Poverty in Canada: Some recent empirical findings

tween (Toronto: Emblem Books, 1963); The Cariboo Horses (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1965); North of Summer (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1967); Poems for All the Annettes (Toronto: Anansl, 1968); Wild Grape Wine (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1968). References in my text to poems in these works are contained in parenthesis following the quotation, containing page number and book title. 2. "Overheard 1865," Canadian Forum, XXX (Jan., 1951), 235; "Paul Kane," Canadian Forum, XXXI (May, 1951), 43. 3. Originally published in The Crafte So Longe to Lerne, reprinted in the 1968 Poems for All the Annettes with such Poverty in Canada: Some recent empirical findings N. H. LITHWICK A. A PERSPECTIVE ON POVERTY The nature of poverty in any society is closely related to the economic potential of that society. The greater the availability of national resources - physical, natural and human - the more the problem of poverty tends to be a distributional one rather than a developmental one. By any standard, Canada is a society of relatively abundant resources. The level of GNP per Canadian is now about $3,500. Had we been operating closer to full resource utilization, the level would be several per cent higher. To gauge the significance of this figure, there are two useful perspectives. One is the past, to see how our resource potential has been augmented. The second is to compare our current potential with that of other countries to see where we stand in an international context. Table 1 contains some data on the expansion of GNP per head since Confederation. * Part of this paper was written while on sabbatical leave at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, with the financial assistance of a C. D. Howe fellowship. Journal of Canadian Studies minor rev1s1ons as changing "got drunk" to "took LSD.'" The 1968 Annettes is, In effect, not a second edition of the original but a "Collected Poems" to date. 4. Originally published in The Blur in Between; the latter reprinted with slight revisions in 1968 Annettes. 5. "Gilgamesh and Friend," 1968 Annettes, 43. 6. In his Technology and Empire (Toronto: Anansi, 1969), 13-40. 7. See "Hombre," Wild Grape Wine, 67-8. 8. Robert Jay Lifton, "Protean Man," in his History and Human Survival (New York: Random House, 1970), 311-31. The effects of inflation have been crudely eliminated, and estimates are given for prices prevailing in 1867 and in 1967 to provide a forward and backward looking perspective to the growth of resource potential . TABLE 1 CANADIAN PER CAPITA GNP, CONSTANT DOLLARS YEAR 1867 PRICES 1967 Prices 1867 120 573 1900 205 984 1929 311 1488 1933 209 1002 1939 294 1418 1946 434 2080 1956 518 2482 1967 635 3042 Source: DBS, National Accounts, Income & Expenditure, 1926-56, 1961 and 1967. 0. J. Firestone, Canada's Economic Development, 1867-1953, Income & Wealth, Series VII, Bowes & Bowes, London, 1958, Table 10, p. 66. The increase in the level of real per capita GNP since Confederation is indeed substantial . This was based on an increase in the total flow of resources by some 25 times, 27 and a widening of the population by a factor of 5, so that their average economic potential also rose by 5 times. Since aggregative statistics hide much of the tangible evidence of economic progress, and since they are almost universally distrusted , we include in table 2 some further evidence on the growth of our economic potential. Not only are the increases in the flow of goods and services substantial, but the reduction in those factors that made life so harsh 100 years ago, such as long work weeks, and high mortality rates, also have been important concomitants of our economic progress. TABLE 2 INDICES OF THE EXPANSION OF C/\NADIAN POTENTIAL 1871 1904 1926 1960 1) Housing Stock (Millions) 0.6 n.a. 2) Installed Power Generating Capacity (MKW) 2.1 3.9 0.6 4.6 23.0 1.3 158.5 4104.4 736.7 5728 82.4 8.0 0.9 43.0 3) Employment in Manufacturing (Millions) 4) Railroad Freight (Millions of Tons) 5) Automobile Registrations (Thousands) 6) Civil Aviation (Thousands of Hours Flown) 7) Telephones (Thousands) 0.2 5.7 n.a. n.a. 0.5 95 8...