Persistent drought adds billions to California agriculture losses: study

Story by Sharon Udasin • Yesterday - 
The Hill

As California’s drought stretches into a third straight year, the state’s agriculture industry is incurring billions in related losses, a new study has found.


Persistent drought adds billions to California agriculture losses: study© Provided by The Hill

The report estimates direct impacts on farm activity of $1.2 billion this year — up from $810 million in 2021.

But the effects of the drought in 2022 extended far beyond that $1.2 billion sum, according to the report, released by the University of California, Merced’s Water Systems Management Lab.

Impacts on food processing industries that depend on farm products were about $845 million in 2022 — up from $590 million last year.

“California is no stranger to drought, but this current drought has hit really hard in some of the typically water-rich parts of the state that are essential for the broader state water supply,” co-author John Abatzoglou, a professor of climatology at UC Merced, said in a statement.

Altogether, the combined direct and indirect consequences of the drought have reached about $2 billion in value-added losses this year alone, the researchers found.

These losses amount to a 5.9 percent reduction when compared to those of 2019 and also resulted in 19,420 job cuts, according to the study.

Related video: Calif. State Board of Food & Agriculture to discuss food impacted by drought
Duration 2:24
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In addition to suffering the impacts of the drought, California’s agricultural economy has also suffered from supply chain disruptions, including the ability to ship crops out of state, the authors explained.

Such delays could result in increased inventory and influence some of California’s specialty crop prices, according to the study.

While acknowledging such negative effects of the drought on agriculture, the researchers found that things could have been worse.

Drought impact mitigation techniques — such as land idling and increased groundwater pumping and water trading — reduced potential economic losses, according to lead author Josué Medellín-Azuara, an associate professor of environmental engineering at UC Merced.

Meanwhile, some parts of California were hit much harder than others.

“The Sacramento Valley and its communities have been ground zero during this drought,” Alvar Escriva-Bou, a senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California, said in a statement.

Statewide idled land in 2022 grew by 750,000 acres in comparison to 2019 — with more than half of these farms located in the Sacramento area, according to the study.

Given that the region is typically much wetter, Escriva-Bou recommended increased investments in basin recharge and pumping infrastructure to bolster the region’s drought resilience.

“We need to more fully invest in building climate resilience in our rural, agriculture dependent communities as they are on the front lines of climate impacts to their economic base,” added co-author Joshua Viers, a UC Merced associate dean for research.

“We can only expect prolonged dry periods briefly interrupted by pronounced wet ones — which will further stress access to clean drinking water and steady employment, among many challenges,” Viers said.

UN votes to take the reins on global tax standards

Story by Tobias Burns • Yesterday - The Hill

The United Nations General Assembly’s finance committee voted unanimously Wednesday to start discussions on international taxation standards, effectively challenging a similar long-standing initiative led by advanced economies in the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).


Wednesday’s resolution calls for “developing an international tax cooperation framework or instrument that is developed and agreed upon through a United Nations intergovernmental process.”

Such a framework has been in development at the OECD for nearly a decade, but has yet to be given a final draft.

At stake in the agreement are new rules about whether multinational corporations should be allowed to store their profits in tax havens overseas and in what jurisdictions corporations can be taxed for the use of their products.

The successful U.N. resolution was put forward by the 54-member African Group of nations within the U.N. General Assembly, a bloc with a distinct economic character from the group of developed economies within the OECD and with different ideas on how financial transparency and tax administration should work.

“We note that the OECD has played a role in these areas. It is clear after ten years of attempting to reform international tax rules that there is no substitute for the global, inclusive, transparent forum provided by the United Nations,” the representative of the Nigerian delegation to the U.N. said during Wednesday’s vote.

“The African Group urges countries to remain committed to the development of inclusive tax instruments at the United Nations and encourage the OECD to play a supporting role in this regard,” the Nigerian representative said.

Countries from the OECD cautioned that it would be unproductive for the U.N. to double up on the OECD’s work, but stopped short of voting against the resolution.

“We disagree with the notion implied by this resolution that there is not presently a highly inclusive forum working to strengthen international cooperation on tax,” the U.S. representative told the second committee.

The U.N. resolution “proposes a process that will tear down much of the progress that has been made in international tax cooperation since the 2008-2009 financial crisis and will undermine the inclusive framework at the OECD through which so much progress is being made,” the U.S. delegate added.

Related video: World Business Watch: Decoding the state of Global Economy

Duration 4:31 View on Watch

Fears that the OECD process had stalled grew over the summer after the nation of Hungary blocked a 15-percent minimum corporate tax from being adopted in the European Union, leading the U.S. to cancel its long-standing bilateral tax treaty with Hungary.

