Misconduct & "Privacy" in Canada

In the last couple of days there have been a couple of newspaper reports through the 'Postmedia' news service, of academic misconduct in Canadian universities.  Based on the details provided, it is challenging for the reader to know if these were two different stories, or if the details outline events related to one instance.

The challenges in sorting out the details appear to result from the notion that the details surrounding this case(es) are protected by Canadian privacy legislation; and as such, while the stories speak to misconduct in the information provided by the faculty member(s) to the funding agency, The National Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), most other details are absent from the reports.  The reading public is not provided with the name of the university(ies) involved, nor is the name of the faculty member(s) provided.

We are told in one of the stories that the faculty member resigned and has been hired by a different institution, but it is unclear as to whether the new setting is a university, whether the setting is in Canada, or whether the new employer has any awareness of the preceding misconduct........

So much information on this case is (to use the word made popular in the United States) redacted, it is virtually an empty story, save for the notion that perhaps most of us are not well served by either the Canadian privacy legislation, or the interpretation of such legislation when it comes to such matters.

What the heck is going on?  How is it that we have become so ensnared in issues around privacy (and in this case, it seems not just personal privacy), that misadventures and their consequences can take place in a vacuum of information.

It was NOT ever thus.  Because of my interest in family history, I have had occasion to review newspaper reports going back at least 200 years.  One of the most interesting revelations of such browsing is that newspaper reports in earlier times were often full of detailed personal information that many today might find surprising.  For example, it was not unusual for local newspapers to review the registers of local hotels and to report the arrivals and departures of registered guests.  It was also not unusual to have reported quite intimate details of family troubles.

In these current days of concern about matters such as identity theft, and with our world of immediate global communication, I am not suggesting that those earlier sensibilities would serve anyone well.  However, based on this recent reporting, one has to think that whatever the 'privacy wall' we have created in Canada, it appear that we have missed the mark in the other direction.

Are We Blind?

This morning I heard the news that Coca Cola Enterprises has announced plans to buy back $1Billion of its own stock.  Apparently this announcement is part of a larger pattern of corporations engaged in similar buy backs.  At least in part, the strategy reputedly is driven by an intent to help shareholders defer taxes.  But the practice also solves a 'problem' for the corporations, many of which are awash in cash reserves for which they have no immediate investment plans.  It is no secret that much of the world-wide corporate sector is sitting on such huge cash reserves.

The irony is, of course, that during this same period, unemployment rates across the globe, and particularly in some parts of Europe and the United States, are at or near record levels, with little prospect of a positive change any time soon.  And as importantly, many countries across the globe are in fiscal difficulty due to rising expenses and declining or stagnant tax revenue -- leading to large accumulated deficits.  Indeed, many governments are being told to institute deficit cutting programs, mostly focused on reducing spending on 'costly' programs such as health care, and apparently 'expensive', but unfunded, pension commitments.

The United States is caught in governance gridlock over an unwillingness on the part of a significant segment of policy makers to consider tax increases for the wealthy and for the corporations.  The outdated, trickle-down notion being that such increases will act as a disincentive for job creation.  Canada is in the process of reducing its corporate tax rates yet again.

In the meantime, the cash-rich corporations, apparently bereft of any further entrepreneurial imagination -- which might indeed create employment -- are using their 'surplus' cash to buy back their own shares.

Does anyone else have the sense that the Matrix is in the process of being torn wide open?

Minimal Compliance

Perhaps it is only my perception, but it seems to me that business, and even other kinds of enterprises often avoid doing the honourable/sensible thing because it is not required by law.

A large example is the tobacco industry, which often resists every sensible constraint with the complaint that the use of a 'legal product' should not be constrained.

Most builders of offices and houses, who might construct more liveable neighbourhoods by constructing buildings with increased setbacks, will construct right to the legal minimum setback, regardless of the long-term consequences for the people who will live in the area for years to come.

I could go on and on.  But I was reminded of minimal compliance recently by a consumer complaint I saw mentioned on the TV news.  A mundane matter really, but indicative of the pervasive nature of minimal compliance.

The consumer asked why s/he could not find a 'best-before date' on canned beans in sauce.  Each can does carry an indecipherable code.  When the company was asked why the product did not contain a best-before date, the response was that Canadian food products with a shelf life of more than 90 days are NOT REQUIRED BY LAW OR REGULATION to carry a best-before date.  So, the company puts on their product an obtuse production code, which ALLOWS THE COMPANY to determine the actual product production date.

