A study published last week shows that social inequality in Canada has now reached levels unseen since the 1920s. Or, to put it otherwise, is now at levels comparable to those that prevailed prior to the great social struggles that gave birth to the mass industrial unions and compelled big business governments to establish a social safety net.
Published by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) and authored by CCPA economist Armine Yalnizyan, The Rise of Canada’s Richest 1% shows that “the higher up the income ladder you climb, the faster the rise of the rich.” “Whether the economy grew or faltered,” during the past three decades, “the rise of the rich has been unstoppable.”
Previous studies have shown that since the economic slump of the early 1980s the vast majority of Canadians have experienced no or only tiny gains in their incomes once inflation is taken into account. Yet over the past thirty years, Canada’s real economic output has more than doubled...
The CCPA study argues that the past three decades have seen “a stunning reversal of long-term trends.” From the beginning of the Second World War through the 1977, the income share of the top 1 percent was almost cut in half, falling from 14 percent to 7.7 percent. But, by 2007, the richest 1 percent of Canadian were again earning 13.8 percent of all market income and a 15.7 percent share of capital gains (which prior to 1971 were not taxed and therefore not declared) are included.
Huge as is this reversal, there is a second element in the rise of the rich that is almost as significant. As Yalnizyan demonstrates in the second half of her study, the rich have not only monopolized the gains in income, they have benefited from massive cuts in the rates at which their incomes and capital gains are taxed.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/dec2010/cana-d09.shtml
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