Hungary then sent a delegation to the U.S. to express solidarity with Republicans who also opposed the Biden administration’s efforts toward international corporate tax standards.

“Treasury’s actions suggest an impulsive attempt to pressure a country that has raised legitimate concerns with the agreement to fall in line,” Republican leaders on the House Ways and Means and Senate Finance and Foreign Relations committees wrote in a letter earlier in November.

International tax experts say the timing of Wednesday’s vote has to do with the delay on the OECD provision that stipulates where a corporation can be taxed for the use of its products as well as frustration from lower-income countries about the amount of that tax.

“There’s a document that’s supposed to be coming out in December outlining which unilateral measures will need to be abandoned, including digital services taxes,” Daniel Bunn, president of the Tax Foundation, a Washington think tank, said in an interview. “The goal is to have a multilateral treaty ready for signature middle of next year.”

On the amount that corporations can be taxed – which is known as Pillar Two within the agreement – EU finance ministers are set to meet again in December.

“The language of their announcement is that they’re going to be ‘aiming for agreement’ on Pillar Two, but it’s not clear that that’s certain. Hungary has been holding things up,” Bunn added.

Other analysts in Washington say that the interests of developing countries are not given proper consideration in the OECD’s framework, an oversight that could further delay a final deal.

“Although the OECD’s global minimum tax framework got broad international support last year, there have been advocates concerned that any final product would not address the needs of developing countries,” John Buhl, an analyst with the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, said in a statement to The Hill.

“In the near term, it could also embolden skeptics in Congress and holdouts in the EU who already have concerns about the plan and whether it will ever reach critical mass with enough countries to make adoption worthwhile,” he added.

Tax fairness advocates welcomed Wednesday’s U.N. resolution, arguing that the OECD had its chance to deliver on a global tax treaty and that the U.N. is now the better organization to handle the issue.

“The OECD has been unprecedentedly aggressive in its lobbying, but could hardly have failed more completely as the resolution passed by unanimous consensus,” Alex Cobham, head of the European Tax Justice Network, said in a statement. “Some OECD countries spoke in favor of the organization’s role after the resolution’s adoption, but … the OECD’s two-pillar tax proposal is on life support.”

The OECD’s work “has left countries losing $483 billion in tax to tax havens a year; and work which has been widely identified as exclusionary by countries outside the core membership of rich countries. Ultimately, this only confirms the importance of moving tax rulemaking to a globally inclusive and transparent forum at the United Nations,” Cobham added.

The Tax Foundation’s Bunn said that whether negotiations take place at the OECD or the U.N., the same sets of issues are bound to arise in the practice of hashing out an agreement.

“What has happened at the OECD, with countries struggling to reach agreement on big picture tax issues – the struggle is going to continue regardless of what the forum is,” he added.

AMERIKA

Indigenous groups fight to preserve native language

Yesterday


HER TRIBE HAVE HOPED FOR THIS DAY FOR A LONG TIME.
Duration 9:48
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It's been nearly half a year since Secretary Deb Haaland released the first report in the Interior Department's investigation into the legacy and lasting trauma from Indian boarding schools.

For more than a century, from 1819 to the late 1960s, the federal government and some religious organizations took Indigenous children from their families, their land and forcibly assimilated them into White European culture.

"I called the boarding school era one of America's best kept secrets," said scholar Denise Lajimodiere. "Boarding school and the legacy of boarding schools has impacted every...Native family."MORE: Indigenous families seek justice for boarding school abuse as graves of children uncovered

Lajimodiere chronicled the experience of boarding school survivors in her book Stringing Rosaries.

"Their hair was immediately cut…some had kerosene put in their hair. And they said it burned…they were given uniforms," Lajimodiere said. "They had to work half a day… in the kitchen, in the laundry room…work in the fields that they didn't get paid for."


Male and female students read in class at the Carlisle Indian School, in Carlisle, Penn., 1901.© Francis Benjamin Johnston/Buyenlarge via Getty Images

For more than a decade, Lajimodiere has researched the number of schools that existed in the United States, something the government didn't begin to do until last year.

The report released by the Interior Department found that more than 500 American Indian, Alaska Native and Native Hawaiian children died over the course of 150 years in the boarding schools. Scholars estimate the numbers could be much higher. Countless others were physically, mentally and emotionally abused as their language and cultural identities were forbidden by school staff, according to the investigation.

Haaland, the first Indigenous cabinet member, has been traveling around the country as part of the "Road to Healing Tour," to meet with Indigenous communities.



