Human Resources committee  The first one is called The Age of Insecurity, and the second is called The Impact of Inequality. You are probably aware that income inequality and economic inequality—that segment we call poverty—is at the heart of increasing levels of insecurity and crime worldwide. It's also responsible for the ill health that we see right across societies.

Canada-Peru Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act  We have seen the same dynamic right across North America. The member is right to raise the issue of income inequality. All of that money is being channelled to corporate CEOs, corporate lawyers. Essentially, we have a massive movement of wealth which means the wealthiest Canadians now take most of Canada's income.

Human Resources committee  I think the market basket measure measures one thing and the low-income cut-off measures another. It is important to measure income inequality. I think it is important because income inequality is an indicator of social exclusion. My answer is, don't pick one.

Finance committee  I think that if the purpose of the tax reduction was to promote economic growth, there is a considerable amount of evidence that a shift from personal income tax toward consumption tax would promote the rate of economic growth, keeping the overall tax burden constant. However, there is a concern that a move of that sort could increase income inequality. So to a large extent, the answer to the question depends on the relative weight you put on reducing income inequality compared to increasing the rate of growth. I think that is a question for politicians to decide in the countries concerned, rather than the OECD.

Business of Supply  Two right wing, radical free traders, Kenneth Sheve and Matthew Slaughter, who has the oxymoronic title of being a former economic policy adviser to George Bush, said in a recent issue of Foreign Affairs: [Income] inequality in the United States is greater today than at any time since the 1920s. Less than four percent of workers were in educational groups that enjoyed increases in mean real money earnings from 2000 to 2005; mean real money earnings rose for workers with doctorates and professional graduate degrees-- --corporate lawyers and CEOs-- --and fell for all others.

Canada–EFTA Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act  This has not been seen since the 1930s. We went through the Great Depression. We had that type of income inequality. The foundation of the CCF, the NDP's precursor party, fighting in the House of Commons and fighting across the country, made a real difference. We had a much more balanced economy and much more balanced economic approaches.

HIV-AIDS among Aboriginal People  Essentially, we are recreating the same conditions that we had around the time of prohibition and, later, the Great Depression. This is not just limited to Canada. In the United States, we see similar levels of income inequality, as we well know. The United States now, according to many economic indicators, has the same level of income inequality that existed in 1928. We have turned the clock back economically in the United States to a time prior to Franklin Delano Roosevelt's new deal, prior to the array of social programs that were put into place.

International Trade committee  On Monday we had the ambassador from Chile testify before us, and he talked about the importance of not treating trade in isolation, that in fact what's happened under a much more progressive government in Chile now is that they are taking trade and the economy on a parallel track and engaging in a very targeted social policy initiative to try to reduce income inequality. In Canada, of course, we're seeing rising income inequality. We're now at the same stage we were in the 1920s. In fact, for most Canadian families their income has actually fallen since 1989, since the first Canada-U.S.

International Trade committee  Since 1989, real income has actually declined for two-thirds of Canadian families, and we now have the same kind of income inequality that we had in the 1930s, where 50% of all income goes to the wealthiest Canadians. Those are the facts. That's what Statistics Canada tells us about what has happened since 1989.

Business of Supply  The statistics are compelling. Two-thirds of Canadian families are earning less and we now have levels of income inequality that we have not seen since the Great Depression. It has been a catastrophic failure of economic policy and economic fundamentals. The most catastrophic impact has been on younger Canadians, a generation that has been completely lost by both the Liberals and the Conservatives over the past 20 years.

Human Resources committee  I think we do need relative income measures like the LICO, and we can debate the pros and cons of the particular methodology, but that's important. It tracks low income and income inequality. But I would argue that we need to continue to develop a series of deprivation measures, whether it's the MBM or a list of.... For instance, New Zealand has developed a very interesting living standard index over the last decade as part of their social report, which would be very interesting.

Human Resources committee  If we're using the after-tax cycle, it's basically been sliding sideways around the 11% mark for the last four years or so. Income inequality has continued to grow, so the gap between the rich and the poor, as measured, actually has grown. That's a trend that's evident in many advanced industrialized countries in Europe, and in the United States it's even more pronounced.

Human Resources committee  The federal government has moved back from housing, and I don't think it's an accident or a mistake that when we started to see poverty rising in the 1990s and income inequality emerging, it was at the same time that we saw a significant reduction in federal and provincial moneys in social housing and housing programs, just at the time when private market housing was taking off.

Human Resources committee  The LICO, which is much maligned, actually is a very important historical measure. It has been a very credible and rigorous tracking of low income and income inequality in Canada for these many years. We do not have measures, for instance, for material deprivation, and that's what Glenn was talking about. In Europe they've actually supplemented their relative income poverty lines with a series of deprivation indices, and they report on both.

Finance committee  Let me address that with a brief point. One thing that's really interesting is that there has been a rise in income inequality in Canada over the past 25 years, but a lot of that is driven not by changes in capital income but by changes in earned income. People at the very top of the wage distribution of earned income have done very well over the last 20 years.