Canuckistani

I've given quotes and links how temp workers depress wages. A sane country doesn't import temp workers to do permanent jobs - they allow the market to push wages up if required so that citizens will take those jobs. Otherwise, we could make the argument about pretty well every job - there's lots of people in the world who would be happy to do it for half of what a Canadian will - lets just open the borders to unrestrained flow of labor. Once we do that tho, who will pay for the social programs that all the displaced Canadians will need? I guess same as Nicaragua, just let them scavenge on the dumps for their needs. Temp workers are a different issue than outsourcing and immigration. We may not be able to to all that much about outsourcing, but we don't have to insource the workers as well. Temp workers for agriculture or other seasonal work, that makes some sense, as long as they are treated well when here and allowed to orgainze if they wish. Temp permits for actors or very rare specialists in a field also makes sense. But temp workers at Tim Horton's or Denny's (the latter of which sued Denny's for mistreatment) or other permanent jobs makes no sense what so ever. Nor does always going to immigration for skilled needs instead of training our own. Opening our borders too wide will destroy Canada just as surely as closing them.

Yes, it's cheaper for the company, but more expensive for the nation. The nation sets temp worker policy and shouldn't allow it.

Why are we bringing in temp workers to do permanent jobs? Why are we bringing them in to do jobs that are not very rare and specialized. Why aren't we training Canadians for those jobs and why are we allowing wages to rise in those jobs until they become attractive to Canadians. The corporations and shareholders make out like bandits, everybody else gets screwed.

Wages have stagnated since the 80's. That's adjusted for inflation, so people haven't lost ground. Except that the top 20% have made huge gains, while the poorest have lost a bit of ground. Part of holding a society together is people feeling they're getting a fair shake. When all the increases go to a small group who are living large while everybody else is just holding on, that corrodes the social contract. And in Vancouver, there's no way wages have kept up with house prices. The main reason new buyers can afford to get in the market is because their parents are sitting on a lot of equity and can help out. That doesn't make for happy campers either.

http://www.sfu.ca/~schmitt/cpp_paper.pdf http://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/its-not-just-rbc-the-foreign-worker-program-needs-reining-in/article10932004/?service=mobile

So we're doomed to paying third world wages?

They would be free to do so legally anyway. And an immigrant is a Canadian - the job stays here as do the benefits. But, if immigration is drivign down wages, we should reduce immigration.

But it's not just the banks. We're rubberstamping temp worker applications for all sorts of permament jobs because "no Canadian has applied" They haven't applied because the employer is not paying enough, plain and simple. Funny how basic suppply demand is invoked with prices but not with labor. If people aren't taking the jobs, the wages are supposed to rise instead of flooding the market with cheap foreign labor. We're much better off paying a bit more for our double doubles and having the workers be Canadians who then don't require govt assistance and spend the money they earn in Canada.

How does working at a Tim Horton's qualify as a "temporary job" Those are permament jobs with temp workers used as cheap labor. Temp wokers make sense in seasonal work, or other temporary situations. With ongoing jobs we should be hiring Canadians. If Canadians aren't applying for those jobs, that means the pay's too low and needs to be raised. That will give Canadians more spending power meaning more jobs created in Canada, instead of those wages going back home with the temp worker. Temp workers should only be used for temporary needs. Actors, high skill people working on a temporary project or farm workers.

If I said it, it was long ago on another thread before I knew your story. You're right about not worrying about motivations, but it does cut both ways, You've made assumptions about others for this same discussion - that all they do is complain but not adapt to the situation, say. This affects all of us, whether we're sitting pretty or dealing with layoff or who knows what. Society is interdependent. It's not good for any of us if people's hopes are stymied or they have to work at Mcjobs. It costs all of us money at the least, as well as what ever moral feelings we have about it. Especially people who are shoved aside when they are older, that's where it becomes really difficult. We should do our best to help people find a new place in the workforce, it will keep Canada the great place it is to live. We should start by severely limiting the temp worker program, and also restricting immigration much more. First dibs should go to Canadians. Global village is a very nice concept, but if your country won't look out for your wellbeing, no other country will.

Can you please point to one trade agreement we have with any nation that obligates us to let in anybody to work in Canada? I think you're very much mistaken here.

He had to lose his career, why shouldn't everybody else too. It's beneficial. What doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

He just seems delighted by the whole concept of competitive advantage. That we'll find our little niche to exploit and do just fine. If you're compteting with countries with no labor or environmental regulations, you're never going to have the advantage, so I guess our only niche would be back selling resources cheap, importing the goods that are produced from them at a markup. That's a ponzi scheme.

Workers have nothing to do with free trade anyway - we have no free movement of labor agreements the way Europe does, say. We also don't have free trade with any Asian nation I'm aware of. We have it with the US and Mexico. Even that has restrictions, it's not totally free. Certainly a bad idea to have free trade with China. Even worse to have free movement of labor.

Thanks for the lecture. My point was that there are other contradictions in the bible, same as with the flood myth. Of course you're not going to get an understanding of creation that meets scientific scrutiny from the bible, no matter how well you parse it.

It wasn't written in any language at first - it was orally transmitted for generations, then somebody wrote it down. Not sure what your point is tho.

That's because they were written by different authors at different time for different audiences. Same with Genesis:

The people who wrote that stuff weren't really dimwits. Even they must have noticed that just the birds and land animals known to them, with sufficient food for a couple of months would never fit into the ark they describe. And what, they didn't know about insects? (Better watch out for those termites). They knew this was allegory, not reportage. Why have some modern Christians become so stupid?

In any trade deal, there will be winners and losers in Canada as regards the deal. If the winners outnumber the losers we should go for it, but the winners should have to contribute part of their winnings to help turn the losers into winners as well.

Little time out for sarcasm here I guess.

Which one.

Only if people get desparate enough, maybe. We just don't have the culture for it. Instead we'll go with the continued conflict model, and import large numbers of people from countries that have no sense of social solidarity outside the family to weaken our social systems even further.

They're pretty well all acceptable as long as they're legal. We can't force companies to retain people. As I said, we should emulate Sweden. It's very easy to hire and fire there, compared to say France, but the people fired are well supported, not just left for the wolves. And we need the sort of industrial strategey/cooperation that Germany has, where unions, companies and government all work together for what's best for the country. The responsiblity of the individual worker is to be adaptable. Move to where the jobs are, be willing to retrain. The responsiblity of the government is to support the worker so that the transition is as easy as possible.

If we look at the Western European states, they have it figured out. Very high in the competitivness rankings (Switzerland is #1), yet with very solid social supports for people affected by job changes. Sweden is (#4) is deemed a model in how to make it easy to hire and fire people and yet support those people that are affected. We should be looking to emulate them, we're only #14. As I said, during the recession, German government and industry worked to keep people in their jobs at reduced hours. So when people started buying again, the industry was able to ramp ;up very quickly to meet demand. That's what GH (I thin) meant about just letting industries die - it's very hard to bring them back. Some industries do need to die, we can't keep everything, but we should be investing our natural resouce revenues in helping to build up industries that actually add value, instead of just partying iwth the money now. Not by subsidy, but by govt building the required infrastructure and providing the right training for people. We need a comprehensive industrial strategy and start acting like a country instead of a bunch of separate provinces.

And I haven't seen anybody make that statement.