Ruby Left Hand Bull Sanchez speaks at a listening session hosted by Interior Secretary Deb Haaland.© ABC News

"I want apologies. I want my language back. I want our land back. I want everything back," an emotional Ruby Left Hand Bull Sanchez told Haaland during her stop at the Rosebud Sioux reservation last month.

Haaland, a member of the Laguna Pueblo, recounted her own family's history with boarding schools.



Interior Secretary Deb Haaland speaks with survivors of boarding school abuses during a listening session.© ABC News

"We all carry the trauma from that era in our hearts. My ancestors endured the horrors of the Indian boarding school assimilation policies carried out by the same department that I now lead. This is the first time in history that a United States Cabinet secretary comes to the table with this shared trauma. That's not lost on me. I'm determined to use my position for the good of our people," Haaland said at the Oct. 15 meeting.MORE: Tribal elders testify before federal officials on painful memories of Indian boarding schools

For those who lived through the abuse, the pain is still raw.

Dorothy McLane was six years old when she became a student at a Rosebud boarding school, where Haaland's meeting took place. The school has long been closed but the memories still fresh for McLane.

She told "Nightline" she vividly remembers being forced to run laps around a building and being beaten by a school matron as punishment.



Dorothy McLane reflects on her traumatic experiences at the Rosebud Boarding school, which abused indigenous students.© ABC News

"I see myself as a little girl here, 6-years-old and trying to just…be a kid, trying to be a child and trying to be loved and it wasn't in here," McLane said. "I mean, there's I don't ever remember anybody telling me they loved me. What I remember most is the punishment."

Shylee Brave, a granddaughter of a boarding school survivor and an alum of the Sicangu Youth Council, has been pushing for the federal government and others to acknowledge the abuses and help tribes rebuild their lost culture.

"We didn't go to boarding school, but we still deal with the same traumas that our grandparents and great-grandparents went through," Brave said.

Brave told "Nightline," that Haaland's visit sent a powerful message.

"I kind of just I'm hoping that people see how resilient we are as Native American people because they pretty much tried to kill us off and they couldn't," she said.



Shylee Brave of the Sicangu Youth Council speaks about her efforts to bring justice to the indigenous families who suffered under boarding schools.© ABC News

Brave said she was optimistic that the federal government would make amends.

"I think that Secretary Haaland and her team are doing what they can and what they know they should do, because if they didn't think that the government did anything wrong, they wouldn't be doing what they're trying to," Brave said.

The work of the youth council Brave belonged to has helped to heal some open wounds.

Last year, the remains of Indigenous children who died at the Carlisle Indian School in Pennsylvania over a century ago were finally returned to Rosebud Sioux reservation.



The cemetery at the Chemawa Indian School in Salem, Ore.© ABC News

The Sicangu Youth Council helped lead 6 years of negotiations between the tribe and the U.S. Army which oversees the grounds where the school once stood.

The Rosebud Sioux community has also launched a new education program to help preserve their dying language.MORE: Report outlines federal 'abuse' of Native children at boarding schools

Brave is among the people working at an immersion school that teaches children of Indigenous families as young as 4 the Lakota language. Tribal leaders predict the language could be wiped out in a decade.

"In order to do our ceremonies, we have to be able to sing and speak in the language to the spirits. And so if we can't do that, then we can't continue to do our sacred ceremonies," Carmelita Shouldis, who teaches at the school, told "Nightline."



The native Lakota language is being taught to children in a special immersion class.© ABC News

The school is looking to expand beyond its kindergarten to second grade classes.

Brave said she is proud of the work she's done to regain her community's heritage and culture and hopes that it will pay off for generations to come.

"I just really hope to be able to one day sit down with my kids, if I ever have any, and speak the language and just be able to converse in the Lakota language," she said.

ABC News' Jessica Hopper and Marjorie McAfee contributed to this report.

Measles now an imminent global threat due to pandemic, say WHO and CDC

Story by By Jennifer Rigby • 

A vial of measles vaccine is checked at a field logistics base run by Doctors Without Borders in the town of Boso-Manzi in Mongala province© Thomson Reuters

(Reuters) - There is now an imminent threat of measles spreading in various regions globally, as COVID-19 led to a steady decline in vaccination coverage and weakened surveillance of the disease, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the U.S. public health agency said on Wednesday.

Measles is one of the most contagious human viruses and is almost entirely preventable through vaccination. However, it requires 95% vaccine coverage to prevent outbreaks among populations.

A record high of nearly 40 million children missed a measles vaccine dose in 2021 due to hurdles created by the COVID pandemic, the WHO and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in a joint report.