The 'helpful' suggestion was that the consumer was welcome to phone the company contact phone number, included on each each label; and that the company would be pleased to decode the number on the can for purposes of informing the customer about the production date.

Oh yeah!  I can see that happening while some harried customer is trailing through the isles of a favourite super market in the late afternoon, while the family is waiting for supper.

My 'helpful' suggestion would be to provide the production date in a readable form (for consumers) on all products on which a company already records such information on the product.

I suspect we will wait a long time for this sensible thing to happen in the absence of any legislation.

Makes one realize why the mercantile world is full of what they call, 'red tape'.

Wealthy lack empathy, generosity of lower classes, study finds

Wealthy lack empathy, generosity of lower classes, study finds

So, in view of this report, we might be inclined to look in the mirror.  While doing so, if you find yourself checking your cell phone, this might suggest something about which of the two social classes you ought to call your own.

"The Beatings Won't Stop Until Morale Improves"

I though the above quote on National Public Radio today, to be quite appropriate in describing the desire to cut government program spending in a time of economic downturn.

I also saw in the newspaper, a quote from Republican Senator Mitch McConnell, "The debt they ran up in the first year of the Obama administration is bigger than the last four years of the Bush, combined."

Well..... yes.  But the more-complete story is that the Bush administration left the US economy in such lousy shape, both through tax cuts and lack of oversight of Wall Street, that Obama arrived to find an gaping economic black hole.  We call it the recession.

And while the popular sensibility is that the US citizenry pays too much tax, the fact is that US tax rates are lower than they have been since the 1950s. 

Talk about fiddling while the empire burns..........

Imagine the Freedom of a Contented Life

The story of Allen & Violet Large, by Elizabeth Payne is well worth considering.

It is heartwarming to say the least.  It is also worth reflecting upon - both the notion of contentment and the generosity.

My only question is:  "Why ever were they purchasing lottery tickets in the first place?"

Perhaps the practice of purchasing lottery tickets has become such a routine part of people's lives that they don't even think about it....?  Curious behaviour when the general populace seems to, for example,  whinge about paying pennies extra for fueling their vehicles...  Especially here in British Columbia, where it is an intentional tax on carbon.

Ignorance of the Law

New data out this week, indicating that crime -- including violent crime -- is continuing to drop significantly across Canada.

In the face of this continuing trend, the Harper government in Canada continues to press legislation forward on mandatory prison sentencing and ensuring that those convicted spend more time in jail. 

The consequence of which is that those who continue to scrabble for lower tax rates, curiously ramp up a taxpayer-funded spending spree of gigantic proportions, on new and expanded prison facilities.

Although a bit of a non sequitur, the current actions remind me of the kind of sensibilities that apparently led a former governor of Texas (Ma Ferguson - 1925) to state: 

"If English was good enough for Jesus Christ, it ought to be good enough for the children of Texas."

Privacy for Whom?

I've been feeling under the weather of late, so no entries for a while.  I am a little more perky today.

It has been for some time that I have been concerned about our current claims regarding personal privacy.  The matter raises itself for me in two primary ways.  Perhaps the most immediate of the two is the rising tide of concerns about identity theft.  There seems considerable evidence that this is not a concern without some merit.  Although, aside from having credit cards compromised, I feel happy not to have had a real brush with this issue.  And we do take care in terms of pin numbers, passwords, and even shredding documents with any identifying characteristics.

However, it is the second theme about privacy that has my attention today.  This privacy theme appears for me most commonly when I hear or read about some institutional official making the statement that s/he is not at liberty to comment about some matter or incident, 'due to privacy concerns'.  Usually this remark arises in the context of an alleged transgression of one sort or another, or a conflict.  Often the issue involves an individual or group dealing with an institution, either government or non-government.

In referencing the above claim to being concerned about privacy, I also include the ever-more common claim, that one cannot comment on 'matters before the court'.  Or another version is that one cannot comment on matters before some investigating body, such as the police, or a committee.

So, as the observer or community member struggles to make some sense of an event or conflict, instead of transparency and disclosure of helpful information, often one is left with the stone-wall remark that information cannot be shared due to privacy concerns or other protocols aimed at keeping matters opaque.

