New Urgency to Support the Most Vulnerable in this Cost-of-Living Crisis and Climate Emergency
Oxfam Canada briefing note
The combined impacts of climate change, spiking food and energy price inflation, and ongoing and worsening conflict are wreaking havoc on the world’s most vulnerable people. Women and gender diverse people living in poverty, who have contributed least to these crises, are among the worst impacted. The deteriorating global situation has set progress towards achieving gender parity back by a whole generation.1
Federal Budget 2024 is Canada’s opportunity to fight social and economic inequality that threaten the fabric of our society and our shared prosperity. By supporting marginalized peoples to defend their rights and tackle these intersecting crises, the federal government can turn this moment of crisis into an opportunity for transformation.
Oxfam Canada acknowledges the historical and ongoing oppression and colonization of Indigenous Peoples, cultures and lands in what we now know as Canada. We commit to acting in solidarity with First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples in their struggles for self-determination and decolonization. Oxfam Canada’s offices are located on the unceded, unsurrendered traditional territories of the Anishinabe Algonquin peoples. As settlers on these lands, we commit to walking in solidarity with our host nation and according to Oxfam’s values of equality, empowerment, solidarity, inclusiveness, accountability and courage.
© Oxfam Canada October 2023
For further information on the issues raised in this paper, please contact Ian Thomson, Manager of Policy: ian.thomson@oxfam.org
Fighting Inequality and Countering Hate
Budget 2024 can help build a more equal, stable and secure world by countering inequality and supporting marginalized people – such as women, 2SLGBTQ people, Indigenous peoples, racialized people, immigrants, people with disabilities – who make up the majority of the world’s poor and face the greatest social and economic barriers.
We are witnessing the rise of interconnected anti-rights movements – anti-women, anti-trans, antiabortion, anti-feminist, anti-democratic, etc. – and attacks on women’s rights, 2SLGBTQ rights and gender equality. The growth in far-right misogynistic attitudes and movements is provoking growing hatred against migrant trans women, trans women of colour and trans sex workers most at risk.2 Reports of in-person and online attacks, intimidation, threats and harassment against woman politicians are also growing.3 Such acts are a form of backlash against women’s rights and feminist movements and are intended to keep women and gender-diverse people out of positions of power. They pose a serious threat to our democracy and gender equality.
Women’s and 2SLGBTQ movements in Canada need stable, long-term sources of funding to reverse the gender equality setbacks of the pandemic and defend their rights in the wake of hateful movements. Budget 2024 presents an opportunity for the government to create long-term funding streams for women’s rights and gender justice organizations operating in Canada. Strengthened movements to defend rights, promote inclusion and reduce inequality will be a lasting legacy of the government’s feminist agenda.
Extreme inequality, aggravated by the unprecedented climb of food and energy prices, is wreaking havoc on the world’s most vulnerable people. Oxfam estimates that 263 million more people were pushed into extreme poverty in 2022.4 Combatting inequality at the global level means investing more, not less, in our feminist approach to international assistance for low- and middle-income countries. Budget 2024 should increase the international assistance envelope by at least $1.2 billion to fulfil the government’s promise of annual increases and reverse the cuts imposed in last year’s budget. Life-saving humanitarian assistance is needed more than ever.
RECOMMENDATIONS
1. The federal government should create an independent long-term Sustainability Fund for women’s and gender justice organizations in Canada, developed in consultation and collaboration with national, domestically focused feminist organizations. Such a fund would provide stable, predictable core funding to women’s and gender justice organizations in their work to advance equality and achieve the realization of human rights across Canadian society.
2. The international assistance envelope should be increased by $1.2 billion in new and additional funding above 2021-22 levels to reduce global inequality and promote a more stable and prosperous global economy. Such investments will allow Canada to maintain our existing international commitments to tackle the global hunger crisis, fight climate change and uphold sexual and reproductive health and rights – while also investing in new initiatives to promote women’s voice and leadership and respond to new and emerging humanitarian crises.5
3. At least $20 million in international assistance programming should be allocated every year to advances the human rights of LGBTQ+ people internationally. This would roughly be 0.3% of total aid spending, bringing Canada in line with other leading donor countries supporting LGBTQ+ human rights internationally, such as the Netherlands and Sweden. With the rise of anti-LGBTQ+ legislation and hatred in many parts of the world, this is the moment for Canada to show leadership.6
4. The federal government should increase climate finance to low-income countries, in line with Canada’s fair share of financial capacity and in line with our historic responsibility for carbon emissions. New and additional funding is needed to enhance Canada’s current five-year international climate finance package, with an emphasis on providing more grants to low-income countries for climate adaptation and making a significant financial contribution to the new Loss and Damage Facility at the United Nations.