While measles cases have not yet gone up dramatically compared to previous years, now is the time to act, the WHO's measles lead, Patrick O'Connor, told Reuters.

"We are at a crossroads," he said on Tuesday. "It is going to be a very challenging 12-24 months trying to mitigate this."

A combination of factors like lingering social distancing measures and cyclical nature of measles may explain why there has not yet been an explosion of cases despite the widening immunity gaps, but that could change quickly, said O'Connor, pointing out the highly contagious nature of the disease.

The WHO has already seen an increase of large disruptive outbreaks since the start of 2022, rising from 19 to almost 30 by September, O'Connor said, adding that he was particularly worried about parts of sub-Saharan Africa.

(Reporting by Raghav Mahobe in Bengaluru and Jennifer Rigby in London; Editing by Maju Samuel)

Advocates call on Biden administration to renew Haitian migrant protections

A coalition of more than 400 advocacy groups on Tuesday called on the Biden administration to renew a key immigration program to protect all Haitians in the United States from deportation.

Story by Rafael Bernal • Yesterday  - The Hill

In a letter to President Biden, Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas and Secretary of State Antony Blinken, the 422 groups led by Haitian Bridge Alliance asked the officials to extend and redesignate Haiti’s Temporary Protected Status (TPS) designation.

Extending TPS for Haiti would give current beneficiaries more time in the program, and redesignation would grant TPS benefits to Haitians who entered the United States after July of 2021.

Under TPS, the citizens of a designated country are allowed to work and live in the United States regardless of their prior immigration status, but they must register for the program and pass background checks, and they are generally not afforded legal avenues to permanent residency.

The Biden administration last redesignated TPS for Haiti in March of 2021 for 18 months — the maximum allowed period — meaning the designation will expire in February 2023, although Mayorkas has until Dec. 5 to decide whether he will grant an extension.

“Given the deteriorating security and humanitarian crises as described herein that present extraordinary and temporary conditions that make a safe return to Haiti impossible, the Administration should extend and redesignate Haiti for TPS. This will allow protection against removal and eligibility for work authorization to all eligible Haitians currently in the United States,” the groups wrote.

TPS is generally granted to countries suffering from the effects of either human-made or natural disasters — and some designations have been more or less summarily renewed for decades, as TPS beneficiaries have become part of the U.S. social fabric.

The Trump administration tried unsuccessfully to gut the TPS program, claiming that its temporary protections had been made permanent by prior administrations.

Haiti’s first designation was in 2010, following an earthquake that devastated Port-au-Prince and set off some of the instability that now has the country teetering on the edge of failed state status.

“All of the conditions leading to the Biden administration’s original TPS redesignation on May 22, 2021, the assassination of President Jovenel Moïse on July 7, 2021, the August 14, 2021 earthquake and subsequent tropical storm, and the deteriorating crises as described herein, make a safe return to Haiti completely impossible,” the groups wrote.

Related video: Secretary of state’s visit to Canada focuses on crisis in Haiti
Duration 2:00  View on Watch


US & Canada foreign ministers address Haiti


Haiti 'a country on the edge of collapse,' says Ambassador


“On November 3, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk echoed this sentiment and warned, ‘In this context, it is clear that the systematic violations of rights in Haiti do not currently allow for the safe, dignified and sustainable return of Haitians to the country,'” they added.

The Biden administration is widely expected to extend the country’s current TPS designation — not doing so would make tens of thousands of Haitians eligible for deportation — but it’s unclear whether officials will also redesignate Haiti.

“Most Haitians who have entered the United States since the TPS eligibility date of July 29, 2021, crossed through as many as eleven countries on a dangerous and traumatic voyage in search of safety and security for their family,” the advocates wrote.

Haitian migration both by land and by sea has increased, as conditions in the country worsen.

The Biden administration’s decision to repatriate more than 25,000 Haitians during the crisis has aggravated conditions in the Caribbean nation, and potentially put the expelled Haitians in danger.

Given conditions on the ground, the advocates also called for a freeze on deportations to Haiti, a measure the Obama administration took after the 2010 earthquake, although the administration resumed them in September 2016.

The Biden administration refused to halt removals to Haiti after a 2021 earthquake aggravated conditions.

“Even though the Haitian government has been unable to safely receive and reintegrate its citizens, there have been over 240 deportation and expulsion flights to Haiti since September 19, 2021. Most of these estimated 25,000 individuals removed to Haiti were blocked from seeking asylum and other protection by Title 42 policies. These removals severely undermine the Administration’s promise to build a fairer and more inclusive immigration and asylum system for all,” the advocates wrote.