I cannot help but feel that such an approach perhaps serves the institutional interests more than it does the interests of the individual(s) who are on the other side of the transaction.

But an overriding notion attached to all this current concern for privacy seems to be related to an idea that one is protecting a sacred, privacy sensibility rooted in earlier times.  I think not.

Because I do genealogical inquiry, I find myself often reading information generated by the media (usually news papers) from the 19th century and earlier.  My own experience in this regard is that some of us today would be left cringing by information which apparently was quite public in the past.  For example, I have seen news reports relating to the probate of a will, in which the news report indicated and named quite clearly, the individuals who had been named beneficiaries and their relationship to the deceased.

I have seen news reports indicating details of the mental health matters related to a member of the community who took his/her own life.

And the 'social columns' of most early newspapers, contained information about who was visiting whom, and many details about the various life events of every-day members of the community.  Some reports about their activities in other locals.  It was not uncommon for the newspaper to publish the names of individuals who had registered overnight in the local hotel(s).

All these things make me really wonder about whose interests are served by the current claims to be 'protecting privacy'?

Conspicuous Frugality - A New Male Sensibility?

Apparently, among the primarily-male technology millionaire rich, there is a new financial sensibility, at least according to Los Angeles Times columnist, Jessica Guynn. Read More

Unlike the sensibilities of captains of earlier industry -- Carnegie, Rockefeller, Van Horne, etc.,  apparently the new, young, technological-age entrepreneurs increasingly do not see asset acquisition and personal wealth building as key measures of personal status.

Perhaps the transitional phase between this older and newer sensibility is demonstrated by the recent versions of Bill Gates and Warren Buffet?  The latter being the leader in the push for some level of frugality, at least in broad terms.

Assuming the shift represents anything significant, I wonder if this will change anything?  I wonder if this is a new meme?

All Knowledge is Equal?

David Brooks is a 'conservative'-leaning news paper columnist in the United States.  But he seems to me to be genuinely thoughtful about most matters.  For example, in the face of pending government budget cuts, he raises a concern about moves to un-fund/de-fund(?) science-related undertakings.

• "People are complicated. We each have multiple selves, which emerge or don’t depending on context. If we’re going to address problems, we need to understand the contexts and how these tendencies emerge or don’t emerge. We need to design policies around that knowledge. Cutting off financing for this sort of research now is like cutting off navigation financing just as Christopher Columbus hit the shoreline of the New World." (July 7, 2011)

Read More

In like manner, Peter McKnight, in the Vancouver Sun, writes about anti-scientific -- not to mention immoral -- examples within the current 'conservative' Harper government in Canada. Read More

In the realm of the press for 'lower taxation' and the cutting of program spending, it is interesting to see the public policy themes that emerge.  Unfortunately, the choices are not without consequences.

I Can Write Short Comments:

Don't you just like the brand and location labels one finds nowadays on fruits and vegetables, especially the ones that use a glue which is so sticky, you tear off the skin along with the label?

Consumer Choice?

Yet another report indicating that, for health reasons, Canadians really, really need to reduce their salt intake.

The news report I read invested most of its coverage to suggesting that we salt consumers need to be more aware in our eating, of the amounts of salt we are eating; and more importantly we need to cut back.

To me, this argument seems similar to the idea that all we consumers need to cut back on the amount of packaging used in the products we purchase.

Say what????

There was a time in this fair land, when one-income families existed, and when there was a stay-at-home spouse (read, mother) who perhaps cooked virtually every meal from scratch.  She could control the salt intake.

Walk into any supermarket today and the shelf after shelf of pre-prepared foods attests to the fact that those earlier times are long past.  My sense is that most families today eat much of their food out of the boxes, cans, frozen packages (remember packaging?) one finds in the supermarket.

Salt aside, I have some special dietary issues that cause me to have to seek alternatives to most of the pre-packaged foods today.  Trust me, if one is seeking ingredients different than those prescribed by the manufacturers, it is no easy task.

So, if we assume that families today do not have the time, finances or other resources to invest seeking scarce alternatives, one is left with the choices made by manufacturers and retailers -- in terms not only of ingredients, but also such matters as packaging and even source (read, New Zealand apples in Canada).

