A very unbiased organization I am sure.

Ahh, the inevitible solution, MORE MONEY! It is like $14.5bn a year in BC is not enough. Canada ranks tops in health care funding and bottom in delivery.

Clearly the status quo is the only way to go.

Of course, we can't afford proper healthcare, when our dear wealth creating multinational corporate mafia so badly needs our money!

How could we refuse their desperate calls for help, when their CEOs are only "earning" $60, or $150 million in a year?

Ed Deak.

Fiat lux:

How could we refuse their desperate calls for help, when their CEOs are only "earning" $60, or $150 million in a year?

Ed Deak.

Close Ed, very close.

There are many models of governance, I am going to point out three that revolve around the idea that the 'government' is like a company providing a service to its customers 'citizens'.

If a government is owned by a single entity it comes off like Brunei, where profits are taken for the benefit of the owner (the Sultan) and the services are minimized to the level that the citizen customers can accept without revolt - or emigration.

If a government is owned by its customers, then the services are maximized and profits are minimized as the citizens take their 'profit' in the form of services from the company 'government'.

If a government is owned by its employees, then the services are 'rationed', just like the single owner model, to the point where they are as minimal as possible while avoiding revolt or excessive emigration. The profits are then converted into benefits to those employee 'owners'. Witness the expansion of the federal civil service, the power of their union lobby, the endless addition of more and more layers of bureaucracy and the total inability to 'fire' any of these mandarins.

Large, and I mean LARGE amounts of the tax dollars collected are paid out to the 'benefit' of the employees of the Government. More holidays, sick days, better pensions, the BEST health and safety systems of anyone working in Canada. How much does that cost?

And their numbers are always growing (even in bad economic times Federal Employees continue to have all the best), with no way to FIRE ANY OF THEM.

Forget about what largess the Corporate sector can squeeze out, take a very hard look at the model of our governance, and ask 'who is really owning the profits?'

Unfortunately, I'm still a real working man at 79, so now I have to go and put the chains on my big tractor, a whole day's rotten, dirty work, but would like to leave with the question:

Does anybody know how much the multinationals take out of the country?

I don't think so, because it would hurt their "global competitiveness" the governments have to protect, or else they may hold their breaths and turn blue.

I would say, what government employees are taking is chickenfeed in comparison.

Ed Deak.

yes Ed:

I would say, what government employees are taking is chickenfeed in comparison.

And the combination/blending of Governance and BIG business, with MP's like Belinda and Emerson should be a warning signal. The embedded employees get their largess and no a word of comment is coming from the big businesses since they are working together to effect the shakedown.

Thus the reason for the need to break the oligopoly, thus the need to fire the top of the government service pyramid at each change of government.

The problems of 'rationing' of services is not from a lack of funds, it is from a total greedy desire to keep the profits of the extorsions from the common folk in the pockets of the Government Service Union Members.

Waaaaaaaah! (thumps heels, waves fists) I wanna see a corporate C.E.O. hold his breath and turn blue ... right now!

Does anybody know how much the multinationals bring into the country?

I don't think the professional public service - most of whom are dedicated and hard working, is the problem. The enablers put into sensitive slots to further the aims of their politcal masters and corporate paymasters are. Guys like Basi, Basi and Virk are just the grease for the elected characters at the top who are not acting in the public interest.

nln - on balance - nothing.

Here is a link to an article from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives:

http://www.policyalternatives.ca/MonitorIssues/2006/04/MonitorIssue1353/index.cfm?pa=DDC3F905

At that site, Mel Hurtig quotes a StatsCan, 2003 figure of 29.3%. He believes the number to be higher now, and looking at what has transpired in BC, alone, since 2000, I would tend to agree. SIG

People who pay no taxes shouldn't expect gold plated services. Simple.

I get it, the same that you bring to this conversation.

I get it, Percy. So, if some uninsured person of no means, runs over you while you are walking down the sidewalk and you become fully disabled and unable to work and pay taxes, then you should be allowed to rot and die.

Or suppose you contract a painfully dibilitating illness, like rheumatoid arthritis, and you become unable to work as the years pass. Since you pay no taxes, we should let you suffer while we tend to the good rich folk whose daddies and grand-daddies left them millions.

simple answer: As little as possible.
I bet they spend more on advertising than anything else.
That is how BS works!

"And their numbers are always growing (even in bad economic times Federal Employees continue to have all the best), with no way to FIRE ANY OF THEM."

A common lament, but unfortunately not true.

There's always a mechanism to let workers go who are underperforming. Usually it requires the managers to document the employee's failings. That's where the system falls apart, when managers fail to perform their job adequately by not ensuring there's proof of a failure to perform. In other words lazy managers create an environment ripe for abuse.

