What Are They So Angry About?

On October 15 the #occupywallstreet protests will arrive at cities around the world and in one of the birthplaces of the movement in downtown Vancouver. The Vancouver based magazine Adbusters actually inspired the protests that have been going on in New York.

The decentralized nature of the protests has led to some confusion over what people are so angry about and what they hope to accomplish. One of the main themes is the growing gap in wealth between the richest in our society, the top 1%, and everyone else, the 99%.  One way to look at this gap is simply through compensation paid for work. In these difficult economic times of job cuts and spending cut-backs many people are asking themselves: When someone is paid a salary, what is it for? What is a reasonable amount of compensation for a job? Does society have any ability or right to demand that compensation needs to be, in some way, fair?

Here’s a little perspective. Consider two different organizations: a large Canadian Bank and the Canadian Armed Forces. Both have highly paid executives making terribly important decisions which affect the lives and livelihoods of their thousands of employees as well as society at large.

The current Chief of Defence Staff of the Canadian Armed Forces is Walt Natynczyk. In 2007 his predecessor Rick Hillier was paid $234,900 a year.  The pension comes out to about $150,000 a year.  Meanwhile, Rick Waugh, the CEO of Scotiabank makes $10 million a year. I don’t know his pension deal but bank CEO pensions are usually counted in the hundreds of millions of dollars.

Now, let’s consider the entry level workers in those organizations: a bank teller and a private in the Armed Forces. The entry requirements for these jobs are similar: high school education, trustworthyness and passing a security test. A no-hook private in the regular forces starts off making $31,956 a year. The average hourly rate for bank tellers in Vancouver is $17.88/hr. With a generous 5% bonus in a good year let’s say that comes out to around $50,000 a year.

In the armed forces, the ratio of the pay between a bottom and the top is 7.35. The Chief of Defence Staff, who meets with the Prime Minister to decide how many troops to leave in Afghanistan and what risks to our troops are acceptable, makes just 7.35 times more than the 17 year old private learning to shine his boots properly.

Meanwhile, in the bank, the CEO is making a whopping 200 times more than the entry level teller. To be sure, the CEO’s job is hard and stressful and a lot of responsibility is on their shoulders. But the bank teller doesn’t have an easy job either being on their feet all day, dealing with demanding customers and even having to deal with bank robberies from time to time. If General Walt Natynczyk only makes 7 times as much as a private, then what is it that a CEO does that is 200 times harder or more essential than what a teller does?

This is is just one of the many things that the people on the streets of New York, and soon a banking district near you, are angry about.  Doesn’t that make you angry?  If so, then it’s most likely you still won’t be protesting on October 15, and that’s fine of course.  Protesting isn’t for everyone, and it’s really not clear these Occupy Everywhere protests will achieve anything other than letting off some steam.  But then again, maybe they can lead to change. Maybe all this discussion about the basic assumptions underlying the social contract between citizens, government and corporations is a good thing in itself.

Political and business leaders don’t like taking risks on big changes unless they know they will be rewarded for it.  All this protesting shows that people sure are angry about something. Maybe the most important affect of occupy wall street will be a new political atmosphere that allows those in power to actually make some improvements to society. That should be something all of us would welcome, even if we’re not out on the streets this Saturday.

Note: This article is crossposted at the Huffington Post.

Democracy for Sale

Democracy week may have come and gone with very little notice in Canada but this turns out to be Election Week. In Alberta, the PC party selected a new leader and thus a new premier; a woman for the first time ever in Alberta . In Manitoba, the NDP returned for the fourth consecutive time in a landslide win. In PEI, the Liberals were returned to power and on Thursday Ontario will hold it’s provincial election.

HuffingtonPost is asking Canadians why they vote (or don’t), so I thought I’d give my answer. I’ve written in the past about why many Canadians don’t vote:  it might be they can’t find a party or candidate they agree with, they think the entire system is biased or unfair, or they worry that their one vote has very little impact. Voting can be very disheartening in our winner-take-all system where the candidate with the most votes wins regardless of what proportion of the total vote they receive.