And the advocates also called on the Biden administration to move quickly with any humanitarian measures it does take to protect Haitians, in the hopes of avoiding bureaucratic snags that have made life even harder for the Haitian diaspora.

In particular, the advocates asked the administration to quickly issue a Federal Register notice to allow Haitians covered by TPS redesignations to work.

A delay in the last such notice left thousands of TPS beneficiaries unable to work and at risk of deportation for months.

“These delays, which can last more than the period for which TPS is granted, can make the TPS designations meaningless,” the advocates wrote.

The advocates also called on the administration to quickly process TPS applications, as more than 90,000 Haitians are still waiting for their papers from the last redesignation.

“We strongly urge the Biden administration to (1) extend and redesignate Haiti for TPS, (2) swiftly release the Federal Register Notice, (3) provide a minimum 180-day registration period for both current TPS holders and new beneficiaries under redesignation, (4) release all Haitians currently in immigration detention centers, and (5) halt deportation and expulsion flights to Haiti,” the advocacy groups added.

The Hill.

Chinook Arch captivates SOUTHERN Albertans, but its warm signal won't last

SOMETHING I SAW WHEN AT THE U OF LETHBRIDGE 

Story by Digital Writers • 

Southern Albertans were treated to a spectacular Chinook Arch cloud on Tuesday -- something you can both see and feel.

PHOTOS: Snow jelly rolls? See what’s forming from a recent winter wallop

"Also known as mountain-wave clouds, they form on the east side of the Rockies as westerly winds traverse the north-south range," explains Nadine Powell, a meteorologist at The Weather Network. "They tend to have a well-defined western edge and can extend for hundreds of kilometres."


Chinook Arch captivates Albertans, but its warm signal won't last© Provided by The Weather Network

To the viewer looking westward toward the Rockies, as seen in many photos, it can appear like an arch as you are looking out from under the cloud into clear blue skies.

The classic "arch" shape is due to the clouds forming at middle and higher altitudes.

Chinook arches tell of warm weather on the way, as the downsloping "chinook" wind heats up as it descends, leading to temperatures rising at the base of the mountain.

In this particular case, it's definitely the right sign as southern Alberta enjoys some milder November weather this week, with even double digit daytime highs expected across some southern sections by Friday.



It won't last long however, as conditions turn much colder for the weekend as Arctic air plunges south and dominates through most of next week -- including a couple days of "severe cold."

MUST SEE: Don't call it a comeback, Canada: Winter hasn't even started

Some places will see high temperatures that will struggle to reach -20°C and forecasters are also watching a system that could bring significant snow to parts of the region near the Yellowhead Highway, and possibly Edmonton, into Monday.

Here's a closer look at the Chinook Arch cloud captured across southern Alberta Tuesday:

Thumbnail image courtesy: Stuart Milliner/Twitter

Alberta projects $12.3B surplus for budget in latest fiscal update


EDMONTON — Alberta is revising down this year’s budget bottom line as it doles out inflation-fighting payouts but still expects to finish with a petro-powered $12.3-billion surplus.


Alberta projects $12.3B surplus for budget in latest fiscal update© Provided by The Canadian Press

“Our fiscal situation has improved substantially,” Finance Minister Travis Toews said Thursday as he released the mid-year update for the 2022-23 budget.

“Challenges are ahead, but we’re leaving no one behind.

“We’re able to provide significant help to Albertans and their families, to keep more money in their pockets for groceries, gas, utilities and other rising costs of day-to-day living.”

The plan is to put the bulk of the windfall into debt repayment, reducing the taxpayer-supported debt by $13.3 billion to a new total of just under $80 billion when the fiscal year ends on March 31.

The government has also set aside $2.8 billion over the next three years to cover a batch of inflation-fighting programs and payouts to shield Albertans — particularly families, seniors and the vulnerable — from higher costs due to inflation spikes.

Premier Danielle Smith announced the payouts and rebates this week while building on existing relief measures that began in the spring under former premier Jason Kenney.

Among the changes, the province has paused its 13 cents a litre tax on gasoline at the pumps and is rebating $50 a month on household electricity bills.

Smith’s United Conservative Party government is re-indexing personal income tax brackets and benefit payments to seniors and people with disabilities — the same programs it de-indexed three years ago.

Middle- and lower-income families with children under 18 will be getting $600 total per child over six months starting in January.

The same $600 benefit will go to middle-income seniors and those in need.

Related video: Alberta announces $2.4B affordability package
Duration 4:02
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Alberta has a rebate program in place in case heating prices spike, but the trigger point is not expected to be reached at least through to the end of this year.