I'm by no means advocating poor workmanship or on-the-job laziness, but there's plenty of blame to go around.

"Large, and I mean LARGE amounts of the tax dollars collected are paid out to the 'benefit' of the employees of the Government. More holidays, sick days, better pensions, the BEST health and safety systems of anyone working in Canada."

I would think we would want our government to provide an example of fair, equitable treatment of workers, rather than low-balling at every turn, as a public version of some private companies' slavish devotion towards the 'race to the bottom'.

Funny how when it's cabinet ministers all we hear is how we need to offer competitive wages and benefits to get the best of the bunch (no proof yet for that theory I might add) but when it's the people who actually do the work of making a government run the bean-counters can't get enough of cost-cutting.

Rightnutter.....multinationals bring nothing to, or into this, or any other country.

In case it is beyond your ideological warp, their purpose is to "take", not to "bring".

Foreign investment is the inflation of a country's money supply from abroad, for the purpose of priming the well with a few drops for prennial flow later. Absolutely no benefit to the citizens.

Corporations borrow to invest, because it is good business to write off the servicing costs of the capital, in other words, to make the recipient country pay for their own exploitation.

That capital is "created" by some foreign bank from the air, against other peoples properties and resources used for collateral.

In short, foreign invcestment may have had some justification in gold standard days, albeit never in Canada, because the country had tons of gold to begin with, but in these days of free money creation it has become a monumental fraud. The purpose of globalization is to buy up the world's resources with worthless, imaginary money and enslave people before they wake up to the fact that they've been screwed out of house and home in their own lands.

Accordng to official figures, foreign capital builds nothing, between 94 to 97% goes into the acquisition of existing Canadian businesses, in many cases to close them down and fire the workers.

The facts are all there for anybody who can read anything else, outside the prescribed scriptures, used as drugs to wipe out logical thought.

Daaaaaaaaaaaaaa!

Ed Deak.

For the folks that never knew how things worked before the public health care system worked, it was fairly weird if one moved between provinces. Had to get a new plan each time. And now in our town we see something like that reoccurring as companies try to get customers to pay for their services. we are one of very few provinces that a direct payment for services has been in existance for years. Here in Victoria we now have a company advertising. Around 3,000 bucks to start and then over 2,000 a year to stay. What do they get? Well for starters a number of procedures that until Campbell and Co came along were in the public system. The favourite excuse is we don't take doctors from the public system so the ones in the system don't have to wait as long. Up pops a quarter page add a few days ago. Get it done Now says the header. MRI bookings within 24 hours results within 48 hours.( Under the public system your MD gets the results just as fast) Talk to your family doctor to book. Professional service provided by Victoria Hospital Radiologists. So are the guys at Victoria hospitals working on the side for this company? Does it really tell the lie to the idea that going private doesn't cause a drain on public service providers. The add clearly says they work for the company and the hospital. They get away with it because the present government likes it that way.

"I would think we would want our government to provide an example of fair, equitable treatment of workers, rather than low-balling at every turn, as a public version of some private companies' slavish devotion towards the 'race to the bottom'."

There is a middle ground, though. The public service (federal) could use a haircut.

IME, the hiring process starts all the problems in the public service. It takes so long (and so many hoops) to get hired, by the time you are hired you REALLY feel entitled to all the $, benefits, etc.

Plus, gov. employees rarely quit - b/c the benefits are so good, even if they are sick of their jobs. Someone in the private sector if unhappy at work would quit, find something else. But public service employees are led to believe "this is the best there is" so they stay anther 22 miserable years to claim that pension. This leads to that grumpy woman processing your passport application or the snarky man at customs. Every year, they get raises, regardless of merit.

Full disclosure - I have worked for the PS for a couple of years. My boss makes 3x as much as me and is a figurehead. Our combined salaries could provide a great deal of health care to people who need it, if properly managed. But that will never happen.

Here is part of the answer: Close down;
1) Anything related to smoking
2) Anything related to drinking
3) Anything related to Big Macs
4) Anything related to JUNK FOOD
5) Spend less time at TV
6) Spend less time at PC'S

START UP:
1) more sports
2) better eating
3) busy physically
4) good sleeping
5) get a job to support oneself
6) Be constructive
7) DO NOT BE DESTRUCTIVE
8) get motivated with good things

* People should feel better and spend less time in the Doc's office.
** This is a start for a better livestyle.

++ I say this because I see all kinds of people standing at corners doing nothing and this is not healthy to do that. Why not help your Dad paint the house or cut the grass and plant trees. Baby sitting is something which is better then nothing.

*** I see people doing nothing all the time which is bad news. That is part of our medical problem!!

Listening, G West?

The rate of increase in health care spending has been slowing.

Up to 91 billion dollars for public health care. Roughly $3,000 per Cdn?

