Tories to increase immigration levels for election year

[Hal 9000]

He doesn't want to provide the link since it argues what others have been arguing:

"It’s also necessary to consider Quebec’s program based on its original objectives. It’s certainly been successful in drawing more women into the workforce. A 2012 report estimates 70,000 additional mothers are now employed because of the $7-a-day program, including a disproportionate number of single mothers."

http://www.macleans.ca/news/canada/quebecs-plan-to-end-7-a-day-daycare-is-a-breakthrough-for-economic-fairness-and-common-sense/

Not only does the editorial fail to cite the source of the studies, but it also neglects to mention the criticism that those negative studies received for lacking scientific rigour. Namely, they didn't control for other factors that would also affect children behavioural and academic outcomes. Children from disadvantaged backgrounds tend to fair more poorly than their peers. Economists are lousy at accounting for socio-demographic challenges and barriers to success.

The models that they used to examine academic and behavioural outcomes should have also included other variables from the NLSCY (the data set they were using) that would influence those outcomes, eg, parents income, neighbourhood, parents education, peer attitudes towards eduation, child's gender, child's ethnicity, family functioning, parents attitude towards education. They did not control for those things and as a result, the findings cannot and should not make any suggestions that daycare has a negative influence on school preparedness or children's academic/behavioural outcomes. They've not accounted for the vast amount of literature that points to numerous factors that would both influence those outcomes as well as influence whether or not a child is in daycare to begin with. Someone from an affluent background where a parent has the resources to stay at home, as well as making them more likely to have resources like numerous books and learning materials in the home, are far less likely to have their children in daycare and their children are far more likely to be more successful in school due to their access to those resources and supports.

In other words, the editorial stretches the limits of the study and in fact the researchers do so themselves. Economists frequently fail to account for sociodemographic barriers to success in their models and failing to account for the role parents income, education, and wealth plays in their child's academic and behavioural development, as well as whether or not they're even in daycare to begin with is a huge problem with this study.

Here is a link to the preliminary version of the study that the Macleans article doesn't reference: http://www.er.uqam.ca/nobel/r15504/pdf/LM_CB_Table_oct_2010.pdf

WoW! You linked to the actual study that contradicts every point in your post.

[Thinkinoutsidethebox]

Return = tens of thousands of workers freed from child care to work in factories, warehouses, shops, offices, and I suppose, yes, sometimes for the government, thus generating considerable economic activity. This is a return to society, not directly to government, although that economic activity will generate taxes in addition to the taxes paid directly by the employed women.

Your implying that stay at home mothers aren't members of society? I can think of more then a few mothers that would deck you for that comment.

Why isn't stay at home parenting even a consideration in this discussion? Government is in the business of complicating everything in order to employ everybody.

There are young ladies out there who dream of staying at home and raising a family, there are also many that stay at home and work from there. There are also fathers that stay at home while the mothers go out to work. There should be nothing wrong with single income families if that is what they want to do and we should all respect that and the government should back them up in my opinion.

The government should back off this "growth at any cost" mentality and help make this country a better place to live...

[cybercoma]

Who are these critics? The federal NDP, CCCABC, thetyee? The university of Quebec did the research and they plenty of data to use, I'm sure they considered socioeconomics. You could t be more wrong on this one.

The program is crumbling in Quebec and it's too late for them, but not for us.

I couldn't be more wrong about this one? Riiight. I actually found the article you quoted and the research that it was representing. I'm also extremely familiar with the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth that they used. I read their study and their methods. I know that they didn't account for parents income and other factors that go into academic and behavioural success, as well as predicting whether or not the parents would use an early childcare program.

But sure, I guess if you have nothing better to argue, just drop a reply saying I don't know what I'm talking about.