And when I read the nutritional labels, I find, for example:

• Canned Soup - serving 125ml - 480mg of salt
• BBQ Sauce - serving 30ml - 370mg of salt
• Gluten-free bread - one slice - 280mg of salt
• Whole-grain bread - once slice - 115mg of salt
• Frozen, skinless chicken breast - 650mg of salt
• Canned beans - serving 125ml - 410mg of salt
• Canned tomatoes - serving 125ml - 370mg of salt
• Chocolate chip cookies (2) - serving 30g - 70mg of salt

and so it goes.

I don't think most of the above are the worst offenders.  I shudder to think what might be in pre-prepared frozen dishes with wonderful sounding names.  But we do not have any of these on our shelves.

Strikes me, that the target for reduced salt and reduced packaging, and local purchasing, and other "consumer" initiatives, ought to better be the product producers, manufacturers and retailers.  It is unclear to me that we consumers have much control, although I have often thought, after purchasing a highly-packaged product of one sort or another -- about unpacking it in the store and leaving the packaging in the isle after my purchase.

Meme Too

In reading the Vancouver Sun this morning, I ran across an opinion piece, written by a fellow who was concerned about the broadly-shared misconception that an aging population is or will drive massive increases in health care spending.

In making his argument, he raised the notion of memes, an idea about which I had previously never heard.

While his arguments about misconceptions about health care expenditures was interesting enough, it was the notion of meme that immediately hooked my attention.

The following is a Wikipedia definition of meme:

• memes refer to any cultural entity that an observer might consider a replicator of a certain idea or a complex of ideas.... People could view many cultural entities as capable of such replication, generally through exposure to humans, who have evolved as efficient (although not perfect) copiers of information and behaviour. Memes are not always copied perfectly, and might indeed become refined, combined or otherwise modified with other ideas, resulting in new memes, which may themselves prove more, or less, efficient replicators than their predecessors, thus providing a framework for a hypothesis of cultural evolution, analogous to the theory of biological evolution based on genes.

My immediate reaction to reading this definition was to see within it parallels between the notion of meme and the mathematical notion of fractal.

The Wikipedia definition of fractal is:

• fractal is a rough or fragmented geometric shape that can be split into parts, each of which is (at least approximately) a reduced-size copy of the whole, a property called self-similarity.... There are several examples of fractals, which are defined as portraying exact self-similarity, quasi self-similarity, or statistical self-similarity. While fractals are a mathematical construct, they are found in nature....

The notions of fractal and meme are not the same, but certainly the ideas of being self-replicating, self-similar and perhaps infinitely complex, are characteristics which run through both concepts.

And it seems to me, on first blush, that memes may be fractal, or at least have fractal qualities.  A quick Google search of the two terms together shows me that I am not the first person to link the ideas.  Indeed, since the idea of meme (a meme in its own right) apparently can easily be traced back to the early part of the 20th century, I feel like a really late comer to this notion.

I find this ignorance on my part particularly galling, as I have invested the last thirty years or so of my life in the role of meme creator and paid, intentional meme replicator -- an educator.

I need to do more reading.........

Independence Day

We have arrived at yet another "Independence Day" for our neighbours to the south.  This was brought to prominence in my mind this morning, by a reading on "National (meaning United States) Public Radio", of the list of grievances in the United States' "Declaration of Independence".

I am not a student of United States history.  In fact, there are times when I wonder if there are many students of United States history.  Perhaps most of us -- United States citizens included -- live with a kind of shared, superficial, comic-book notion of the more-than two-hundred-year political, cultural, economic and military enterprise that dominates much of what goes on in the everyday world across the entire globe.

In Canada, not only are we not removed from this influence, there are times when I feel Canada and Canadians are perhaps fast becoming a doppelgänger for our powerful neighbour.

We are not there yet; but current events and in matters of public policy, not to mention in the pervasive shared corporate culture, one increasingly captures glimpses of the persona of the other in our Canadian ways.  But that assimilation of another national identity is not my focus today.

Today I want to think out loud about what I view directly by looking south on their Independence Day.  I want to look at two things:

• the first is suspicion of government, and
• the second is the notion of being under external threat, including terrorism.