Health care costs are only 6.6% of GDP. Pretty darn low compared with other countries.

Somebody should call Campbell and Taylor and let them know the sky isn't falling yet.

"Every year, they get raises, regardless of merit."

Every year the cost of living goes up too. I know it's a chicken and egg kind of problem, but still, it seems its always the workers who are expected to be the ones to absorb the difference.

Welcome to the Animal Farm, Stump.

True, Stump, but my issue is with accountability. In the private sector, an employee has an annual review and receives a fair raise based on the year's performance. This, to me, seems a fair way of determining who is worthy of a cost-of-living-rate raise and who is worthy of a bit more. This is not just to encourage people to work harder for the employer's benefit (and the public's benefit) but it's good for peoples' self esteem. Ask most people in the gov't and they'll say their morale is low. Thousands of dollars and hours are spent yearly on workshops, consultants, etc. to raise the morale of the employees. It's so broken it's ridiculous.

But this isn't at all what this story was about.

Great in theory. What often really happens in the private (and public)sector is the best ass-kisser gets the raise.

What happens when you point our your superior's incompetence? Or outperform the boss' favourite lick-spittle? No raise and you're lucky if you can keep your job.

The deck is stacked and not many workers have a hope of holding aces and face cards without a union.

dogbreath:

But this isn't at all what this story was about.

The two sentences are non-sequitur.

This is at the core of the problem, yet so few are willing to look past the 'symptoms' of what is happening to see the 'why' it is happening.

I've lived as an adult in Canada for 25 years. In terms of service, I have always gotten good, courteous, reliable service from every government employee with whom I have had to work. This includes health care. I have had far worse luck and treatment from people in the private sector. I was sent by the health care system to a private clinic to receive a bone density scan last month. It was a filthy place - so dirty that I did not want to sit on nor touch anything. (I am not a phobic-type person either - except for screaming case of neoconophobia that seems to get worse by day.) The receptionist was rude until she actually looked at me and decided I was to her liking; then she came on to me like a gangbuster.

Though still off topic in regards to the article: To give weight to Stump's assertions, I've known a number of bosses (public and private) who perpetuate a system whereby special favours are granted to the bootlicks beneath them. People with courage to make truths be known, even should it not agree with the boss, are often treated poorly. Authoritarian bosses often have control/self-esteem issues that manifest themselves in malignant ways. This is why unions improve service delivery: there are limits as to how a boss may treat employees in a unionized organisation. Unionized public sector employees don't get the boot for not being a yes-man to a control freak. Unionized public sector employees have guidelines and procedures to follow, and they follow them. It has been my experience that, most often, when it is in their power, they exceed minimum standards of service and due diligence - yet the public is continually dumping on them. They deserve to be paid more just for having to read and hear the public continually complain about them. Just imagine how much better our world would be if people were kind and polite to the person who trying to do his or her job to the best of his/her ability. Generally, people do work to the best of their ability.

The mood in the public sector could be better but the mood among private sector workers is certainly lower. There have been polls done on this.

Not too many people enjoy a year end review, few get the raise they think they should get if they get one at all and as Stump pointed out the ass-kissers are bad for the morale of the entire organization since everyone can see the disconnect between how much they get and what they actually do.

It may be difficult at times to get a union started since people are afraid to go out on a limb, and rightly so, but stats show not many workers choose to get rid of their union once they have it.

Ahh, the inevitible solution, MORE MONEY! It is like $14.5bn a year in BC is not enough. Canada ranks tops in health care funding and bottom in delivery

Some per capita governemnt spending stats (U.S. dollars) on health care:

United States: $2,364
France: $2.080
Canada $2,048

Note, Working Man, that the U.S. spends that amount only to cover those over 65 or on Medicaid. When you add private spending on health care in the U.S, they spend $5,267 per person (The Canadian figure is $2,931).

Wages are not the problem. The biggest expenses today goe into the servicing of inflated capital, created out of the air by the banks.

Old time economic textbooks warned against overcapitalization, and advised that the investment in jobs should not be more than one wage year.

Today, in the mills it is 60-70 wage years and in manufacturing over 100 wage years and growing.

This is why we have growing poverty, homelessness and environmental destruction to pay for this incredible and wasteful inflation for the sole purpose of stealing from other sectors.

The world is being destroyed to pay the servioce costs of imaginary capital/

Look up the figures and start thinking .

I could create an endless number of jobs for under $15,000 investment per, and have done it for 50 years, but they wouldn't survive because of distorted values caused by overcapitalization .

Ed Deak.

Ed, I see that you still have gas, apparently it didn't go away over the summer. Too bad, as most of economic rants are just silly nonsense.....

What's really strange nln, is that you haven't 'got' it before now. Clearly Fiat Lux is lost on you.