[cybercoma]

"The study, entitled “Quebec’s Childcare Universal Low Fees Policy 10 Years After: Effects, Costs and Benefits,” is co-authored by Université du Québec à Montréal economists Pierre Lefebvre, Philip Merrigan and Francis Roy-Desrosiers. They look at the main goals of Quebec’s daycare policy—allowing more mothers of young children to work outside the home, and enhancing prospects of success in school for kids, especially those from lower-income families. On letting more moms enter the labour force, the program has been a smashing success, dramatically boosting their participation rates.

The paper is far more contentious, however, when it turns to how children are affected by Quebec’s incentive for parents to put their kids in care at a younger age and for more hours each week. The data comes mainly from a massive, ongoing Statistics Canada project called the National Longitudinal Survey of Children and Youth. The NLSCY tracks the progress of thousands of young people: its latest stage, for example, looks at 35,795 children from less than one to seven years old, and youths from 14 to 25. Such a deep data pool allows researchers to make broad comparisons among groups.

For kids at the ages that the Montreal economists studied, the NLSCY has scores nationwide for more than 10,000 four-year-olds and more than 18,000 five-year-olds. All those children were given what’s called the Peabody Picture and Vocabulary Test, an oral test that’s widely used to gauge verbal ability. The results are adjusted by age group to a mean score of 100; variations above and below that level are what matter.

Sampling seven years of NLSCY data (This is very interesting considering the NLSCY is a panel study that ran from 1994-2009. Why did they choose only 7 years, I wonder?),

the Montreal researchers found no conclusive evidence that Quebec’s daycare policy had changed PPVT scores markedly for four-year-olds. Still, they cautiously flag some negative indications for the children of mothers with low education, (Like I said, family background is a predictor of children's outcome AS WELL as whether they will be in daycare in the first place) calling these variations in PPVT results “large enough for policy-makers to worry about.”

Their findings for five-year-olds, though, are more pronounced. They discovered “sizable negative and significant effects.” For example, they found that Quebec’s child care policy reduced the PPVT score for five-year-olds in 2002-2003 by 4.9 points on average. “This is a very large effect,” they say. To give a sense of how large, they point out that, by comparison, a child whose mother has a university degree typically scores three points above a child whose mother has only a high school diploma.

For Quebec five-year-olds who took the test in 2006-2007, compared with their peers elsewhere in Canada, the study says “negative effects” show up for children of both highly educated and less-educated mothers, but tend to be slightly worse for kids whose mothers had a high school diploma or less. In other words, Quebec kids, after many of their parents began taking advantage of the province’s new low-cost daycare, did worse on a basic vocabulary test. “Therefore,” the researchers conclude with withering understatement, “the picture is not quite what it should be for a policy that seeks to increase early literacy skills and better prepare children for school.”"

Seriously, you clearly have absolutely no understanding of the stuff you're quoting. You just cutting and pasting and highlighting stuff all willy nilly, as though it supports your argument. I've re-highlighted that crap for you, so you can see where it supports what I'm saying.

Moreover, they didn't statistically compare a difference of differences. They didn't look at where Quebec children were compared to the ROC before the program and after, nor report whether the change in differences was statistically significant. In other words, kids in Québec may fare worse on PPVT at that age anyway.

But I go back to my first point. The study wants to talk about school preparedness and the effect that the pre-school program has on that. The study does not control for risk factors that predict both enrolment in pre-school programs and poor school preparedness. Take a look at this study. They list a number of risk factors associated with poor school preparedness amongst Quebec children. These factors were not taken into account when the study that your Maclean's article cites was looking at school preparedness. Failing to account for these things means that it may not be the childcare that's hindering their preparedness but these myriad external factors that they didn't account for in their models.

