Solutions Need to Address The Root Causes of Poverty
“Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is manmade and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings.” – Nelson Mandela
Common Stereotypes and Myths
Check your estimation of the monthly cost of living for 3 against the actual Saskatchewan Assistance Rate Card
Monthly Family Budget
1.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for rent?
2.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for utilities (electricity, heat and water)?
3.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for food?
4.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for personal hygiene (toothpaste, toothbrush, shampoo, etc.)?
5.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for Childcare?
6.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for transportation?
7.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for clothing?
8.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for recreation?
9.)How much does a family of 3 pay monthly for for extra expenses (cable, internet, phone)?
Summary of Recipes for Food Insecurity
Women’s Stories from Saskatchewan
Food Access in Saskatoon
Now Available: Accessibility of Food in Saskatoon Community Report
We are pleased to announce that the Saskatoon Health Region document entitled “Food Access in Saskatoon Community Report” is now available. The report outlines important information about the location and variety of food available in the City of Saskatoon and outlines the specific geographical barriers residents face when accessing healthy food.
The full report by Kershaw T., Creighton T., Markham T., & Marko J. (2010) is available on the Saskatoon Health Region website at the following address:
http://www.saskatoonhealthregion.ca/your_health/ps_public_health_pho_reports_publications_and_presentations.htm
For more information about the report and to discuss the findings related to your community contact Twyla Markham, Supervisor, Health Promotion Department, Public Health Services, Saskatoon Health Region at twyla.markham@saskatoonhealthregion.ca. or phone (306) 655-4465.
Key Findings of the Research include:
Location of Supermarkets and Fast Food Outlets
Less than half of the residents in Saskatoon live within walking distance (1 km) of a supermarket
Three-quarters (75%) of the city’s population lives within walking distance (1 km) of a fast-food outlet.
Balance Between Neighbourhood Supermarkets and Fast Food Outlets
The majority of Saskatoon residents live 2 times closer to a fast food outlet than they do to a supermarket
In some areas of Saskatoon, residents live 59 times closer to a fast food outlet than they do a supermarket
Food Deserts
When people have trouble accessing healthy food because of where they live and because of money problems, they are said to live in a “Food Desert”
Saskatoon has a primary food desert in Saskatoon’s core and surrounding neighbourhoods: Holiday Park, King George, most of Riversdale, portions of Caswell Hill, Pleasant Hill, Westmount and Mount Royal.
Salvation Army Launches The Dignity Project
Myths about Poverty Persist Throughout Canada
Key findings include:
* Nearly 50 percent of Canadians feel that a family of four could get by on $10,000 – $30,000 per year or less
* Nearly half of all Canadians feel that if poor people really want to work, they can always find a job
* Nearly 40 percent believe people who live in poverty in Canada “still have it pretty good”
* 41 percent believe that the poor would “take advantage” of any assistance given and “do
nothing” with support provided
* About a quarter of Canadians believe that people are poor because they are lazy and have lower moral values than average
* 96 percent of Canadians believe that everyone deserves a sense of dignity, but only 65 percent believe that being poor can rob you of dignity
Poverty Free Saskatchewan
Let’s Do Something About Poverty
WHAT DO WE KNOW RIGHT NOW?
Saskatchewan has experienced an unprecedented economic boom over the past decade. However, poverty still exists here and throughout Canada. We know from the people we work with and from research that:
* Poverty still exists today and is a serious problem.
* Economic inequality is associated with many social and health problems
* Poverty costs us all. Eliminating poverty has many benefits and will save society money.
* Poverty is not just about money, it’s about being excluded from community life.
* Poverty can be eliminated. Other provinces and countries have reduced economic inequality through the development of antipoverty programs.
http://www.povertyfreesask.ca/
Health Disparity in Saskatoon
Report Presents Policy Options to Reduce Health Disparity in Saskatoon
“In addition to the excess burden of illness on those who are already disadvantaged, health disparities threaten the cohesiveness of our community, challenge the sustainability of our health system and have an impact on the economy. These consequences are avoidable and can be successfully addressed. Many of the evidence based policy options presented already have strong public support, including a wide range of general support from agencies and community groups.” Dr. Mark Lemstra and Dr. Cory Neudorf
Main findings of the report show:
* Income is the main determinant of health and risk behaviour in Saskatoon
* Aboriginal cultural status has a reduced role in poor health outcomes and risk behaviours after statistically controlling for income status
* A total of 46 evidence based policy options within the general categories of income, education, employment, housing and health care are presented on how to reduce health and social disparity
* 83.2% of Saskatoon residents believe something can be done to reduce health disparity by income status in Saskatoon
Photovoice
Looking Out/Looking In: Women, Poverty and Public Policy
A Photovoice Project
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
2006
In the words of the women who participated…
Low income women are often subject to scrutiny and surveillance by others. In this project we were behind the lens, not under the lens.
