Alberta Politics & Government Thread 3.0

[Fuzz]

According to the 2021 census it's closer to ...err, ok only by age, but looks to be 10%

https://www12.statcan.gc.ca/census-r.../index-en.html

[indes]

Originally Posted by IliketoPuck

Recall that TEBA's complaint to the Labor Board surrounding items the ATA said in internal communications to union members kicked this off. They picked a pretty generic thing to complain about, in my opinion, as a tactic to get the ATA to the table with a compliant third party overseeing the proceedings.



The resolution of that labor complaint was the consent order from the Labor Board that says there are apparently only 3 outstanding items.



Shortly after that labor board meeting, the head of the ATA negotiating team resigned.



My two cents? The ATA got outmaneuvered by the government, and are now boxed in. A vote by the union to turn down the proposal gives them the ammunition to continue negotiating for improved classroom supports, complexity issues, etc.

Oh okay, so not ratifying this deal will reopen the negotiations outside of the 3 BS issues from the labour board? If that's the case this makes sense to me

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by undercoverbrother

Source for that please?

4.5 million Canadians (11 per cent of the population) reported incomes of $100k or higher

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1...pid=1110000801

https://www.statista.com/statistics/...-income-level/

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by CliffFletcher

4.5 million Canadians (11 per cent of the population) reported incomes of $100k or higher

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1...pid=1110000801

https://www.statista.com/statistics/...-income-level/

Which is 25% of people who earn at least a full time, minimum wage salary.

[The Fisher Account]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Which is 25% of people who earn at least a full time, minimum wage salary.

Yeah exactly. Including non-working Canadians into that earlier calculation is kind of disingenuous (even if it is true).

[#-3]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

You can use hydrogen now. Maybe the province should lean into that, since they love hydrogen so much.

That's not really how it works.

Canadian mills for the most part fall into 3 categories,

the biggest ones are the top photo, they need coal.

the other more common and established mills are the right half of the bottom photo, but on the left half is primarily fed from scrap, not iron ore. They are steel mills but not steel refineries. They need scrap, which becomes scarce fast if you stop burning coal. *The tiny amount of steel making capacity in Alberta falls into this category.

the newer lines at 2 of the mills kind of follow the bottom process, but use natural gas instead of hydrogen, and also use scrap and waste from the top mills as feed stock.

Spoiler!

There is also the problem of Grey hydrogen, where you are actually creating more GHG than you would if you just used fossil fuels directly, instead of burning them to make an intermediate product that is later re-heated again.

The Canadian steel industry as is very much needs coal still to produce, just not coal from the Alberta Rockies, it's the wrong kind and in the wrong place to work for them.

[IliketoPuck]

Originally Posted by The Fisher Account

Yeah exactly. Including non-working Canadians into that earlier calculation is kind of disingenuous (even if it is true).

Cost of living by jurisdiction needs to be considered as well.

$100,000 in NB =/= $100,000 in AB.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by The Fisher Account

Yeah exactly. Including non-working Canadians into that earlier calculation is kind of disingenuous (even if it is true).

Even including “Canada” as an entirely entity is a bit disingenuous, as it ignores way too many factors.

If you look at just higher concentration areas like Calgary or Toronto, for example, around 30% of the full time, minimum wage+ workers make $100K or more.

[malcolmk14]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

The other day I was talking with a friend who is a teacher and I asked them what kind of strike benefits they would receive if they did end up on strike and they said they weren’t 100% sure but they think the ATA covers the premium costs to keep their health benefits going but don’t have a fund set up for strike pay.

Are there any ATA members in this thread who can confirm whether or not this is true?

Confirmed. But we pay the ATA back for our benefits through payroll deductions when the strike is over.

[CliffFletcher]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Which is 25% of people who earn at least a full time, minimum wage salary.

If you want to look at full-time workers, yes it’s 25% for $100k. Given how steeply income declines at those levels, I’d guess the $125k figure ucb asked me to source is less than 15% of Canadians.

* A third as many Canadians earn $150k+ as earn $100k:
https://www.statista.com/statistics/...-income-level/

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by PepsiFree

Even including “Canada” as an entirely entity is a bit disingenuous, as it ignores way too many factors.

If you look at just higher concentration areas like Calgary or Toronto, for example, around 30% of the full time, minimum wage+ workers make $100K or more.