Maybe a few should. Ask any employer if CRA has made a mistake on their remittances and you will find that most will say "yes." I recently had a seven month nightmare when CRA claimed I did not make a GST remittance. I even had the cancelled cheque and remittance forms to show them. I got threatening letters and finally they dragged me into court to seize one my bank accounts. The judge was rather, ahem, not impressed.

In that case, it was that our much vaunted public servants kept shuffling the file from desk to desk to avoid taking responsibility for the error. I wonder how many tens of thousands to dollars that cost the Government of Canada?

Well, if those employees were not doing their jobs and their bosses recorded it, I am sure this could certainly have led towards grounds for dismissal. Sorry you had a rough time of it, Working Man. Nobody likes to see people's time wasted like that. Universities are the worst for wasting time and making people stand in line. My question to you is, did you email a scan (or a fax)of your cancelled cheque to the said employees and their boss before having to go to court? - or was murphy's Law in full force for you for the duration?

Dear NoLeft; I can understand your gratuitous grumpiness, and I sympathise, I really do.

Maybe you've already explained and I missed it, but I'm afraid my curiosity sometimes gets the better of me. I have to ask.

What exactly did happen to your left nut? Did the health care system have anything to do with it?

Fiat lux:

More than is brought in. That is all we need to know. Dollar amounts are immaterial.

Something to be said for a flat-rate income tax -- on gross income!

NLN:

More than is brought in. That is all we need to know. Dollar amounts are immaterial. Or do you think the multi-nationals are one big benevolent society?

This article talks about 1/3 of Canadians living on the health-care margins and points out that rural communities are hardest hit. To see British Columbias Socio-Economic Indices: Local Health Areas (LHAs) go here:

http://www.bcstats.gov.bc.ca/data/sep/i_lha/bars/bar.asp

You will note that the area least affected happens to be where our Premiere resides - imagine that! Does he care about those people living outside of his riding?

SharingIsGood, the government buggers up all the time. If you deal with them on a regular basis you will leanrn this. Nobody gets fired, either,

I deal with government employees all the time, WM.

All large organizations bugger up all the time, because they all exist by the Peter Principle of everybody being promoted one step over their capabilities.

As far corruption is concerned, the waste and corruption that goes on in largcorporations beats government at any time.

Lick up and kick down is the motto and to steal the most while there's chance.

I'd bet that tomorrow there will be $1. million worth of labour and equipment used in BC on the private jobs of corporate executives, even as low as supervisors and foremen, accounted as " tax deductible business expenses". In my contracting years I have worked hundreds of hours beside company employees, and wrote bills to companies for jobs done for executives. It was that, or no work from them.

Ed Deak.

Restaurant owners are notorious for stocking their own pantries, freezers, fridges, and bathrooms with products that go on the company expense ledgers. The company looks like it is doing poorly, yet the owner gets to eat at work and whatever he takes home. But I don't wish the restaurant business on anyone - even with the free food - it is dog eat dog, and long hours for most.

Unscrupulous contractors often over-order materials for construction projects if those materials fall within the materials list for the home they are building for themselves (or on speculation). Sometimes they just store things up, waiting for a cash-job. No tax on those products - and the original job they were taken from shows a less lucrative bottom line. Therefore the company/contractor jumps down a tax rung or two. Sometimes the sub-trades and the foremen (like Ed says) can pull it off....Happens all the time.

I was ordered by a large corporation to help move $500,000(in US dollars, 1975) worth of finished product to a barn about a mile away - two weeks before inventory time! After the inventory was complete and the auditors were gone, back came the product.

Ed is correct, the larger the organization, the greater the theft - especially in the private sector. In the past, I've blown the whistle on a couple of these crooks; and it never won me any friends. It cost me a good deal of time and a few headaches, but at least i could live with myself.

WM, you never answerred my question, about what you did to mitigate your possibly having to go to court. Did you send them faxes of your cancelled cheque? If they had had a copy of your cancelled cheque, then they would have been able to track down the transfer at the bank without anyone having to go to court. I have had the banks mess me around more than the government. I always ask, "What is it that I can supply for you so that we can both move on with our business?"

SIG:

Reminds me of a conversation I once had with a farmer (a cuzzin): He stated that he may never earn a lot of money, but by gum, he would never go hungry. I personally wouldn't want the gov'mint to start snooping in the freezers of the nation.

And your example is yet another reason why I favour a flat rate tax on gross income. Who would then care what the expenses are, and what happens to materials, etc.? Perhaps it would even encourage companies to check into internal theft, as a tax on gross income would discourage inflationary costs in order to make the profit margins higher.....

Joyless Macphailure took it off with one bite during the last NDP reign. I still have her teeth marks if you'd like to see them......