recent male immigrants
also started out making about 63 cents for every dollar earned
by the Canadian-born, but reached over 90 cents for those who
had been in the country for 10 years, Statscan said.
A decade earlier, male immigrants
who had been in the country for only a year made about 72 cents
for every dollar made by the Canadian-born. Those who had been
in Canada three or more years made about 90 cents or more.
"Once they had been in
the country nine or 10 years, they made as much as Canadian-born
men of the same age," the agency said.
"The patterns are similar
for women."
© 2003 Bell Globemedia
Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Debt looming over province
The
StarPhoenix Editorial Thursday, March 20, 2003
When Finance Minister Jim Melenchuk
suggests that some help from Ottawa and a war-inspired spike
in oil prices are easing the pressure on what promised to be
a tough provincial budget next week, most people begin to breathe
a little easier.
After all, it must be good
news that Melenchuk has found enough new money to stave off a
tax hike or having to borrow millions to balance the books. Yet,
even as the minister says things are so promising that he isn't
ruling out further tax breaks, he invokes the Fiscal Stabilization
Fund as his ace in the hole that makes it all possible.
Rather than get embroiled in
the details of how this fund operates, suffice to say that drawing
down money from it requires the finance minister to borrow the
money on the market. Call it good cash management or phantom
accounting, the fund operates as a line of credit, not a savings
account.
Given Saskatchewan's overall
debt load which then finance minister Eric Cline pegged seven
weeks ago at nearly $12 billion -- this after tacking on $500
million which included $23 million borrowed to cover a drawdown
on the rainy day fund -- it's time to pay close attention to
Melenchuk's "good news."
While Saskatchewan no doubt
benefits in the short term by oil prices that spiked in the runup
to another Gulf war, it's foolhardy to treat the money as anything
more than a windfall. With the war a certainty at this point,
some analysts are predicting that oil prices that soared to more
than $32 US could plunge within months to as low as $20 a barrel.
The provincial auditor warns
us at every turn that Saskatchewan's indebted, trade dependent
and resource-based economy remains greatly vulnerable to forces
beyond its control -- a fact that will hit this province a few
years hence with the impact of a freight train.
Anyone who has been paying
attention to what's been happening south of the border knows
by now that it's U.S. President George W. Bush who has the throttle
wide open on that freight train.
As the non-partisan Congressional
Budget Office has made abundantly clear, the lop-sided tax cuts
instituted by the Bush administration this year are destined
to reverse a projected American budget surplus of nearly $5.6
trillion US over the next decade into a deficit of at least $1.8
trillion.
Factoring in costs associated
with the war in Iraq, ballooning medicare costs and such things
as the impact of baby boomer retirements which will begin hitting
the treasury around 2010 -- their pension costs are borne by
the federal budget under a pay-as-you-go system -- the once-rich
Uncle Sam will be in the hole by close to $5 trillion.
While American budget woes
may seem far removed from those of puny little Saskatchewan,
the reality is that the multi-trillion-dollar needs of the U.S.
giant set the rules for the market that apply to everyone else.
With the giant U.S. economy
claiming first dibs on hundreds of billions of investor dollars,
it only drives up borrowing rates for lightweights such as Saskatchewan.
And if a struggling U.S. government adopts an irresponsible strategy
of printing money to pay the bills and lets inflation drive down
the value of its burgeoning debt, interest rates will skyrocket.
Saskatchewan's public accounts
show that it has about $4 billion in debt coming due over the
next five years, with nearly another $1 billion borrowed by Crown
corporations. Government borrowings of close to another $4 billion
will need to be renewed over the decade after that, along with
$2 billion or so by Crowns. Renewing all this debt at high rates
will exacerbate Saskatchewan's problem of having to siphon off
more than $600 million annually to cover interest.
That's why Saskatchewan residents
should be holding Melenchuk to account when he talks about a
"good news" budget. Will he put the windfall revenue
to good use for the long term or pad programs and do nothing
to fix structural budget deficits?
Melenchuk should act as if
the light at the end of the tunnel indeed is a freight train,
not the route to electoral salvation.
© Copyright 2003 The StarPhoenix (Saskatoon)
Among the
big salaries in Saskatchewan: Superintendant Brian Dueck who has risen through
the ranks through serving himself. He is making around $150,000
a year and taxes have paid for yet to be determined thousands
to defend his criminal actions | Many of the university degreed people
work for Saskatchewan Social Services and the Department of Justice
where they earn their high salaries by keeping others down.
The $10M+
lawsuit: Rick Klassen still standing. Pretrial conferences in
May will prepare September trial. New Justice Minister Eric Cline has
inherited a badly corrupted portfolio
StarPhoenix
editorial: Privilege
ruling blow to justice | Dueck succeeded in pressing his bad
faith block to exculpatory evidence | a precedent from the
Stasi | Holgate's
motions on Feb. 19 | Matt Miazga | Terry Hinz | The
$10M+ lawsuit | StarPhoenix
report from July, 1991
|
Truth can never be
told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd. William Blake, The Proverbs of Hell