From years back, I recall viewing the hearings on what is known as the 'Iran-Contra Affair'.  In particular, the comments of now-United States-senator, Daniel Inouye, in rebuttal to some of the silly pronouncements of then-colonel Oliver North, first drew my attention to the idea(s) of the United States.  And it seemed to me that, at the very least, Inouye was telling the colonel that he really understood nothing about this idea.

Over the years, this notion of the United States as an idea, and perhaps as a grand experiment around the idea, took me to some of the early writing related to this experiment.  Prominent among these is Thomas Paine, who wrote and published a pamphlet called, "Common Sense", Feb. 14, 1776.  Early on in this publication, Paine states, "government even in its best state is but a necessary evil in its worst state an intolerable one".

In much of the partisan rhetoric of today from our neighbour to the south, it seems that Paine's pronouncement remains as a kind of standing wave in the rushing stream of the social sensibility that makes up the United States of America.  Whereas the Declaration of Independence was based on the perceived and actual oppression of the governance of the British King George III, the earlier anti-government sensibility appears to have been transformed into the notion that no government is better than any government, except perhaps for an important role in border defense of the state.

And this sensibility appears to be increasingly making its way into the Canadian context, even though, as Pierre Berton (Why We Act Like Canadians) suggested, key tenets of the Canadian sensibility (1982) seem to have been built on "law, order and good government".  An interesting contrast to Paine.

My second point, the notion in the United States collective psyche, of an ever-present danger from the outside.

As the National Public Radio program this morning presented the list of grievances set out in the 1776 Declaration of Independence, I realized that not unlike the early pronouncements of Paine, the United States' concern for national security prevalent today did not arise only (perhaps not even primarily) from the experiences of Pearl Harbor or the more-recent attack on the twin towers.  This concern for security sensibility too seems to me more like another standing wave in the more-than two-hundred-year collective understanding.  Out of many grievances set out in 1776, the following seem to me to point to this way of seeing the world, even today.

• [George III abolished] "the free system of English laws in a neighboring province [now Quebec], establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries [my emphasis] so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule in these colonies."
• [George III] "has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavored to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers..."
• [George III] "has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burned our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people."

In my experience from a distance, the Declaration of Independence is most often conveyed in the popular culture as a response ultimately to unfair taxes and taxation without representation.  And while that is not inaccurate, one can see from just these additional grievances above, that taxation was hardly the whole story.

It seems that an ongoing suspicion of powerful forces outside the borders is written large in the national psyche from the outset of the American experiment.  Later incidents only serve to reinforce and justify the original concerns.

Clearly, my thoughts are only initial and partial.  But and a resident of some of the other parts of North America, this is what strikes me today -- so to speak.

Perhaps Pigs Can Fly

Douglas Todd, in his column in the Vancouver Sun Today, writes that it appears that there is agreement between economists for both the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and the Fraser Institute, with regard to the need to examine Canada's policies related to the fast-rising use of foreign temporary workers in Canada.

According to Todd, although the reasons for agreement differ, the two policy organizations each have reservations about the negative effects of our country's increasing use of temporary foreign workers, particularly the use to fill unskilled positions.

The Fraser Institute economist apparently is concerned that the use of temporary foreign workers may cause Canadian low-wage earners to hesitate to invest in the on-going training they require.  My own sense is that this problem is made worse by the fact that governments across the country are continuing to transfer to the price of tuition, the burden of ongoing education.  Hence the combination of limited personal resources and increasing direct tuition costs has dramatically increased the economic barrier to continuing education.

And, of course, I very much liked the insight of the Centre for Policy Alternatives economist, when he observed, as quoted by Todd, "firms claim there is a 'shortage' of workers; what is implicitly meant is that they cannot find workers at the wage they are offering."  And I would add, there is also an issue around working conditions.  Agricultural workers being the perhaps the most exploited in this regard.  Having watched my university-student son over the past few years, work in low-paying jobs from berry picking, the fast-food industry, to for-profit recreational services, it is clear that there is often marginal concern on the part of employers for minimal work standards.  It is also clear that such jobs are increasingly the domain of temporary foreign workers.

Wouldn't it be nice if a non-ideological way could be found for addressing this issue in an intelligent manner.  It ought not to be ignored.

Retirement Project

Back in January, after hearing about the passing of a colleague from my undergraduate years, I took on the self-appointed task of documenting as much as I could about the Simon Fraser University Swimming and Diving Team.

The above link points to an incomplete, on-line archive of the life of the team from inception in 1965, to date.

