(no subject)

[alexmegami]

I can't decide what the most horrifying statistic out of this study is, but I'm going to start with these ones:

European and Canadian ethnoracial family members in Toronto have 10% of their population below the "low income cut-off" line (i.e. poverty line).

Compare to:
-20% for Aboriginal+other, South Asian, East Asian, Carribean and South & Central American family members
-30% for Arabic and West Asian families, and for solely-Aboriginal family members
-40% for African family members (and for African children, it's almost half).

And those are averages. With reasonable predictability, those who are immigrants from war-torn countries are MUCH more likely to be below the LICO. Over half the, as a small sampler, Somali, Afghan, and Ethiopian immigrants are under the LICO - some of these groups have nearly 3/4 the population in poverty.

There is just no possible way to think of that as the result of poor circumstances, especially in conjunction with (for example) the fact that South Asians, on average, are more likely to be educated in post-secondary and post-graduate institutions than Euro Canadians... but are making less money.

It will take nearly 20, sometimes up to 35 years before the immigrant population is making a comparable income to born-here Canadians, AND that's assuming that they follow the same trajectory as, say, Italian immigrants did in the 50s-70s (which, let's face it? Probably not going to be the case).

I haven't yet finished reading - I'm into the "what do we do with this information?" chapter - but god. I feel sick. Literally physically ill.

Comments

[kisekileia.livejournal.com]

To play devil's advocate...it's 20-35 years before the immigrant population is likely to have as strong command of the English language as non-immigrants. I think it's reasonable to be less inclined to hire someone for a high-level job if they can't speak clear, good English. However, there need to be better systems for equating credentials from other countries to Canadian ones, and prospective immigrants need to be given accurate information about that.

The bit about people from war-torn countries sounds like we need to do a way better job of integrating our refugees.

[alexmegami]

Not necessarily true - these data hold true across from 1971, which means that those who were children in 1970 - that is, those who emigrated here 30 years ago, as of the study - are still making less than the average Canadian-born Euro. They are, in fact, even making less than the non-English speaking immigrant Euro community (Russian, Greek, Italian, etc). So it's not a matter of language proficiency, at least not entirely.

[alexmegami]

And, I'll point out here that the African and Carribean groups - 70% of whom were born in Canada - still have 3x the poverty rate of Euro Canadians, as do the (entirely American- and Canadian-born) solely-Aboriginal population.

It isn't a matter of English/French proficiency we're looking at, really, especially since part of our non-refugee immigration policy covers ability to speak the language and saleable skills.

[kisekileia.livejournal.com]

OK, that makes sense.

[sasuran.livejournal.com]

I'm surprised that I don't find this more troubling. o_O. (Weird moment for me). I think it's because of the following:

1. The majority of 'economic immigrants' in Canada are Asian (specifically, Chinese). Note how low they rate in terms of percent LICO here. (Note, too, that this means the majority of immigrants from other countries are /not/ economic immigrants).

Now, were these figures the result of racism, as opposed to economic factors, I would expect them (and probably Aboriginals, to include another specific group) to be more comparable to the other categories.

2. Even if born in Canada ('this generation'), a lot of a person's financial status is determined by their parents, who may very well not have been well off. (Esp. given that, as per the above, if not Asian or European, would not have been economic immigrants - those given access to living here by virtue of having lots of $$ in the bank). Even though my family has historically been poor Irish types, wealth does accumulate through the generations. I get to go to university, even though my mother barely finished high school. Many generations of wealth = you're probably wealthy. Few generations = you're going to have to pull yourself up that ladder. It's like when you're talking about U of T vs. U of Waterloo for endowment funds. Waterloo is so young, it has inherited virtually no funds, and will take many generations to catch up to U of T.

Similarly, if an Irish family made 10/11/12/13/14/18 'dollars' per gen, and an African family had only 1/1/1/1/1/1/2/4 or something like that, any child is going to have trouble going from 4 to the 18 the Irish guys are at. In real life, this is reflected in the type of neighbourhood you grow up in, the amount of school you can attend, etc.

... I don't know if I'm explaining it that well, but I guess 'wealth accumulates' sums it up, and Europeans and economic immigrants have a longer history of monetary wealth than most other immigrants, I imagine.

3. Even if 'poor' by Canadian standards, there is not, to me, a poor person in Canada. (Which is contentious, I know). Any Canadian has access to free health care, to potable water, to sanitation systems, and to free education, not to mention what welfare will help to cover. There are also shelters, food banks, employment centres, OSAP, etc. And, even if you couldn't survive off all that, you could always put yourself in jail. Which /sounds/ horrible, I know, but the truth is even living in a prison you would have a higher standard of living than 1/3 of this planet (and even then, probably a lot more). Canada's poor are rich compared to international standards. I don't know that I would spend more money to make our poor 'richer', given a chance to make those who are truly poor by comparison (e.g., no water, sanitation, health care) any better off.