And on a final note, the Québec childcare program was restructred to be less effective in preparing children for school. From that same study:

Finally, in order to constitute a protective factor for at risk children, the child care service must be of good quality. In general, however, the quality of the child care network in Quebec is of minimal quality (Drouin et al. 2004; Japel, Tremblay, and Côté 2005) and the budgetary restrictions of the last few years have not helped improve this record. In addition, the recent restructuring of family-based services may negatively affect the child care services offered. In handing over management of 88,000 family-based places to 164 CPEs designated as coordinating offices (until 2006 this function was performed in a much more decentralized fashion by 884 CPEs), the reform has led to a reduction in the number of educational consultants available to support family-based services. If children are to start school better prepared, more funds will have to be made available to the child care network so that services can create high-quality physical, social and educational environments while at the same time adequately supporting and equipping their staff.

This is literally the exact opposite of what you are arguing. The failing that the original article you reference notes are completely unclear. We don't know if it's due to numerous risk factors that weren't accounted for in their modelling or if it's because the child care system is inadequately funded and managed. That original article does nothing to actually investigate the problem in any substantive way. By leaving out crucial details about children's risk factors and competencies, their models are inaccurate to start. But even if you were to ignore that, they system has been poorly financed and restructured in such a way that educational consultants could no longer effectively provide support. Your solution is to burn it all to the ground, when the appropriate solution is to adequately fund and manage the program because the benefits are clear. Effective and comprehensive programs do improve school preparedness and mitigate risks for socio-behavioural issues down the road. They also provide a return on the investment by growing the GDP since they allow more single-mothers to re-enter the workforce. Québec's mismanagement of their programs is not an argument against child care. It's an argument against mismanagement.

[Hal 9000]

"Their findings for five-year-olds, though, are more pronounced. They discovered “sizable negative and significant effects.” For example, they found that Quebec’s child care policy reduced the PPVT score for five-year-olds in 2002-2003 by 4.9 points on average. “This is a very large effect,” they say. To give a sense of how large, they point out that, by comparison, a child whose mother has a university degree typically scores three points above a child whose mother has only a high school diploma."

"For Quebec five-year-olds who took the test in 2006-2007, compared with their peers elsewhere in Canada, the study says “negative effects” show up for children of both highly educated and less-educated mothers, but tend to be slightly worse for kids whose mothers had a high school diploma or less. In other words, Quebec kids, after many of their parents began taking advantage of the province’s new low-cost daycare, did worse on a basic vocabulary test. “Therefore,” the researchers conclude with withering understatement, “the picture is not quite what it should be for a policy that seeks to increase early literacy skills and better prepare children for school.”"

The point here is not to compare university mothers' children with high school mothers' children. The point of using the 3 point example is to illustrate just how bad the 4.9 PPVT number is. The 4.9 number is comparing all kids of equal backgrounds with the only exception being that of full time daycare. In other words; if the difference between university mothers' children and High school children is 3 PPVT points, then saying the difference between kids in daycare and kids without daycare is -4.9 PPVT points, then that's a pretty drastic difference. They compared high income kids with other high income kids and low income kids with other low income kids. The results were slightly worse for low income kids, but were bad for kids in every demographic.

[overthere]

One in four go west, 2 of 3 wind up in Ont.

Really? Then those poor Quebecois must either have taken the wrong exit off the 401 and be totally lost, or they are now enjoying the fine benefits of the social welfare system in Ontario.

More than 85% of new Canadian jobs came from one place: Alberta

Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/more-than-85-of-new-canadian-jobs-came-from-one-place-alberta-1.1721026#ixzz3JdE35Fbs

Note: they are not enjoying the less fine social welfare system in Alberta. If you are single, have no dependents and employable you cannot get welfare in AB. Sorry to disappoint.

[overthere]

Alberta's net inflow of international and inter-provincial migrants in the first quarter (25,757) was the second highest among the provinces, just behind Ontario's 26,614. In the first half of 2014, international migration declined by 27.4% from the levels of the first half of 2013, while interprovincial migration grew 13.4%. - See more at: http://economicdashboard.albertacanada.com/NetMigration#sthash.keHEUsDr.dpuf

[guyser]

Really? Then those poor Quebecois must either have taken the wrong exit off the 401 and be totally lost, or they are now enjoying the fine benefits of the social welfare system in Ontario.