This site is a wiki, and, therefore -- just like Wikipedia -- it is possible for anyone to contribute and to edit.

As with other web-based, collaborative archival projects in which I have been involved, the challenge is to actually have others contribute.

Who Knew?

I was reading section B of the Vancouver Sun today.

Comments on a couple of things that gave me pause:

First was the headline: "No Evidence Gasoline Prices Spike Before Long Weekends".  This being the beginning of the Canada Day long weekend, my first thought was that this is a 'news' article about nothing happening........  Curious.

The second item to draw my attention was a column by Stephen Hume about what might have counted for knowledge in 1597, particularly about the coast of British Columbia.  The column is dwarfed by a two-page, accompanying image.  For some reason (perhaps because of the image size), I found myself reading the photo credit.  It was attributed to (wait for it).......  "The Masters and Benchers of the Honourable Society for the Middle Temple".

I kid you not.

So, in the face of this mouthful, I immediately stopped reading the paper and went looking on the web for this enterprise, fully expecting, due to the spelling of honourable, that this had to be something British.

Well, indeed!

Along with the above link, Wikipedia has an item about the society, so I guess I have just just been out of the knowledge loop.......  Yet another learning late in life.

Shucks, there is even a Facebook page.

Although it claims to be a society of men and women, not surprisingly, considering its origins, women seem to be scarce in the membership roles.  And while apparently based in the legal community, I see that members now include people with designations such as academic, cricketer, television presenter and politician.

I looked without success for information about the process of membership.  I was thinking that I would just love to be able to say that I belong to a club with a name like that.

In the end, I consoled myself with the Woody Allen quote from the movie, Annie Hall:  "I would never want to belong to any club that would have someone like me for a member."

Not that it appears they would.

 Very Long Item

I am a pensioner.  I am a member of a 'public-sector' British Columbia pension plan.  I am also watching and listening to the news stories, the most recent of which involved the Canada Post and Air Canada dispute.

I am troubled by the apparently broadly-based employer/neo-conservative 'rush to the bottom' in implementing defined contribution pension plans. In some cases converting existing defined-benefit to defined-contribution plans.  In the face of such developments, it is not hard to figure out why employees would feel concerned about these efforts.

In the following, I am going to say some things that I believe I 'know' about pensions.  So, my understandings:

In broad strokes, to me, there seem to be primarily two different pension contexts.  Those that operate in the so-called private sector, and those that operate in the so-called public sector.  The plan of which I am a retiree, of course, is one of the latter.  There is perhaps a third category, and those are the plans of which politicians are members -- often seen as 'gold plated'.  My comments will focus mostly on the first two, although I think that the general public often confuses the broader, so-called public-sector plans with the plans politicians have created for themselves.  And increasingly, the conventional wisdom seems to suggest that defined-benefit plans (particularly those in the public sector) are 'gold-plated' and unsustainable.  It seems to me that public-sector pension plans are often represented as 'taxpayer-funded'.  

In the face of this notion of taxpayer funding, I will describe what I understand about the public-sector plan from which I draw a pension. And then make some comments about private sector pensions.

Public Sector Pensions:

As I recall, a dozen years or so ago, the BC provincial government at the time and the trustees administering the plan to which I belong -- and perhaps for all BC public-sector plans -- engaged in a process of separating the plans financially from the finances of the government.  My understanding at the time was that this was to remove the government from any future unfunded liabilities that might arise.  This deal was done and has been in place for a decade or so.  The trustees of the various public-sector pension plans use the services of the British Columbia Pension Corporation, which administers the various pensions and investments, my plan included.

The BC Pension Corporation web site states the following:  "The Pension Corporation is one of Canada's largest pension benefit administrators, serving the boards of trustees for the largest public sector pension plans in British Columbia, and representing over 440,000 active and retired plan members, and about 800 plan employers."

So, two things about British Columbia public-sector pension plans:

1. The so-called public-sector pension fund administration is arms-length from government, and 
2. The administrative costs are paid out of the employer-employee contributions on behalf of the members, and from income on investments.

None of the funds in BC public-sector plans (or any BC public-sector plans, as far as I know) are taxpayer funded in the direct way I believe is sometimes more-commonly assumed. 