Building a Fair Economy for All
The soaring cost of living is making it harder for households to afford basic essentials and is requiring workers to put in long working hours, often at more than one job. Low-income Canadians in particular struggle with a cost-of-living crisis and housing crisis while Canada’s biggest corporations are reaping record level profits and not paying their fair share of taxes. In 2021, corporations enjoyed their lowest ever recorded income tax rate, despite having their third highest recorded profit rate, thanks in part to over $100 billion in federal pandemic support. Canadian corporations pay so little tax that less than one week of revenues covered all their income taxes for the entire year in 2022.7
The dramatic increase in profits means that companies are not just passing along their own higher costs to consumers, but are actually profiting from the crisis. Similar to the measures introduced for the financial sector, a temporary 15% windfall tax on excess profits should be introduced across all sectors to help bring an end to crisis profiteering.
To pay for the essential services on which we all depend, the federal government should raise new public revenues by implementing a permanent wealth tax on the super-rich. A modestly progressive wealth tax – at 2% for wealth over $5 million, 3% for wealth over $50 million and 5% for wealth over $1 billion – would generate close to $79 billion annually.8 Canadians support such a move in principle, with polls showing that the idea of a 1% tax on wealth paid by people who have more than $20m in assets is favoured by 4 in 5 Canadians, with at least 75% support in every region, across age groups and education levels, including broad support in households in the top income bracket.9
RECOMMENDATIONS
5. The government should introduce a permanent wealth tax on the richest Canadians immediately. This tax should be at least at 2 per cent for wealth over $5 million, 3 per cent for wealth over $50 million and 5 per cent for wealth over $1 billion.10
6. The government should introduce a 15 per cent windfall tax for companies in all sectors that generate oversized profits due to crises, such as pandemics or global spikes in food and energy prices. The government should also raise the federal corporate tax rate to 20 per cent from 15 per cent to ensure Canadian corporations pay their fair share.
Budget 2024 should respond to our current economic crisis by investing in the people who keep our society strong and resilient. Public services that benefit all Canadians – such as health care, disability care, long-term care, education and public transit – remain dramatically underfunded.
Daily tasks that keep our society and economy running – such as cooking, cleaning, laundry, family planning, child rearing, elder care and caring for people with disabilities – are disproportionally done by women. For hundreds of thousands of women in Canada, there is no escape from the constant of care work.
In Canada, care workers make up nearly one fifth of the total employed labour force.11 Yet, the paid care sector is characterized by low wages, low status and poor working conditions. Burnout among paid care workers has spiked since the onset of the pandemic, and many workers are leaving the sector as a result.12
Expanding the care economy and the public and emergency services on which Canadians depend should be a core priority. Establishing a National Care Economy Commission can identify current gaps, recommend solutions and best practice, and direct federal investments in a strategic manner.
RECOMMENDATIONS
7. The government should establish a National Care Economy Commission with $30 million of funding over 3 years, tasked with designing and implementing a holistic strategy that recognizes care as a human right, combats gender norms surrounding care work and builds a robust system to provide child, disability, health and elder care.13 This has already been recommended by the Standing Committee on the Status of Women,14 and pursuant to Canada’s obligations as a member of the Global Alliance for Care.
8. The government should expand non-profit and publicly owned early learning and child care with an additional $10 billion to the existing Infrastructure Fund to build out physical facilities required to create 250,000 new quality and inclusive spaces by March 31, 2026, as outlined in the Government of Canada’s $10-a-Day child care plan.15 The government should also develop a workforce strategy for child care workers that ensures adequate compensation and dignified working conditions in partnership with childcare workers and organizations.
The government should be coordinating its investments in the care economy with its sustainable jobs agenda. A just energy transition presents a unique opportunity and avenue to promote gender equality and inclusiveness in the world of work.
The Sustainable Jobs Act, Bill C-50, mentions “the creation of employment opportunities for groups underrepresented in the labour market, including women, persons with disabilities, Indigenous peoples, Black and other racialized people, 2SLGBTQIA+, and other equity seeking groups.”16 Clearer guidelines and regulations will be required to ensure women, care workers and Indigenous peoples’ human rights are upheld.
Sustainable jobs legislation will require significant investments into a strong workforce development strategy that explicitly recognizes care infrastructure in the jobs plan that are high quality, green and contribute to climate resilience. Canada’s care strategy and climate action must come together in the sustainable jobs agenda.