So you got the workers and the majority of the slugs came to Ontario?

riiiiight.....

[jbg]

To be fair, I'm pretty sure, from the Quebec perspective, Ontario is to the west.

And Manitoba is one further to the west.

[overthere]

So you got the workers and the majority of the slugs came to Ontario?

riiiiight.....

well, we didn't get the welfare mutts.

They;d go hungry here.

And those are the numbers related to jobs, so draw your own conclusions.

[guyser]

well, we didn't get the welfare mutts.

They;d go hungry here.

And those are the numbers related to jobs, so draw your own conclusions.

No idea what you are saying to be honest.

If you are single, have no dependents and employable you cannot get welfare in AB. Sorry to disappoint.

Disappoint?

What to make of this then?

"Typically, a single person who is expected to work receives $627 per month in support, while a single person with barriers to employment gets $731."

http://www.edmontonjournal.com/Thousands+still+welfare+rolls+despite+booming+Alberta+economy/10259097/story.html

[cybercoma]

"Their findings for five-year-olds, though, are more pronounced. They discovered “sizable negative and significant effects.” For example, they found that Quebec’s child care policy reduced the PPVT score for five-year-olds in 2002-2003 by 4.9 points on average. “This is a very large effect,” they say. To give a sense of how large, they point out that, by comparison, a child whose mother has a university degree typically scores three points above a child whose mother has only a high school diploma."

"For Quebec five-year-olds who took the test in 2006-2007, compared with their peers elsewhere in Canada, the study says “negative effects” show up for children of both highly educated and less-educated mothers, but tend to be slightly worse for kids whose mothers had a high school diploma or less. In other words, Quebec kids, after many of their parents began taking advantage of the province’s new low-cost daycare, did worse on a basic vocabulary test. “Therefore,” the researchers conclude with withering understatement, “the picture is not quite what it should be for a policy that seeks to increase early literacy skills and better prepare children for school.”"

The point here is not to compare university mothers' children with high school mothers' children. The point of using the 3 point example is to illustrate just how bad the 4.9 PPVT number is. The 4.9 number is comparing all kids of equal backgrounds with the only exception being that of full time daycare. In other words; if the difference between university mothers' children and High school children is 3 PPVT points, then saying the difference between kids in daycare and kids without daycare is -4.9 PPVT points, then that's a pretty drastic difference. They compared high income kids with other high income kids and low income kids with other low income kids. The results were slightly worse for low income kids, but were bad for kids in every demographic.

for the last time, that is because they did not control for the children's social conditions, in particular their mother's income, which is a significant predictor of both attendance in daycare as well as their academic performance. Feel free to keep ignoring that point. I'm done trying to make you understand it. The study cannot with any adequacy attribute the academic problems to daycare without controlling for those other influences. That's why they hedged their statements and were hesitant to come out and say it. We don't know the actual effect of daycare if they haven't controlled for those other factors that contribute to the children's school preparedness. That's the problem. Family functioning and income adequacy are the most basic basics of understanding children's academic performance. It's in the article I posted that discussed the factors associated with school preparedness. i'm not spending anymore time arguing about research methods that you clearly don't understand. The findings in the article you posted does not account for endogeneity and as such cannot accurately state the effects of Quebec's daycare program on school preparedness. Worse still it never accounts for whether or not Quebec children are already behind the ROC. It's a poor study on the effectiveness of daycare, but that wasn't their goal anyway. They were looking at the cost benefit of the program as economists. They did a terrible job as education evaluators, since they used faulty methods.

At the end of the day ALL of the research shows that the program is profitable to the provincial AND federal governments. Problems with academic preparedness need to be addressed not by scrapping the program, but rather giving the program more attention and better management. That's if the academic preparedness issues are with the program at all and not a result of factors outside the daycares which were not accounted for in the research that you keep pointing to.