There are many reasons why I vote: I see it as duty as a citizen akin to jury duty, paying taxes and serving to defend our country if needed. Voting is probably the easiest of these to do. It’s also important to participate in the system that runs our society. You pay taxes into anyways so you might as well try to influence things to be run the way you’d prefer.

Sometimes these arguments aren’t enough to convince a skeptical non-voter, but until today there was still one final desperate argument that democratic optimists like myself could use to try to cajole our cynical friends to vote: it was the per-vote party subsidy.

Every party that met the threshold of 5% support everywhere they ran was given $2 per vote they received each year after the election. This policy guaranteed that at the very least, when you voted for a party, they would get some support for later campaigning, even if they didn’t win the seat. It was the only proportional part of our voting system where every vote counted and counted equally. This was great because it was a relatively cheap system but it was concrete, it equalized parties somewhat and it meant you literally could not say your vote didn’t count.

I’m using the past tense because soon the per-vote subsidy will be no more. Inside the huge crime bill introduced by the Conservative government on Tuesday is a single paragraph that does away with the per-vote subsidy. This is a particularly offensive way to get rid of if since it caused a crisis in 2008 when the minority government tried to get rid of public financing during a minority parliament.  In order to avoid a snap election or, gasp!, a coalition, the Prime Minister needed to take the unprecedented step of proroguing parliament to avoid defeat.

Some people think it’s a great move. Take Tim Powers at the Globe and Mail, for example:

If what you are selling is worth buying the money will come.

Of course, that assumes the people you are ‘selling’ to, the voters, have money to spare. Many families work multiple jobs and struggle to find money to pay the bills, let alone to support a party that might look out for their interests.  Do these kinds of parties not matter? Do these voters not matter? The levers of power are already biased towards those with money, education and influence. Why in the world would we take away one of the only equalizing parts of our system?

Democracy shouldn’t be about money (no, seriously), it should be about people, policy and ideas. That’s why public financing is (was) a good thing, that’s why limits on donations are a good thing.

It was always clear once the Conservative’s won a majority that they were going to slash the per-vote subsidy. The way they have chosen to achieve this indicates they aren’t even willing to stand up and treat it as its own issue. They aren’t willing to put it forward as a separate bill, debate it publicly and force it through with their majority. What does this say? It doesn’t seem to say the Conservatives are proud to do kill it. It seem to say they are hope no one will notice that they are changing the rules to favour themselves in future elections.

May the party with the richest supporters in the most strategically focussed regions win.

Ah…democracy.

This post can also be seen on The Huffington Post Canada.

Advice to Ontario Leaders about Minority – Stick to the Issues

There is talk now that Ontario may elect a minority government in the upcoming election. My advice: leaders should avoid making promises about what they would or would not do to form government. Once the people have spoken and the seat counts are settled, only then can the parties know what their options are.

Parties can state any policy conditions they would demand to work with other parties. However, there is no reason to make a false proclamation such as that the party with the most seats must form government or that a coalition with this or that party is impossible. Just stick to your issues and wait for the vote to be finished.

That’s how democracy works. Wait to hear what the voters decide then figure out who can represent that decision best in the legislature.

Continue the discussion on google plus

United They Stand, While Democracy Falls

There are two very different stories playing out in two of the most contested democratic chambers in Canada right now.  One chamber is Toronto City Hall and the other is the House of Commons in Ottawa. The difference between these stories is very enlightening about one important condition for a robust democratic discussion to exist: the independence of democratic representatives.

City hall is led by a mayor, Rob Ford, who was elected by a minority (47%) of the population. The House of Commons is led by a Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, who’s party was also elected by a minority (39%) of the population. Both elections were described at the time as decisive victories. Both elections were expected to bring in a wave of conservative lawmaking by the new leader and his group of like minded elected members.

This week, Toronto city council reached a compromise on the contentious issue of how to clean up and develop Toronto’s Portlands. The compromise conforms with existing plans the mayor had expressed extreme disagreement with. This week also saw a progressive plan for managing and approving graffiti that conflicts with previous goals of the mayor.  New city councillors that were expected to remain in lock step with mayor Ford were not so willing to continue when faced with a huge public outcry over this and several other issues.