RECOMMENDATIONS
9. The government should provide targeted funding to support people and groups who have been historically under-represented in Canada’s energy sectors (such as Indigenous peoples, women, immigrants, racialized people, people with disabilities) to find green jobs in the renewable energy or energy conservation sectors. The energy transition presents an opportunity to centre Indigenous Peoples’ human rights and the rights of marginalized women in the Sustainable Jobs agenda by creating an equity and inclusion green jobs strategy.
10. The government should adopt and invest in a strong workforce development strategy that explicitly recognizes care work and care infrastructure under the Sustainable Jobs plan to create care economy jobs that are high quality, green and contribute to community resilience. Canada’s care strategy and climate action must come together in the Sustainable Jobs agenda.
ENDNOTES
1 Oxfam Canada. (2023). Feminist Scorecard 2023: Feminist Action in a World of Crises https://www.oxfam.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/feminist-scorecard-2023-report.pdf
2 J. Wareham. (2021, November 11). “375 Transgender People Murdered In 2021-‘Deadliest Year’ Since Records Began,” Forbes
3 M.L. Krook. (2020). Violence against Women in Politics https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780190088460.001.0001
4 Oxfam. (2022). First Crisis, Then Catastrophe h ttps://www.oxfam.org/en/research/first-crisis-then-catastrophe
5 Cooperation Canada. (2023). Written Submission for the Pre-Budget Consultations in Advance of Federal Budget 2023 https://cooperation.ca/written-submission-for-the-pre-budget-consultations-in-advanceof-federal-budget-2023/
6 Dignity Network Canada. (2021). Federal LGBTQ2S Action Plan Submission https://dignitynetwork.ca/wp-content/uploads/DNC-Federal-LGBTQ2S-Action-Plan-Submission-EN.pdf
7 D.T. Cochrane. (2022). January 7th is Corporate Income Tax Freedom Day 2022 https://www.taxfairness.ca/ sites/default/files/2022-06/report-january-7th-is-corporate-imcome-tax-freedom-day-canadians-fortax-fairness-jan-2022.pdf
8 Fight Inequality Alliance, Institute for Policy Studies, Oxfam and the Patriotic Millionaires. (2022). Taxing Extreme Wealth: An Annual Tax on the World’s Multi-Millionaires and billionaires: What It Would Raise and What It Could Pay For. Retrieved 6 March 2023, from https://patrioticmillionaires.org/wp-content/uploads/ Annual-Wealth-Tax-Factsheet.pdf
9 N. Bulowski. (2021, August 5). Canadians Want a Wealth Tax and Are Willing to Vote for It. Canada’s National Observer.
10 Oxfam. (2023). Survival Of The Richest: How We Must Tax The Super-Rich Now To Fight Inequality https://www.oxfam.ca/publication/davos-report-2023/
11 F. Khanam, M. Langevin, K Savage, et al. (2022). Women Working in Paid Care Occupations https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/75-006-x/2022001/article/00001-eng.htm
12 D. McGinn. (2022, March 12). “Daycare Workers Are Exiting the Profession in Droves, Just as Access for Parents Opens Up,” The Globe and Mail
13 Oxfam Canada. (2023). How Much Do We Care? An Assessment Of The Canadian Paid And Unpaid Care Policy Landscape https://www.oxfam.ca/publication/how-much-do-we-care
14 Parliament of Canada. (2021). Women’s Unpaid Care Work: Report of the Standing Committee on the Status of Women https://www.ourcommons.ca/Content/Committee/432/FEWO/Reports/RP11380080/feworp08/ feworp08-e.pdf
15 Child Care Now. (2022). Submission to Department of Finance Canada Federal Budget 2022 https://childcarenow.ca/wp-content/uploads/sites/9/2022/07/Child-Care-Now-Child-Care-AdvocacyAssociation-of-Canada-2022-Federal-budget-submission-2.pdf
16 Parliament of Canada, 44th Parliament, 1st session. (2023). Bill C-50: An Act respecting accountability, transparency and engagement to support the creation of sustainable jobs for workers and economic growth in a net-zero economy https://www.parl.ca/legisinfo/en/bill/44-1/c-50
Oxfam Canada’s mission is to fight inequality and patriarchy to end poverty and injustice, with a focus on improving the lives and promoting the rights of women and girls. We work directly with women’s rights organizations, communities and partners to challenge the systems that perpetuate inequality and keep people poor.
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