I guess if I thought this was due to racism, I'd be a lot more upset. More likely, it strikes me as self-perpetuating cycles - if you start off poor (coming from an impoverished country, etc.), it's a lot harder to become "rich".

But, it would take a lot more research to determine if that is actually the cause per se.

... And, then again, part of the beginning of this cycle may very well have been rooted in racism; I know when my grandparents came over companies all over had signs that said (jobs) "Irish need not apply". I can just imagine how much worse it would have been if you were black or Indian, etc.

[alexmegami]

The problem is, these figures (well, not the LICO ones, but the wealth, job opportunities, etc.) still have major discrepancies even when things like age, time in Canada, and the like are controlled for.

For example:
If we accept that "Canadian" wage is going to be our base number, at 100%, after controlling for age, education completion, and time since immigration (these numbers are split between men and women, keep in mind, so if I specify women they're making 77% of the average FEMALE wage, which is ALREADY lower than the average MALE wage):
-Aboriginals-only make ~82%
-Iraqi men 73%, women 81%
-with only a couple of exceptions, West Asian/Arabic make between 64%-90%
-South Asian women average to 77% (low of 48%), men 75% (low of 63%)
-East Asian (your "economic immigrants"): 90% for women, 83.3% for men
-almost across the board, Africans are making less than 85% of Canadian income (exceptions: bi-racial/ethnic African/South+East Asian, African/European)

Out of a total of 128 groups, I see only eight that match or beat European-born Canadians after these controls are put into place, whereas even European immigrants from war-torn countries (say, Bosnia) are FAR more likely to be making an equal wage.

Your theory also doesn't work for groups like the South Asian group, which, as I pointed out, has MORE university degrees and MORE post-graduate degrees, but is STILL making less money.

[alexmegami]

Also, jail? WTF? o_O Seriously, that goes beyond contentious into "insane". First off, you have to commit a crime to go to jail - which basically totally fucks with your ability to get a job upon LEAVING jail. If you want a self-perpetuating cycle, there's a doozy for you.

...and, you're basically saying that because Canada isn't a third-world nation, we should totally ignore the effects of racism on our population.

Yeah.

[jagwhier.livejournal.com]

To be fair, it was never said that the racism should be ignored. But rather that they didn't think that it was racism related.


-Jason

[alexmegami]

No, that's true, but I think (hope!) that the stats I posted prove otherwise.

[sasuran.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, interesting. But none of the controls account for starting money? (E.g., how much you come to Canada with?) That's different than time from immigration. And, does the time from immigration control cover multiple generations, or only your own? (E.g., does it assume that someone born in Canada is treated as a complete non-immigrant, even though, if their parents were immigrants, it likely would affect their current economic status?)

[sasuran.livejournal.com]

Obviously, Jagwheir is correct and I am saying that poverty in Canada is to me a (comparative) non-issue when considered in the global scale, not racism. Again, I said that I suspect the case is more likely that a family's historical economic status is playing a larger role than anything else (BECAUSE Chinese, who represent the majority of immigrants with 'economic immigrant' status in Canada are not suffering the same sort of effects. Were it a case of racism, I would suspect they would be - the Chinese have suffered a fair bit of racism in North America in the past).

And, again, it could still *be* rooted in racism, but what I am suggesting is that it may be more historical racism (again because of the Chinese), whereas in earlier decades you were /more likely/ to be discriminated against because of race (without question).

Or, of course, I could just be insane. (I know I would rather be in a Canadian prison than starving and without water in Africa, but hey, each to their own). That's always possible too, thanks.

[alexmegami]

Immigration controls cover the fact that if someone is born here, but considers themselves of South Asian heritage, they're counted as being raised in Canada (immigration = 0 years) but are treated as members of the South Asian community.

I honestly have no idea about the former, but yes, time from immigration covers the children of immigrants as well.

[sasuran.livejournal.com]

OK, so it is theorhetically not counting for the length of time your family has actually spent in Canada. (Barring today's children).

I would /expect/ if they did, the results would show that families that have been here longer (regardless of race) are better off than families recently immigrated, assuming the same economic starting condition of those families at the time they moved.

But, again, that would probably be another study in and of itself. But really, I *suspect* it much more likely that there's a closer correlation to your family's starting income and your future income than there is between race and income in Canada. (Certainly, you would expect a very close correlation value for present income and future income in most cases - I can't imagine there are many other better predictors!)