In contrast,  the Conservative government in Ottawa is planning soon to introduce significant changes to the criminal code which were rejected in previous parliaments and no opposition parties realistically expect to be able to stop them. This is despite the fact that some pollsters are finding that a majority are against these changes. So we have the odd situation one leader having more trouble achieving his goals than another leader with much lower support. It’s a case of a unified and vocal minority getting it’s way over a majority who disagrees but is divided. Unfortunately, this is likely to become a running theme for the next years in Ottawa.

The difference between these two chambers shows how the structure of a democratic system can influence how policy and compromise happen, or fail to happen. In Toronto, 44 councillors run on their own funding, to win the support of people in their own riding. Councillors may owe some loyalty to the mayor or other councillors but nothing institutional and nothing that has any lasting affect. So when public opinion sways against some policy: like cutting funding to daycare, selling the zoo, painting over all graffiti or building a ridiculous ferris wheel; those councillors needs to think about their future independent of the mayor or anyone else. In city politics, each councillor needs to convince everyone that they are the right person for the job.

Meanwhile in parliament, parties dominate and individual MPs do not have nearly as much freedom or desire to deviate from their leader or their party on specific issues. They have no freedom because the party whip requires voting in line with the party on most votes. They have no desire because public pressure is largely useless on them. With up to five plausible candidates in each riding, federal MPs only need to win a small portion of the vote in their riding to win. Furthermore, candidates rely very heavily on the campaign of the national party for funding, to build brand, get voter recognition and acquire volunteers. So, the Federal MP representing you in Ottawa has little incentive to worry about broad public opinions and the kind of rebellion Rob Ford is dealing with in Toronto is much less likely to happen in Ottawa. This is to the detriment of our democracy, regardless of the policies involved.

Now, I’m not saying all the problems in our democracy are caused by political parties or that all representatives should be independents. Parties can have their place, they help to simplify the national conversation and voting process. At their most basic, political parties are tribes we associate with in the national conversation about what our country should be. However, it’s time we realized the importance of empowering individual MPs to speak their voice and do their real job, which is to represent all their constituents, not just their party.

Happy Democracy Day, Canada! Or Is it?

Happy Democracy Day Canada!

Wait, what? That’s not even…huh?

That’s right, Sept. 15 is the International Day of Democracy. The fourth annual! Apparently. I know, I hadn’t heard of it either.

I only heard about it because Fair Vote Canada is holding events all week discussing democracy. So, for my first post on HuffPost Canada I was planning on pointing out how Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s claims to a strong mandate for his government’s legislative agenda are misplaced given that his party only received 39 per cent of the popular vote.  However, in doing the research for it I found something even more depressing.

The Conservative Party did only get 39.6 per cent of the popular vote and this is historically quite low for majority governments.  Unfortunately, Canadians almost never get a government that more than half the country voted for! Take a look at this depressing summary of all the elections from 1867 up to 2008. Sigh. I say, sigh.

This of course doesn’t mean Harper is right about his ‘strong mandate’, it just means all our leaders should be humble about representing everyone when most people voted against them. (Except for John Diefenbaker and Robert Borden, they can crow all they want.)

So how should Canadians celebrate Democracy Day? Obviously, relative to the rest of the world we don’t have much cause to complain. People are dying in the streets of Libya and Syria right this moment to secure greater freedom from tyranny and maybe, just maybe, to one day to live in a truly democratic society. There are as many types of democracies in the world as there are nations but by any measure Canada is one of the fairest and most democratic countries in the world. And yet…

And yet, we could do so much better.

There are so many issues that are important for our society that involve the machinery of our democracy rather than particular social or economic beliefs. Whether it’s Senate reform/abolition, the place of the monarchy, electoral reform and proportional representation, public campaign financing, local elections, town halls, voter turnout, the youth vote, prorogation, primacy of parliament, televised debates, taxes, the census, etc. Everyone has an opinion about these issues, whether they are Conservatives, Liberals, NDPers, Greens or anyone else who refuses one of these labels (hand’s up!). So, discussions about the workings of democracy should be non-partisan but most importantly they should be ongoing.