[Hal 9000]

for the last time, that is because they did not control for the children's social conditions, in particular their mother's income, which is a significant predictor of both attendance in daycare as well as their academic performance. Feel free to keep ignoring that point. I'm done trying to make you understand it. The study cannot with any adequacy attribute the academic problems to daycare without controlling for those other influences. That's why they hedged their statements and were hesitant to come out and say it. We don't know the actual effect of daycare if they haven't controlled for those other factors that contribute to the children's school preparedness. That's the problem. Family functioning and income adequacy are the most basic basics of understanding children's academic performance. It's in the article I posted that discussed the factors associated with school preparedness. i'm not spending anymore time arguing about research methods that you clearly don't understand. The findings in the article you posted does not account for endogeneity and as such cannot accurately state the effects of Quebec's daycare program on school preparedness. Worse still it never accounts for whether or not Quebec children are already behind the ROC. It's a poor study on the effectiveness of daycare, but that wasn't their goal anyway. They were looking at the cost benefit of the program as economists. They did a terrible job as education evaluators, since they used faulty methods.

At the end of the day ALL of the research shows that the program is profitable to the provincial AND federal governments. Problems with academic preparedness need to be addressed not by scrapping the program, but rather giving the program more attention and better management. That's if the academic preparedness issues are with the program at all and not a result of factors outside the daycares which were not accounted for in the research that you keep pointing to.

They're not comparing rich kids with poor kids or university parents with drop-out parents, they're comparing all kids in equal situations...with the only difference being daycare/no daycare. I saw the article you posted, it's meaningless to this discussion, it states the obvious - that given a certain amount of negative factors, a child's learning or behaviour will suffer...and I agree. The problem is; this study and common sense will tell you that full time daycare is adding to those negative influences that are holding children back.

As far as your statement; "At the end of the day ALL of the research shows that the program is profitable to the provincial AND federal governments.", that's just laughable. The studies...the actual studies, not the fairytale world of hypotheticals, projections and wishful thinking, all point to the fact that it's not only bad economically, it's bad for children's social and scholastic progression.

In fact; their study takes into account everything from mothers age, income, age of child, siblings, hours in daycare, married parents, single mother etc.etc. - not just who is utilizing the system, but the effects of the system on those children.

Edited November 21, 2014 by Hal 9000

[cybercoma]

They're not comparing rich kids with poor kids or university parents with drop-out parents, they're comparing all kids in equal situations...with the only difference being daycare/no daycare. I saw the article you posted, it's meaningless to this discussion, it states the obvious - that given a certain amount of negative factors, a child's learning or behaviour will suffer...and I agree. The problem is; this study and common sense will tell you that full time daycare is adding to those negative influences that are holding children back.

The problem is that it's not common sense. When you build a model to indicate the negative affects of daycare, if you don't account for those other negative factors, then the effect of daycare gets overstated. It's not about comparing groups. It's about comparing kids in equal situations, as you've said. They haven't done so because they haven't controlled for the kids' situations. That's the entire point I'm making and you keep missing it, saying that they have. You need to control for income because you need to see the effect daycare has on kids in spite of them both being from single-parent families, or low income families, or dysfunctional families, etc. There's also some indication that the PPVT may be somewhat biased against children from multi-lilngual families. Most of the studies suggest that it is, while other studies say the opposite. So that's something else that needs to be accounted for, especially if you're talking about children from Québec. The point I'm making is that any study that wants to make claims about the negative impact of childcare in Québec on school preparedness needs to account for all the factors that affect school preparedness to see what effect is left over from daycare. This is basic inferential statistics. When the study you linked does not even account for the family's income adequacy, it has a glaring and significant problem, which overstates the effect of daycare and ignores those other factors. I'm not sure I can explain it more simply without showing you mathematically how these inferential models work and I'm just not going to get into that here.