(Even given race or nationality - consider - if you're a rich family in a poor middle eastern nation, your kids will likely be rich, even though, if you were to do it by nationality comparing countries across the world, it would be *poverty* that would be closely correlated to your nationality - e.g., one expects that people from a poor nation will generally be poor. So which would be the better predictor - your family's money or your nationality?).

[alexmegami]

What you are suggesting is more akin to "bring the starving Africans up to the standards of our prisons" rather than "have poor people here live in prisons", but you worded it very poorly originally. Sorry, that's my misunderstanding.

And if it were solely 'historical' racism (honestly, I'm not sure what you mean here, but I'm going to assume that the following statement covers it... if not, you're going to have to elaborate :(), these numbers would be changing at the same rates as, for example, Italian and Irish immigrants' economic statuses changed (i.e. it took about 20 years to bring them to level with English immigrants). As noted from the numbers given, this isn't the case - even assuming they take the same trajectory that white immigrants took, they're not coming up to the same 100% mark, instead almost entirely falling short (save those eight groups mentioned). And, as I said, the Chinese are suffering this; an Asian woman, with the same educational status I do, would be making approximately $3000 less per year. That's a substantial chunk of money, and it's even more for other immigrant populations.

To some extent, I find the not-worrying about economic statuses here in favor of economic statuses elsewhere a bit of a red herring. I can worry about both, you know? Even in proportion. Fixing problems in Africa does not preclude fixing economic statuses here.

[alexmegami]

And I should note that the $3000 less takes into account the adjustments for race/education/etc. Without those adjustments, averaged across all ages, I'm making $45,000 to her $35,000.

[alexmegami]

The study does give an e-mail for the guy that ran it, I could check with him if it takes into account the family's socio-economic status.

[sasuran.livejournal.com]

That's a good point about the curve for other European immigrants, although I wonder if they might have had better starting positions again. (e.g., free land). Certainly a lot of them would have been dirt poor, though, so I imagine you're probably right.

And of course, you can and should worry about both. I'm just a fan of addressing (and worrying about) issues in proportion - I agree with you completely. I think I'll digress a bit, if you can forgive me for doing so, to expand on this idea and how it relates (for me) to this topic.

It bothers me very little (BY COMPARISON) if one rich person is making slightly less than another rich person because of race. They are both rich, alive, and (at the global scale) healthy. If that seems heartless of me, I am sorry. I believe that the truth is just the opposite, actually - when you worry about bigger issues *all* the time, it's hard to be emotional about ones you perceive as being smaller. (Although not un-serious by any stretch of the imagination).

It does bother me a LOT more that there are truly poor people easily a HUNDRED times poorer than either of these rich people sick, starving and dying on the streets of the third world. The slight inequalities that exist in Canada are nothing compared to the inequalities that exist between the first world and the third world, and the fact of the matter is that I have trouble having sympathy for the rich or even-more-rich when, even in the *absolute worst situation* they could face (prison), they would STILL be better off than most of the world. A Canadian /criminal/, regardless of race, is better off than most of the other human beings on this planet who have done nothing to deserve the lot they've been given.

Yes, Canada is not perfect. No, that is not an excuse. But I just can't feel THAT horrible about this. (Or, by virtue of feeling that horrible over this, I would never be able to handle anything that much more serious. Environmentalists tend to go insane enough as it is). When I see racism, homophobia, etc., I usually try and act. But the fact that some people in this country are probably racist bothers me far less than the fact that most of us live our daily lives spending more on coffee that we ever will to save a dying child's life, that we will watch billions of people die (not be discriminated against, but DIE) because we are selfish. Which is the worse crime? I know which one I lose sleep over (esp. as I am guilty of the same).

And, while ideally, we'd address issues in proportion, in practice we never do. If third world poverty were addressed in comparison to the financial discrepancies in Canada (say 10% for the Chinese as suggested above), we'd have to have another 10 LJ posts about third world poverty - but how many have you seen this year, in any of our LJs?

For every time as an environmentalist I'd say "air pollution kills 5,000 Canadians each year!" I should say SIX HUNDRED TIMES "Aids killed 3 million Africans last year".

But of course, I don't.

Now isn't that *really* horrible? I think it is.


(And now I must apologize, because this is horribly, horribly off topic and not what you originally were talking about at all. XD Sorry, Alex. :) Racism *IS* bad, I do agree. I continue to be befuddled as to how people could be doing this to one another in Canada; you've certainly defended the study well. I'll go off and lament the state of our nation again, tonight!)

And wow. Now I really HAVEN'T gotten anything done today. *sigh*. Back to work!

[sasuran.livejournal.com]

That is, indeed, very disturbing.

Hrm.

... Must... start own.... business... and hire lots of non-Caucasian types!

*is resolved*!