Right now is a perfect time to have this discussion. Canada is in the midst of its second major political realignment in 20 years. The centre-left is now splitting its vote the same way the right did after the PC party collapsed.  The Bloc, a literal blockage in the normal parliamentary process has apparently vanished; and for the first time in our history, a completely new, official (and loyal) opposition has risen that isn’t simply a rebirth of a previous party. How will the NDP be affected by the tragic loss of Jack Layton just at their moment of ascendancy and his inspiring last call to action? There are many unknowns right now. But right now we have an interlude while parties find themselves, pick new leaders and while the Conservatives enact some of the projects they have longed for.

For all the storminess we’ve had over the past 20 years with party restructuring and minority parliaments, I don’t think the storm has passed yet. More likely, we are now in the calm in the center of the storm. When the next federal election approaches, the storm will return and all we know for sure is that it will be different than before: with the Bloc reduced, the Liberals rethinking their purpose, the NDP trying to prove themselves and the Greens having a better case of not being ignored. Before all that starts in earnest, now is the perfect time to discuss what it is we, the voters, want our democracy to be in the 21st century.

Some of this discussion is already happening online (on blogs, on twitter, …) and sometimes on tv and radio, but is it enough? Are we having a national discussion about our democracy? Shouldn’t we always be having that discussion?

So maybe the best way celebrate democracy day, in this moment of calm in the eye of the storm, is to start that discussion in some way, even if it’s just sitting down with a friend over coffee and fixing one cog in the machine.

This post is cross-posted here on The Huffington Post Canada.

What We Don’t Know Will Hurt Us

So, apparently the Conservative government’s deep cuts to Environment Canada are leading to the cancellation of an important monitoring project on the ozone layer over the Arctic.

The British journal Nature says scientists and research institutes around the world have been informally told the Canadian network will be shut down as early as this winter putting an end to continuous ozone measurements that go back 45 years.

…

He and his international colleagues say they’ve been told the network and a related data archive will be closed down as part of the Harper government’s deep cuts at Environment Canada where hundreds of jobs are being are eliminated.

This project provides a significant amount of the data climate scientists use to monitor the ozone layer over the Arctic and recent years have seen it declining.  Climate science requires a team effort by nations all around the world. Canada can’t pull away a dataset like this with so little warning and with no alternative.

This would be like us pulling out of a military operation with two weeks notice when we provided some core service no one else can perform. Imagination the Conservative cries over that. But science takes just as much coordination and the implications are just as large. The less we know about how our climate is changing the less we can prepare for it and help people deal with it. Getting things wrong about climate change will impact the future health of Canadians and people all around the world.

It’s irresponsible.

It reminds me of the Long Form Census kerfuffle last year,  or the firing of the head of the nuclear safety commission before that. This government just doesn’t value data and science.  It seems like the idea is that the less you know the less you can ask hard questions, because all the answers are unknowable.

That’s no way to run a country.

A Coming Out Party for Optimists

Watching the funeral services yesterday for Jack Layton, I felt it was like a coming out party for optimists, a chance for people to be unashamed to express hope in the human spirit, in the future and in what is possible in our country if we all work together.

I’m tired of cynicism. I’m tire of it from the latest federal election, the Toronto election and the insanity that is the current American political ‘discourse’.  I’m tired of people tut-tutting that this or that is impossible. Look at the world, the impossible is happening right now. Dictatorships are falling left and right, just because the people have decided it is time. Unshakable assumptions about our world economy are falling around us.  Pragmatism is needed, it always is; but pragmatism isn’t equal to cynicism. If something is really important to us as a society, then we can make choices that reflect those values.

I think Jack’s kind of pragmatism are what the world needs and it is absolutely clear that his honesty is what Canadians yearn for.  As others have pointed out, if some aspiring politician wants to know how they can cause a seismic shift in the politics of this country, they need look no further than the enormous outpouring of genuine grief at Jack’s death. The death of a politician.