In fact; their study takes into account everything from mothers age, income, age of child, siblings, hours in daycare, married parents, single mother etc.etc. - not just who is utilizing the system, but the effects of the system on those children.

And now you're just lying or really don't know what you're reading. Edited November 21, 2014 by cybercoma

[cybercoma]

As far as your statement; "At the end of the day ALL of the research shows that the program is profitable to the provincial AND federal governments.", that's just laughable. The studies...the actual studies, not the fairytale world of hypotheticals, projections and wishful thinking, all point to the fact that it's not only bad economically, it's bad for children's social and scholastic progression.

Here's that study again that you claimed was meaningless and irrelevant. http://www.usherbrooke.ca/chaire-fiscalite/fileadmin/sites/chaire-fiscalite/documents/Cahiers-de-recherche/Etude_femmes_ANGLAIS.pdf

Our research also assessed the fiscal impacts of the Quebec childcare programme, including on federal and provincial government own-source revenues and family transfers. This exercise has relied on our tax-transfer simulator and simple assumptions about the reaction of tax revenues to increases in GDP. Our estimates for 2008 range from an initial return of $500 million from higher-income taxes and lower transfers within a purely static framework to a final budgetary feedback of $2.4 billion from all taxes and transfers when the programme's static and dynamic effects are both taken into account.

This means that the tax-transfer return for the public sector significantly exceeds its cost. Our $2.4 billion estimate of the overall budgetary feedback in 2008 turns out to be 47 per cent greater than the net cost of the programme in that year - just over $1.6 billion.

However, the two levels of government do not share equally in the cost and the benefits. The Quebec provincial government bore the entire cost of $1.6 billion and gained $1.7 billion in tax-transfer return. Meanwhile, the federal government incurred no cost and reaped a $0.7 billion return. Put another way, in 2008 each $100 of daycare subsidy paid out by the Quebec government generated a return of $104 for itself and a windfall of $43 for the federal government.

Source.

I have no idea why you want to keep arguing things that are wrong. I'm explaining to you that they're wrong. I'm showing you that they're wrong and yet you're still saying the exact opposite of the research. You're either completely unaware of how wrong you are or you're being intellectually dishonest. I'm not sure which, but this is becoming more and more a waste of my time with each post. I need to stop responding to you because you're clearly unwilling to understand the studies and what's safely generalizable from them. If you can look at that research and sit here and say the childcare program is not profitable, then there's not much else to say to you.

Edited November 21, 2014 by cybercoma

[jacee]

This country has gotten along just fine without national daycare. We don't need another boondoggle. I can just imagine how out of control the costs would become. If people are having children, they should be prepared to raise said children themselves and not depend on the government. if they cannot then they shouldn't be having them. Simple as that.

it's bad enough that we have free healthcare that no one pays into directly. We need less government intrusion into our lives not more.

It's quite ironic ... the immigration naysayers are all for bumping up the birthrate instead ... until faced with the need for child care so women can work to support their families.

I think we're getting the picture ... no more brown people and single moms should stay home and raise their children in poverty on welfare.

Ya that's really gonna happen!

.

[cybercoma]

My mother raised 5 children by herself and worked the entire time. She didn't take any handouts from the government other than the baby bonus. So stop acting like it isn't done.

You're aware that the economy today is a hell of a lot different than it was when she did it, right? It's a hell of a lot different than it was before 2008 even.

[Argus]

It's quite ironic ... the immigration naysayers are all for bumping up the birthrate instead ... until faced with the need for child care so women can work to support their families.

I think we're getting the picture ... no more brown people and single moms should stay home and raise their children in poverty on welfare.

Ya that's really gonna happen!

.

Evidently it has completely escaped your notice that I was the one who started this thread, and that I've spoken in favour of helping with daycare.

How that could be, I have no idea, unless you're so utterly wrapped up in your own ultra-ultra lefty ideology that you can't even read basic English.