Non-renewable resources are expected to bring in $28.1 billion, with revenue from the oilsands alone making up 70 per cent of that windfall.

Total revenue is pegged at $76.9 billion and total spending at $64.6 billion.

Spending is up slightly to cover big-ticket items such as $174 million in a new pay deal for physicians.

Personal income taxes is to take in $13.3 billion and there will be $6.3 billion in corporate income taxes.

Total spending on COVID-19 and an economic recovery plan are estimated at $2 billion.

The long-term outlook looks bright. Real GDP growth is pegged at 4.8 per cent this year and Alberta is welcoming 22,000 more people — the biggest net migration among all provinces and the biggest influx to Alberta since 2014.

Inflationary pressures have receded but remain a concern, says the government’s outlook. Headline inflation — the raw figure that includes such volatile price swings as gasoline and food — is predicted to be 6.3 per cent this year.

“Volatility in the market is extreme, and that’s why we must continue to make smart, responsible budgetary choices,” Toews said.

It has been a vertiginous ride for Alberta’s resource-reliant economy. In February, as the global economy reawakened from a two-year COVID-19-induced hibernation, Toews tabled a budget forecasting a modest $511-million surplus following years of multibillion-dollar deficits.

But as global demand for oil shot up and Russia invaded Ukraine, putting more strain on energy supplies, the benchmark West Texas Intermediate oil price went through the roof, averaging more than US$100 a barrel for months.

In August, Alberta’s budget surplus was revised from $511 million to $13.2 billion before being revised yet again Thursday to $12.3 billion.

The West Texas price has softened somewhat and is expected to remain as such in the near future, but still hovers in the very healthy $80 a barrel range.

The government says the WTI needs to average out no lower than $81.50 a barrel the rest of the way in order to meet its budget targets.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 24, 2022.

Dean Bennett, The Canadian Press

RED TORY CRITIQUE OF SMITH
Tasha Kheiriddin: Danielle Smith gets in the way of health reform

Opinion by Tasha Kheiriddin • Yesterday 

For political commentators, Alberta Premier Danielle Smith is the gift that keeps on giving. Whether it’s the war in Ukraine, the oppression of the unvaccinated, or the sacking of Alberta’s entire health services board, every time Smith takes the podium, she says or does something that prompts a slew of outrage — and makes the rest of Canada’s premiers look utterly rational by comparison.


Danielle Smith speaks to the Calgary business community during a Nov. 18, 2022 luncheon.

© Provided by National Post

In a video widely panned on social media, she described how Albertans should all have Health Care Savings Accounts to pay for care. These would be partly funded by the state, but also by individuals, their employers, their families, indeed, anyone who could spare a dime. The video built on a paper Smith published in 2021 for The School of Public Policy, in which she wrote that “My view is that the entire budget for family practitioners should be paid for from Health Care Savings Accounts … The fundamental rethink that has to happen in health care is to create a patient-centred system … It has to shift the burden away from taxpayers and toward private individuals, their employers and their insurance companies.”

Smith is not wrong when she says that the system needs to be more patient-centred. She is also correct when she says the system must find a different way of shouldering costs. But like a bull in the proverbial china shop, her blunt words and lack of empathy smashed any possibility of a rational discussion on the subject. The image people were left with was of patients begging their relatives for money so they could go to the emergency room once they had exhausted the $375 the government had put in their HCSA. She has since said that people could use their accounts only for services that aren’t covered by public health insurance — but only after her earlier statements had been made public.

A patient-centred system isn’t about patients paying out of pocket for services: it’s about money following the patient through the system. Currently, most hospitals in Canada receive block funding, allocated according to the demographics of the population served by the institution. This means that every patient who comes through the door represents a cost, not a benefit. The more patients a hospital treats, the less money it can allocate to each of them from the pool of money available.

This leads to rationing and triage. It means capacity goes unused; for example, there may be a block of funding for only 10 surgeries a week, which take three days to perform. The other two days, the beds lie unused and the doctors, though they might be available, cannot be paid to perform more surgeries, as the funding has been exhausted. The result is underused capacity and overlong waitlists. A patient-centred system would have the money follow the patient; in other words, the hospital would be reimbursed for each patient it treats. This would incentivize hospitals to treat more patients, not fewer, and create competition between institutions, incentivizing innovation and higher quality care.