Even Pierre Trudeau’s death didn’t cause this kind of spontaneous expression of sadness. Certainly, part of it is the shock. We all assumed, agree with him or not, that Jack Layton was a key part of the fabric of our country and would be here for a while to come. But part of it, surely, was his sheer decency. He had principles and he had a party, but he was always willing to talk to the other side to see if compromise was possible.  His response was always thoughtful and it was always honest.  Those qualities should be a requirement for holding public office, as it stands, it has made him into someone to be admired.  If someone with Jack’s decency can survive and thrive in politics then maybe there is hope for our country to reach it’s potential. People just have to take courage from Jack’s example and step forward.

I’ll let Stephen Lewis and Jack himself finish it off:

But it obviously goes much deeper than that. Jack, I think, tapped into a yearning, sometimes ephemeral, rarely articulated, a yearning that politics be conducted in a different way, and from that difference would emerge a better Canada.

That difference was by no means an end to rancor, an end to the abusive, vituperative practice of the political arts. The difference was also, and critically, one of policy – a fundamentally different way of viewing the future of Canada.

His remarkable letter made it absolutely clear. This was a testament written in the very throes of death that set out what Jack wanted for his caucus, for his party, for young people, for all Canadians.

Inevitably, we fastened on those last memorable lines about hope, optimism and love. But the letter was, at its heart, a manifesto for social democracy. And if there was one word that might sum up Jack Layton’s unabashed social democratic message, it would be generosity. He wanted, in the simplest and most visceral terms, a more generous Canada.

- Stephen Lewis

If we want to honour Jack Layton’s memory and all his hope and promise we should commit ourself to making his final message the new definition of the Canadian dream. The dream of an unapologetic, capitalist yet social democratic country:

My friends, love is better than anger.
Hope is better than fear.
Optimism is better than despair.
So let us be loving, hopeful and optimistic.

And we’ll change the world.

- Jack Layton

 

Rest In Peace Jack

The Chomsky/Norvig — Classical/Statistical AI Brouhaha

I’ve written an article on my other blog Computationally Thinking summarizing an ongoing fascinating discussion on the state of Artificial Intelligence research. It should be accessible to technical and non-technical but I’ll add more to it as the discussion heats up. For political nuts you might be surprised to learn that its a debate between Noam Chomsky (yes that Noam Chomsky) and the head of Google research Peter Norvig.

No, Google hasn’t declared an extrajudicial assassination a victory or undermined democracy in favour of the Military-Industrial complex. Chomsky is a very famous in linguistics and a founding father of some of the concepts of computer science and artificial intelligence. Peter Norvig on the other hand wrote the book on modern AI and Google is the epitome of modern AI research which treats intelligence as advanced pattern recognition and  statistical analysis of huge amounts of data under uncertainty. It seems that some people disagree that this is the way to building a full artificial intelligence. And the dust is still flying.

Read the full article on CompThink with updates on the ongoing discussion across …

Hobbits for Electoral Reform

Dear Wise Races of the United Kingdom of Middle Earth,

Please forgive a humble Hobbit for bothering you  but I just wanted to write about an urgent matter of democracy. Here in Hobbiton we have just had a Shire-wide election. Let’s just say that I’m fairly miffed about the results. In fact everyone I know if quite perplexed by the outcome. You see, we use an ancient method of voting, some say it came from Mordor itself, called First-Past-The-Post (FPTP). I know you are familiar with it as I am told it is the same system you use yourselves. It is as simple as can be, the candidate with the most votes wins, no matter how much or how little of the vote they received. This simplicity seems to hide many problems.