It might also have flown completely over your head, but the only person on this thread who is introducing racism is YOU, probably because you use it as an all-purpose dismissal of everyone not up on the same high moral pedestal you assume you stand upon.

Edited November 21, 2014 by Argus

[Hal 9000]

Here's that study again that you claimed was meaningless and irrelevant. http://www.usherbrooke.ca/chaire-fiscalite/fileadmin/sites/chaire-fiscalite/documents/Cahiers-de-recherche/Etude_femmes_ANGLAIS.pdf

I have no idea why you want to keep arguing things that are wrong. I'm explaining to you that they're wrong. I'm showing you that they're wrong and yet you're still saying the exact opposite of the research. You're either completely unaware of how wrong you are or you're being intellectually dishonest. I'm not sure which, but this is becoming more and more a waste of my time with each post. I need to stop responding to you because you're clearly unwilling to understand the studies and what's safely generalizable from them. If you can look at that research and sit here and say the childcare program is not profitable, then there's not much else to say to you.

What you are linking is not a study, it's in defence of a study that makes the program look bad. There is no data here except jobs created and an assumption of what GDP than brings...sure jobs will be created, how much will those jobs cost taxpayers is the big question. The money aspect shown here is really nothing except projections and hypotheticals. Any study that uses the word "assume" as much as this one does, is not real accurate. They show a return of just 35%, then miraculously after using the word assume about a dozen times, they come to 147% return - globally of course, meaning it can't and won't ever be traced or proven. And, there is little to no information on the social effects to children.

Sorry, this reeks of a study commissioned in panic mode from some desperate politician.

[On Guard for Thee]

This country has gotten along just fine without national daycare. We don't need another boondoggle. I can just imagine how out of control the costs would become. If people are having children, they should be prepared to raise said children themselves and not depend on the government. if they cannot then they shouldn't be having them. Simple as that.

it's bad enough that we have free healthcare that no one pays into directly. We need less government intrusion into our lives not more.

Apparently youdon't understand how health care works in Canada. Are you an American posing? You seem to sound like it.

[On Guard for Thee]

Our healthcare system should have a user fee attached or a yearly fee attached. This would help bring some of the costs down. Healthcare takes up over half the budget and it grows every year, this isn't sustainable forever. If everyone paid $20 per usage or $100 a year, that would help greatly. It could be worked so that it is charged to their tax file so they wouldn't need cash on the spot. Something needs to be done.

How much would national daycare cost? In Quebec it costs 2.7 Billion for 230,000 spots. Over ten provinces and two territories you're looking at at least $15-20 Billion a year. Where is this money going to come from?

Plus I'm pretty sure we already have some subsidized daycare in Ontario. I think, don't quote me on that.

Well something that comes to mind from what you say is that I have personally known a few people who would be off to the doctors office for a mere sniffle or some such. They happened to be elderly but I'm sure hypochondria is not limited to them. I suspect the driving force with the ones I speak of was simply that they were lonely and maybe bored as they had lost their partner and lived alone. I have no idea how rampant it is nationwide but I would assume it could easily increase as we age. I live in a city were there is at least one seniors activity center not far from where I live. I suspect such a thing could help this problem, at least in the cities.

[overthere]

How much would national daycare cost? In Quebec it costs 2.7 Billion for 230,000 spots. Over ten provinces and two territories you're looking at at least $15-20 Billion a year. Where is this money going to come from?

Call me crazy, but I am going to guess Alberta as the source of the money.

Well, assuming we somehow figure out how to build a pipeline or two.

Our healthcare system should have a user fee attached or a yearly fee attached. This would help bring some of the costs down. Healthcare takes up over half the budget and it grows every year, this isn't sustainable forever. If everyone paid $20 per usage or $100 a year, that would help greatly. It could be worked so that it is charged to their tax file so they wouldn't need cash on the spot. Something needs to be done.

FRance has long been touted as having the best system in the world, and they have both user fees and a way to reimburse low earners for them.