Jordan Peterson interviews Premier Danielle Smith on conservatism and Alberta

Alberta premier says she didn't do 'deep dive' into ancestry after Cherokee claims questioned

A patient-centred system would also empower patients to choose how they want to get their care delivered, by having both public and private options available to them for all services, not just those not covered by Medicare. Courts have already ruled that in Quebec, patients should have that choice for several operations, including hip surgery. Health Care Savings Accounts and private insurance can help pay for such choices; they currently exist in Canada to pay for things not funded by the public system, including a private room in a hospital, for example. But they should represent an option, or an add-on, not a requirement as Smith would have, for getting care. No one should be denied care based on ability to pay.

Health-care costs are not a burden, as Smith describes: they are a form of social contract necessary for a decent, functional society. Yes, we should make every effort to tame them, and there should be no sacred cows. But the premier’s harsh words do the debate no favours. And they are also highly ironic. If Smith really wants people to take personal responsibility for their care, she should be preaching prevention, like the public health officials she fired. Wear a mask in crowded spaces. Wash your hands often. Get vaccinated. Try not to infect others. But hey, that would be off-message in her brave new everyone-for-themselves health-care universe.

Postmedia News

Front-line workers seeing more amputations in Edmonton homeless community

Story by Andrea Huncar • 

An emergency room physician is among front-line workers calling for more shelter space and the collection of data after seeing more amputations in Edmonton's homeless community.

Dr. Sandy Dong, who has practised medicine in the Edmonton for two decades, says he has never seen more amputations due to frostbite than he did last year.

"The vast majority was because they were houseless and did not have access to a warm place," said Dong.

He said he hopes to see better decisions this year "because we have a situation where the outcome and the injury is preventable."

In an email, Alberta Health Services said it does not track amputations from frostbite and had no further information.

The health department does not track deaths, or causes of death, among Edmontonians living homeless, either.

Dong said an official count should be kept of mortality and amputation rates to better understand the scope of the problem.

The Alberta government announced last month that it would spend an additional $63 million over two years to reduce homelessness province-wide.

Of 450 provincially-funded additional shelter spaces, 260 spots at Hope Mission and Herb Jamieson Centre are already open.

Forty additional overnight spaces are expected to open November 23 at the Mustard Seed Trinity Lutheran Church.

Related video: Edmonton health-care workers struggle to control shigella outbreak

Duration 2:01

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The Hope Mission is working toward opening up at least 150 more spaces at an off-site location near Argyll Road and 77th Street by mid-December.

With roughly 2,700 Edmontonians now living homeless, the Edmonton Coalition for Housing and Homelessness says at least 1,550 additional shelter spaces are needed.

Dong said investment in shelter and housing is relatively inexpensive compared to the required acute care, treatment, surgeries and rehabilitation.

Amputees are often discharged back to homelessness where healing and getting around are even more challenging, and many can no longer work.

"Now they have no income and then they're back into the cycle of poverty," Dong said.

'Four walls and a roof'

While handing out supplies on her regular patrols, Judith Gale, local chapter leader for the outreach group Bear Clan Patrol, said she is seeing more people who have lost their fingers and toes due to exposure.

Gale recalled some of those heartbreaking circumstances: a double amputee stuck in a snow pile while trying to cross the street in a wheelchair; a homeless refugee who escaped war in Somalia only to lose all of his fingers on Edmonton's streets.

"It's a life sentence," Gale said. "It's a life sentence of not being able to work with your hands again, not being able to walk shoulder to shoulder with your peers and society. It's a life sentence and it could be avoided so easily just by four walls and a roof."


Judith Gale, leader of Bear Clan Patrol Beaver Hills House Edmonton, said amputation is a life sentence that is easily preventable.© Jamie McCannel/CBC

Elliott Tanti, a senior manager with Boyle Street Community Services, said collecting data would show whether the rate of amputations has gone up or the number has increased because more people are experiencing homelessness.

He noted that earlier in the pandemic, daily updates were provided so that appropriate health decisions could be made.

"So how as a society, how as an agency, how as a health-care provider, are we able to make effective decisions around public health if we don't have effective information, whether it be deaths or amputations?"

Peter Hall: Why inflation is not really the problem
Story by Special to Financial Post • 


The Bank of Canada in Ottawa.© Provided by Financial Post

Most readers are already offended, having read the title. Let me explain.

Clearly, inflation is a huge problem for households, businesses, government budgets — and of course, for monetary policymakers. Arthur Okun ’s famous misery index has just two elements, and inflation is one of them. Moreover, inflation is arguably worst in the beginning, when prices are outpacing incomes, putting the bite on real purchasing power — the second-quarter gap between CPI inflation and the rate of hourly wage increases hit four per cent, meaning for now, households are poorer.

