SWRK 1001H Lecture Notes - Lecture 10: Friends House, Unemployment Benefits, Median Income
28 Jun 2018
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Swrk1001H: Introduction to Social Welfare
Tuesday, March 21st, 2017: Lecture Week 10
Chapter 9: Poverty
How can people in Canadian society work full-time and still live in poverty?
Poverty is often tied to the idea of social exclusion – the economic, social, and political marginalization
of people in society.
The idea here is that participation means achieving a certain level of health and well-being in society.
Poverty is often also tied to powerlessness – not having a voice in society.
How We Measure Poverty in Canada (even as we cannot agree on what it means…)
The Low-Income Measure (LIM): low income families are defined as those families whose incomes are less
than half the median family income in a given area.
The Market Basket Measure (MBM): cost of necessities (food, clothing, shelter, basic needs, transportation),
compared with family’s disposable income. Low-income households are those whose income is lower than
what is needed to spend on the “basket”.
Low-Income Cut-offs (LICO’s): a family that spends 20% or more of their after-tax income on basic necessities
is considered low income. LICO is often referred to as the “poverty line”. LICO is used to measure the depth of
poverty (i.e. how many families live below the poverty line) as well as the persistence of poverty (how LONG
people live in poverty).
What is the difference between MBM and LICO?
Why is it important to measure depth and persistence?
Risk Factors Associated with Poverty…
Why might geographical location affect levels of poverty?
Why might age affect levels of poverty?
Why might race affect levels of poverty?
Why might ability affect levels of poverty?
Why might being LGBTTQ+ affect levels of poverty?
Why might you be more prone to experiencing poverty if you are a single parent?
Why might you be more prone to poverty if you are a woman?
Why might you be more prone to poverty if you are Indigenous?
- What do all of these “risk factors” have in common?
The Feminization of Poverty…
Rooted in the idea that women are exposed to higher levels of poverty, particularly Indigenous,
differently-abled, racialized, senior, or lone parent women.
Women are subject to higher levels of poverty because their labour in the home is “unpaid”.
Commonly referred to as “women’s work”, work in the home is not considered to be of value in a
capitalist society which is primarily linked to employment and contributions to the market economy.
Work in the home is linked to childcare, maintaining households, elder care, etc. which is a necessary
component of maintenance of the residual welfare system, yet not counted as “work”.
In addition to this, women also face discrimination in the workforce, in many cases because of their
responsibilities in the home – what some refer to as “double duty”. Women who experience the
find more resources at oneclass.com
find more resources at oneclass.com
Document Summary
Poverty is often tied to the idea of social exclusion the economic, social, and political marginalization of people in society. The idea here is that participation means achieving a certain level of health and well-being in society. Poverty is often also tied to powerlessness not having a voice in society. How we measure poverty in canada (even as we cannot agree on what it means ) The low-income measure (lim): low income families are defined as those families whose incomes are less than half the median family income in a given area. The market basket measure (mbm): cost of necessities (food, clothing, shelter, basic needs, transportation), compared with family"s disposable income. Low-income households are those whose income is lower than what is needed to spend on the basket . Low-income cut-offs (lico"s): a family that spends 20% or more of their after-tax income on basic necessities is considered low income. Lico is often referred to as the poverty line .