Of course, as I have said above, compensation for public-sector employees is initially paid by taxes.  In that sense the original funding comes from a different source than private-sector plans -- which are intended to be based on earnings of the firms having their own plans.  But in both cases, regardless of the initial source for employee compensation, in either case, the amounts involved are part of the agreed-upon package for which any employee agrees to provide his/her service to the employer.

As I understood the situation at the time of my own retirement three and and a half years ago, the elements of the fund from which my pension is drawn was based on two primary factors:

•  about 20 percent of the funds in the plan is from on-going direct contributions (part directly by the employer and part as a checkoff from each employee's gross pay) , and 
• about 80 percent was from return on investments of the built-up savings.

If I can assume that the fund of which I am a member is roughly representative of all the BC public-sector pension plans, then the collective contributions of 800 public sector employers and their employees (20%) and the investment income (80%) generated by those funds is what makes up the fund(s) from which all BC public-sector employees expect to ultimately draw their defined-benefit pensions. 

And, as mentioned above, a decade or so ago, by mutual agreement, the government and its employees decided that would be the limit of the funding relationship.

As I understand it, this has offered an advantage to the taxpayers of British Columbia in the sense that the BC taxpayers do not have an open-ended pension obligation; and from the point of view of the future pensioners, their pension prospects have benefited from what appears to be excellent asset management on the part of the BC Pension Corporation.

Just as importantly, there are benefits of scale to each plan through collective asset management.  Indeed, this matter of 'scale' seems sufficiently beneficial, that pension funds have been joined with other publicly-administered trust funds -- through the British Columbia Investment Management Corporation.  (Furthermore, these funds are available for investment in BC firms, for example, the funds were recently used for a shared investment in Timber West.  So, what sector is 'public' and what is 'private'?)

I am sure that there are parallels to the above strategy at the federal level and in other provincial settings.  But I am anything but an expert on these matters.  I am told, however, that in the case of some Federal public-sector employee pension plans, and perhaps some other provincial plans, that unlike the British Columbia situation described above, the governments involved never actually accrued the employer-employee savings, and did not create a separate investment fund.  Instead, a book entry was created, and all funds just stayed as part of general government funds, with no pension fund.  The political policy expectation being, I guess, that future pension obligations coming due, would be paid out of future taxation revenue.


Not having accrued any actual contributions, and more importantly, not having accrued any investment income, the emerging claim is that the taxpayer can no longer afford to pay for such 'gold-plated', union-bargained pension obligations.  While one can see the point of the taxpayer, it is hard to argue that blame for the expense rests on the greed of public-sector workers who assumed the governments for whom they were working were appropriately taking care of business.

Private Sector Pensions:

The latter scenario above is not unlike what I understand to have happened in the case of many so-called private-sector, defined benefit pension plans which are now also being touted as too expensive for employers. 

Not unlike the BC public plans, each employer who has agreed compensate employees partially through having access to a defined benefit plan is expected to set up a fund -- conventionally often administered by the firm itself.  Again, generally the employer or employer (or both) make contributions.  I am not aware of how smaller corporations handled such funds, but I believe that most large corporation funds were or are self administered.  I suspect that there are likely some legislative requirements in place around the administration of private-sector pension funds, but I am mostly ignorant in this regard.

I know little about whether or not the private-sector employers have ever moved to pool their respective pension funds or pension obligations in the fashion of the BC Pension Corporation for public-sector funds. If so, I expect this practice would be very uncommon. 

A decade or two ago (perhaps more), private-sector employers began to realize that the book value of the pension funds they had established exceeded the actuarial projections of the future retirement needs for such funds.  There were all kinds of news reports of conflict between corporations and their employee groups (organized or unorganized) as the corporations sought to 'claw back' the actuarial excess in such funds.

My own sense is that jurisprudence at the time allowed for such claw backs.  I don't 'know' the rationale for such permission, but I presume that it might relate to the notion that the employer in some fashion was only required to ensure that "defined benefits" would be fully funded. Otherwise, the 'excess' belonged to the shareholders.  Easy to understand, perhaps, because the corporations were generally self-administering their respective employees' pension funds. Presumably these funds had been invested in some income-earning assets, not unlike I have described is done in the public sector by the BC Pension Corporation.