We looked in at our own experiences and out at the world from our own perspectives.
We look out for all the obstacles that come from living in poverty and we look for all the good things that keep us going.
We encourage people in communities to look out for each other, by developing just policies and treating everyone with dignity and respect.
We are looking for change and hoping to make a difference.
September 22, 2011 at 7:43 pm
If the FoodBasket Challenge has done nothing else, it illustrates Saskatoon desperately needs a public discussion that challenges prevailing beliefs. In the interest of insighting further discourse, I am pulling together some thoughts from the work of Bob Black (Google: “Bob Black, Why Work”) and am happy to take aim at one of those prevailing beliefs, that being the insideous compulsion to place a job at the centre of poverty elimination.
A job is nothing but the confinement of an individual to the status of ‘worker’ and too often to a single limited task, usually one which involves no creativity and often no skill. I am critical of the mindset supported by social norms, government policies and collective fears of poverty that results in people working against their will, and believing there is no other way to survive. And I suggest labor done under the free market is just as forced as labor done in prison camps.
The desperate need for money results in taking jobs out of joyless obligation. Therefore I ask, is such a mindset at the root of many, many otherwise solvable social, economic, and environmental problems?
Put aside your incredulity for a moment and accept the opportunity to explore the argument which can’t help but be compelling. Perhaps it seems unrealistic, but the idea will resonate with anyone who has ever had to get up in the morning to avoid starvation. Why aren’t we talking about this when our fellow workers around the globe find themselves ground into meat, or otherwise die, at work every day, and their friends still have to show up the next morning? Work is a source of misery in the world, countless evils come from working or from living in a world designed for work.
In order to eliminate poverty, therefore, we all have to stop working!
That doesn’t mean we have to stop doing things. It does mean creating a new way of life based on opportunities to participate in a variety of useful yet enjoyable activities.
And if this doesn’t float your boat, there’s always Thoreau!
September 27, 2011 at 1:29 pm
I am interested in the pages you posted here about Solutions addressing Root Causes and Common Stereotypes and Myths. Where are these pages from? I would like to cite some of this information. Thanks.
September 27, 2011 at 3:02 pm
Hi Eileen … the pages are from the Sask Health Region media package that was put together for the Food Basket Challenge. If you would like a copy you can write to me at steve.e@saskatoonfoodbank.org and I’ll send you a pdf.
There are also links to Community Action Plan to Reduce Poverty, PFS’s Let’s Do Something About Poverty and The Cost of Poverty here:
http://more2poverty.weebly.com/
October 4, 2011 at 9:41 am
@Jon: Any survival strategy is justified by the degree to which it facilitates some form of survival. To this end drugs, alcohol, gang life and sitting motionless in front of a television can all lay the same claim to being successful strategies of perseverance as becoming proficient at counter sinking drywall screws, jacking up existential dread as an insurance salesman or engaging in predatory lending and black box economies. To the extent that they provide a response to needs and wants, they are validated. To the extent that they fail to provide an answer or even create more problems they become a detriment.
Just as jails and rehabilitation clinics are full of failed strategists, the food bank lines of North America are full of those who believed that work was an unimpeachable strategy of survival.
One of the reasons poverty thrives is that it plays a cautionary role in the same moralistic fable that ennobles wage slavery. Though rewards for working hard and being diligent may ultimately be negligible, the tale guarantees that the wages of not being a good employee are marginalization, homelessness, starvation and early death. But notice the assumption of choice that is being made … rewards and punishments are doled out depending on how closely one’s decisions agree with what is deemed right. That there is no real choice offered is not discussed.
The myth fails to explain how those who choose to do the right thing have been let down by their strategy. Work as defined by the industrial/post-industrial can make no more innate claim to being “The Way” than any other strategy and in fact must justify itself as a reasonable response to survival in the same way as any other proposal. Without protection from abuse and the provision of a living wage, without freedom, skill and meaning, work is just another potentially ugly answer that may very well destroy those who look to it for solace.