In yesterday’s election, for example, one Stepper Harphentwizzle was elected Mayor of All-The-Shire. The problem is Harphentwizzle has some quite extreme ideas about how Hobbits should live and only 39% of Hobbits actually agree with his clan’s view.  The problem is, you see, that because of FPTP the other main clans, the Proudfeet, led by Ignatius, and the Headstrongs, led by Jackleberry, split their vote in many of the Shire’s 308 ridings. (yes, that seems like a lot but the Shire is bigger than it seems)

To be sure, Ignatius didn’t inspire people with his talk of long ages past and the great war of the Ring as the Proudfeet expected. And truly Jackleberry surprised everyone with his energy and charisma, for a time many thought he might become Mayor himself. But in the end much of their vote was split even though many would have chosen the other had they known. But Hobbits are not so good at working all that out ahead of time. Perhaps you other grand races are better at it. Although I could not fathom how.

But it is what it is. The reason I’m writing you is because I have heard that across the pond in your part of Middle Earth you are using the same horrible Mordor based system and are considering a switch. I have heard that the two strong and wise races of Dwarves and Elves both support fixing the system but that they vehemently disagree about what system to switch to.

I must say, given our recent outcome here in the Shire I simply can’t fathom why you would keep FPTP. It is true I am no Dwarf or Elf, but both of your systems seem plain to be an improvement over FPTP. The Elven system is more elegant surely, and probably best if I had to choose.  Yet I hear that it is the system of the Dwarves that is on offer. And it is not really so bad a system as it gives people a choice by ranking. I know many who would have swapped their Proudfoot and Headstrong votes if they had known how to.  The Dwarf system makes this easy even for a Hobbit. The Elven system is truly magical and will let all voices be heard…but it is not on offer. And once the Men of Gondor see that the Dwarf system has lost they will never again offer another choice since they need neither when all else are divided.

With all due respect, only an Elf would make the perfect the enemy of the good. It is the only flaw of that great race. From a Hobbit’s point of view the answer seems simple. Modest gains are the joys of a life lived well. One should be ready to strike out and grab for perfection if it presents itself, but if somebody offer you to simply improve your lot, you should take perhaps be happy.

So I urge all the wise people of the United Kingdom of Middle Earth, our mother country in a way, to take some advice from a humble Hobbit. Be you a Dwarf or an Elf or whatever else, vote like a Hobbit on May 5. Vote yes to AV.

Sincerely,

Canadian Election: Fringe Edition

Warning: This post will only make sense to you if you follow the recurring adventures of the characters discussed in it as they try to save our nation and the world as we know it from imminent destruction…it will also help if you watch Fringe.

I’m watching Fringe tonight and we all know Fringe is filmed in Vancouver but what if the characters were all voting in the Canadian Federal election on Monday? I thought about this and then I just couldn’t unthink about it. So I thought I’d share. I think the characters cover a pretty wide range of views and voting strategies.

Walter: Marijuana Party – obviously. He’s probably a founding member and major donor.

Broyles: He’s a party man, he always vote Liberal, “No question.”

Astrid: Green party – she likes their outlook, knows her vote may not actually elect anyone but she’s willing to let the world figure it out and go with the flow.

Peter: Vigorously non-partisan, leans libertarian. Switches between NDP/Liberal/Progressive Conservative based on conditions. Note to parties: DO NOT put him on your robocall list, it will not end well for you.

Nina: Legally restricted from voting for reasons that are above your pay grade.

William Bell: Natural Law party – come on, soul magnets? Who else would he vote for?

Walternate: Conservative Party – although he wishes Harper would stop dallying about get really tough on crime, lock up all those other scientists, they’re dangerous.

Fauxlivia: She used to vote Progressive Conservative, probably leaning conservative this time, although she’s starting to have her doubts. She’d really like that national daycare program right about now.

AstridX: Non-partisan, she performs a rigorous cost-benefit and statistical analysis of all the relevant socio-economic-environmental factors and computes the vote which allows her to maximally influence the outcome of her local riding election to increase the probability of a positive outcome for the largest number of citizens.

Olivia: She is an average voter, indecisive about Liberal or NDP, she liked Chretien, finds Ignatieff a bit cold and she really likes Jack. he’ll decide in the voting booth. She just wants to do what’s best.

As do we all.

So, turn on the machine on Monday May 2, go out and vote…and may God have mercy on our souls.