But the fact is, that many corporations withdrew the 'excess' funds for the firm's ongoing operations.  A process somewhat parallel to the way some governments set up defined plans, but instead of setting aside the funds, simply made a book entry and used the funds to provide ongoing public services.  However, enter the turbulent investment periods of the last decades or so. 

Now the finances of the private-sector pension plans are reversed.  Instead of surpluses for future pension payouts, there are short falls.  Corporations either ignore the actuarial deficits, or they begin to change the rules of the game -- not unlike is currently happening with Air Canada and Canada Post.  Many employers either de-fund existing plans and discontinue them, or move to defined-contribution plans. The 'gold-plated' defined benefit pension plan is no longer seen as economically viable. 

And over some period of time the ascendant public narrative about pensions begins to seem  to be in accord.  The new narrative says nothing about poor asset management or clawbacks on the part of the corporations, but is mostly about the costly nature of providing employee pensions and the ongoing 'richness' of 'gold-plated public-sector, taxpayer-supported pension plans.

The narrative promotes the effective alternative as one of two things:

1. employees ought to be responsible for ensuring their own future through retirement, through their own financial discipline; or
2. employers will assist with retirement planning of their employees by ensuring that employee compensation includes contributions (perhaps shared) to what amounts to a self administered RRSP, including more recently, a delimited tax-free savings account.

On the face of it the option of employee independence seems not unattractive to individuals at the top of their earning capacity.  What gets missed by such a change is the potential loss of expert asset management, and the loss of collective sharing-of-the-risk that comes from combining pension fund resources.

Faced with the new economics of pension (in)-security, the previous Harper government had the opportunity, in such a climate, to try to create some sort of broadly-based pension vehicle that would presumably allow employees with their own personal retirement funds to enter into some sort of collective arrangement for spreading the risk.  A nation-wide portable pension arrangement.  The current federal finance minister stepped away from such an initiative.


So, we are left with a pension mess, and a broadly-based rush to the bottom in terms of policy around assisting Canadians (particularly paid employees) to provide for their own retirement.  Everyone eventually will pay a price for a retirement bulge that does not have the financial resources to see themselves through the retirement years.  And, as described above, the lack of resources is often not a problem of employees' own making.


By the way, while it is a little difficult to calculate at this point, after working in the public sector since the mid 70s, my 'gold-plated, public sector pension when I turn 65 next year, will amount to about $1500/mo, before taxes.  I am grateful for it, but not a huge income; no years of world travels ahead of us.  It would have been better, if over my years of employment across the country, there had been portability arrangements among pension plans.  Another topic.

Weary of Content-less "News" Stories

I think that perhaps TV news programs are the worst offenders, but newspapers follow not too far behind.

In the case of the TV news, an event happens. We get the person-on-the-street interview, often prefaced with the implied or explicit question: "How do you feel about this event"?   This instead of the reporter preparing a report about the facts behind the event, including an appropriate analysis and presentation. 

A parallel in the Vancouver Sun today.  The headline reads:  "Mood desperate in Athens as austerity bites: Violence consumes streets as Greek Parliament approves controversial package". 

Call me crazy, but I expect that perhaps reading the story will give me some details about the controversial package.  Or, I would even like to know the nature of the effects that are actually causing demonstrations and riots in the streets.  What is it about the legislation that has such a direct impact on the citizenry that they take to the streets?

The details of the report on austerity indicates that there will be spending cuts and tax increases aimed at saving $40 billion over five years and a $70 billion plan for privatization.  Otherwise, the story focuses on a description of the rioting and the equivalent of the person-in-the-street interviews again.

The mind aches for some substantive information pointed at helping the reader understand some specific aspects of such broad-based legislative change.

Am I the only one who is reminded by  Christine Sinclair in her mask, of Russell Crowe in The Gladiator?

A whole new image for Canada and Canadians, not to mention for soccer.

Best wishes to her and the team.

Watching MLS soccer, Vancouver-Toronto. MLS soccer is entertaining,but the lineups seem to shift so frequently it always seems like one is watching strangers play.

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The most comprehensive of my genealogy sites is the following:

 Atlantic Canada Genealogy Project

I update this site regularly.

Natasha Marsh - I Won't Light a Candle Yet For You

I have been wandering musically today, through YouTube.  The above piece is the temporary end of this particular exploration, with an earlier pause at:

Roberta Flack - "The First Time Ever I Say Your Face" 1972