For businesses, the bite is more like a chomp, given the average increase in input costs of about 10 per cent and recent bottom-line results. Worse still, this was a beast that was considered long dead, and is now resurrected and wreaking havoc. If this isn’t really the problem, then what is?

First and foremost, central banks will win the fight. Although it has been decades since they last conquered the beast, their playbook is well-rehearsed, proving itself through various business cycles over the past few decades. Central bankers have the tools to continue tightening, not just until inflation itself is subdued, but more significantly, until inflationary expectations are completely quelled. If so, today’s inflation is temporary, and the only real debate is, how temporary.

But that’s the key to the problem. Inflation might soon be mastered, but at what cost? Economies everywhere will react negatively, and indeed are already showing signs of recession or at the very least, slowdown. That’s a scary prospect, given that it can take up to 18 months for an interest rate change to impact the real economy; given the timing of increases to date, there’s a lot more weakness in store. It won’t hit every economy the same. Thankfully, the bulk of the world’s “driver” economies have ample evidence of pent-up spending pressure. Rate hikes in those fortunate zones are actually accommodating growth.

Canada has some pent-up spending in reserve, but our runway is a lot shorter. Here, housing markets have been red-lining for years, debt-to-income levels are sky-high, and the average household’s wealth is heavily dependent on the value of the principal dwelling. Add to that the instant debt-sensitivity of the larger variable-rate mortgage cohort , the shock for those who opt to lock in at a higher rate, and the ultimate impact of rate resets when current mortgage contracts expire. Given this backdrop, at least 60 per cent to 70 per cent of our gross domestic product is highly sensitive to rate hikes.

It gets more somber. Soft landings are as tricky to achieve as they are desirable. Put more directly, monetary authorities have been known to overdo it. We can hardly blame them; monetary policy is a blunt tool at best, and perfect outcomes usually require a lot of luck. Moreover, cracking the psychology of inflation almost dictates monetary overreach, especially after a lengthy phase of well-behaved prices.

Math is also a problem. The most-quoted, up-to-the-minute inflation numbers are in actual fact quite dated, and the inflation fix can actually be in long before consumers or businesses realize it. That’s because we use this month’s prices compared with those of a whole year earlier. We tend to do it this way for good reasons: the numbers are easy to grasp, and useful for compensation adjustments and a whole array of other pricing decisions. The trouble is that monthly price behaviour can be well in line with targets — or even under target — long before it shows up in the headline numbers. In fact, it can take a full 12 months until that becomes clear — and at that point, it is almost always too late for the economy.

Take 1991. Amid monetary tightening, the new year brought the GST, which added seven per cent to the cost of most goods and services. Not surprisingly, the consumer price index jumped instantly, to 6.9 per cent. Fearing a re-kindling of higher price expectations, the central bank went to work. By the end of the year, year-over-year increases in the consumer price index were down to 3.8 per cent, and core price growth was just 2.9 per cent.

Success, right? Wrong. When 1992 arrived, the GST was fully embedded — that is, the year-to-year change disappeared. In monthly terms, prices were deflating. In January 1991, yearly price growth fell to 1.8 per cent, and by mid-year, all-items inflation was just 1.1 per cent. Suddenly, worry shifted to possible disinflation, or worse, deflation.

While a new national sales tax isn’t a worry this time, the dynamic is still the same. It doesn’t get much airplay, but on a monthly basis, core price growth has been slowing quickly, from the double-digit level in May to about four per cent in October. This is a remarkable shift, given that we are only in our ninth month of tightening. Allow time for the full effects to take hold, and we could be back to 1992.

Ah, but we got through it then. Won’t this time be the same? Not necessarily. Disinflation and deflation are much trickier beasts; the central bank playbook on those is far less clear than for inflation. Just ask Japan, where disinflation and deflation are decades-long mysteries. Human behaviour causes deflation to persist — if prices are going to be lower tomorrow, why buy today? Or for that matter, why buy at all, unless you simply have to? In this way, deflation begets deflation.

Can we escape the deflationary trap? That largely depends on the state of fundamental demand. If the economy is indeed overstretched, consumers can delay purchases for a lot longer than usual, abetting the malaise. Businesses that depend on domestic demand will feel the pinch. If there’s a glimmer of hope, it’s likely in exports. Stronger fundamentals in the United States and elsewhere suggest that external markets will be more resilient.

Ultimately, inflation’s not the main problem. It’s the reaction to the remedy that will tell the tale. That reaction won’t be the same in all countries — but Canada’s weak fundamentals suggest a more acute response here.

Peter Hall is chief executive of Econosphere Inc. and a former chief economist at Export Development Canada.

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