Why stop there? If we zoom into just downtown Calgary or look at Bay Street in Toronto the percentage grows quite a bit higher.

[PepsiFree]

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

Why stop there? If we zoom into just downtown Calgary or look at Bay Street in Toronto the percentage grows quite a bit higher.

The majority of teachers aren’t in downtown Calgary or on Bay Street so that sounds a bit stupid.

[powderjunkie]

Originally Posted by calgarygeologist

Why stop there? If we zoom into just downtown Calgary or look at Bay Street in Toronto the percentage grows quite a bit higher.

Because it's not very useful to include my 3 year old or his great-grandmother in this discussion about full-time wages

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by malcolmk14

Confirmed. But we pay the ATA back for our benefits through payroll deductions when the strike is over.

I’m sure there’s some other benefits available to their members, I know they do cover some education advancement costs, but to me not having a strike fund is kinda nuts.

[woob]

Originally Posted by you&me

I don't really have a dog in this fight, but as a parent, it seems insane to me to watch a bunch of other (presumably) parents argue against what's best for the education of their children.

From the perspective of quality education, you'd think most parents would want teachers to be paid well; to have excellent working conditions, which ergo translates into better learning conditions for their children through smaller class sizes and even more engaged, better teaching (presumably, a happier, less stressed teacher is a better teacher).

Absolute lunacy.

This is my whole thing.

And laughably, after (hopefully) reading all of the posts in here, some think teachers aren’t being vilified over the matter, or close to it.

[GGG]

Originally Posted by corporatejay

Well I can't speak for "people", but I can speak for myself and I can also interpret what Cliff is trying to say.

DB pensions are a great benefit and rarely exist in the private sector. They should be looked at as part of an entire compensation package, just like any other job.

Person A makes $105,000 but has no DB pension, maybe has DC and some stock matching.

Person B makes $95,000 but has a DB pension.


If Person B said "I don't make as much as person A and that's not fair" a reasonable response might be "well you do have a DB Pension so you should probably factor that into to the entire calculation package"

Instead it seems people here view that as suggesting Person B doesn't "deserve" the pension.

Final point. A government backed DB pension plan is guaranteed cash money for the rest of your life from retirement until death. There is simply no other product that a person could buy that would give you that kind of certainty, even private company DB plans. It is an excellent benefit and good for them, but let's not pretend that there isn't significant value ascribed to that pension.

Are you advocating for more CPP expansion?

[Ashartus]

My wife hasn't been able to access the new teacher proposed deal yet but what she's heard is basically the same as the offer from last spring except hiring 1500 educational assistants - except there are already vacant positions there which they can't fill. Also that the supposed 12% raise over 4 years includes raises for moving up the salary grid, so senior teachers (the ones who have had their salaries mostly frozen for the past decade) are actually only getting 1%/year - hopefully that is someone misinterpreting, if my employer offered that to me I'd tell them to pound sand, so I expect we are heading to a strike.

[malcolmk14]

Originally Posted by Ashartus

My wife hasn't been able to access the new teacher proposed deal yet but what she's heard is basically the same as the offer from last spring except hiring 1500 educational assistants - except there are already vacant positions there which they can't fill. Also that the supposed 12% raise over 4 years includes raises for moving up the salary grid, so senior teachers (the ones who have had their salaries mostly frozen for the past decade) are actually only getting 1%/year - hopefully that is someone misinterpreting, if my employer offered that to me I'd tell them to pound sand, so I expect we are heading to a strike.

This is not accurate. There’s a 3% raise at each grid step.

[puffnstuff]

Hey guess what...

The government-commissioned third-party report into procurement and contracting practices at Alberta Health Services (AHS) has missed another deadline, remains incomplete, and was not published Wednesday as promised, according to the province.

The interim report by retired Manitoba judge Raymond Wyant was to have been due on Wednesday after already having been#delayed by nearly four months.

Wyant was announced in March to lead the investigation with his interim report initially to be due in May and later pushed back until Sept. 24. His final report was to have been published by June 30 but is now scheduled to be completed by Oct. 15, a delay of three months and 16 days.

https://edmontonjournal.com/news/pol...ort-incomplete

[Reggie Dunlop]

A "report" with a predetermined conclusion not going to be released anyway.

Like the Allen Inquiry. Remember that?