-Caveat Lector- from: http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.4/pageone.html <A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.4/pageone.html">Laissez Faire City Times - Volume 3 Issue 4</A> The Laissez Faire City Times January 25, 1999 - Volume 3, Issue 4 Editor & Chief: Emile Zola ----- Canada: Statist Crapshoot by Peter Topolewski We can hardly cease to admire writers such as George Orwell (1984) and Aldous Huxley (Brave New World) for their combining superb writing craft with dire political cautions. But in hindsight we can lament the fact their imaginings for the future fell short of the mark. Indeed, their portraits of overarching and Byzantine state control only hint at the bizarre and intricate machine into which the modern state in Canada has sadly metamorphosed. Unlike fiction, however, the story in Canada does not necessarily have heroes or even victims. Hardly a citizen can escape culpability for the state that has evolved – or devolved – into present day Canada. Long ago the law became, as Bastiat feared, an instrument of plunder. When that happened, he astutely predicted, those plundered would quickly want in on the plundering. Such is Canada today: one of the richest nations in the world where the fate of the people is shared poverty—a fate to which they run blindly. This national non-fiction comes with an irony that would make even Orwell and Huxley envious. While Big Government is well established in all of Canada, it is government-as-industry in the province of British Columbia that has made huge strides under the current ruling party. The New Democratic Party (NDP) under Premier Glen Clark has long been an ally of unions. And unions, at least in Canada, have protected workers against reality by securing their jobs without regard to the economic storms raging around them. Since its ascendancy into power, the NDP has made the climate for unions more favorable, and has distinctly changed the character of unionized labor in the province. Not long ago the bulk of union/non-union disputes in BC were between unions and private sector businesses. In this arena the unions in general were on the outside. No longer. Through the NDP’s union-happy legislation, the unionized labor force has ballooned in the province. The greatest portion of that labor has been added to the government itself. Although long unionized in BC, nurses, health technicians, lab workers, teachers, transit workers, ship builders, and many other "government" professions have in recent years all seen their ranks swell with new workers. Hiring more "public sector" employees to create jobs in the moribund BC economy is a characteristically Canadian thing to do; failing to mention that provincial employment gains are made up most significantly of new government workers is a characteristically NDP thing to do. Health Care To no one’s surprise, except perhaps the NDP’s, the expansion of the public sector has done nothing to reduce "job action". In the vaunted health-care industry alone, nurses across the province have recently been on strike, health technicians have reduced their services to a minimum, and lab technicians are threatening to do the same – all with demands for more money and greater security. This sort of action occurs every 2 or 3 years – whenever contracts need renewing – and has clearly created an unaffordable system. Doctors in BC (who are not unionized but are as much civil servants as the rest) have cut work days here and there because the government cannot afford to pay them to work regular schedules. Recently the doctors threatened to up the number of work stoppage days to 52 a year. Money is not a problem in health care alone. Every sector of the government is strapped for cash. BC’s budget deficit is between $100 million and $900 million, depending on whom you believe. Yet teachers, clerks, maintenance crews, gardeners, and all the rest want more money and their jobs guaranteed. They’ve asked, and they’ve received. For them, "the gettin’s been good," and as for the rest, well, they want in on the plunder. The ignored facts that the plunderers and the plundered are the same people and that economic resources are finite (no matter how freely they seem to flow from the government) demonstrate either a grotesque detachment from the reality of cause and effect or a most putrid disregard for truth. Likely it is some of both. Howsoever it may be, with those important mental and moral hurdles overcome, citizens are properly suited to elect politicians by how well they facilitate or promise to facilitate access to the plunder. In this one arena, elected governments have displayed great ingenuity in devising schemes to deliver on their promises. More importantly they are tightening the self-feeding cycle that will make the business of all the people all the business of government. Highway Construction The Vancouver Island Highway Project (VHIP) is BC’s prime example. Begun in 1994 to alleviate traffic congestion problems on Vancouver Island, the VHIP is a crown jewel of the government’s public works job creation strategy. The strategy is called BC21, and make no mistake the jobs it creates are government jobs. In order to implement BC21’s employment and equity goals (as well as to build cost-effective transportation infrastructure), the government created Highway Constructors Ltd. (HCL). HCL’s mandate is to ensure that labor on the VHIP •does not strike •meets minority quotas •is local •receives adequate training •is paid fair wages HCL’s mandate emerged from negotiations between the government and – you guessed it – unions. With the unions’ help the government established what are "fair wage rates" and what are "good working conditions". By agreeing to eliminate strikes and lockouts, the government and the unions created a stable labor environment, and putatively hope the whole scheme will turn out to be a cost-effective way of delivering transportation infrastructure. That, though, is hardly the purpose of HCL. For "fair wage rates" equal "union wage rates", and "good working conditions" equal "union working conditions." As a consequence, VIHP costs run 30 percent to 40 percent higher than the market, and make indubitably clear the sad fact that government and unions use "cost effective" in a way drastically different than honest human beings. No, to understand the purpose of HCL, one must understand that all construction contracts are open to firms large and small, and understand that "HCL is the employer of construction labor on BC’s major highway projects" ( http://www.tfa.gov.bc.ca/annrep97.html). The government of BC has created a state construction force. In this forced menage-a-trois the contractor pays the wages for his workers (who are not his employees) to HCL, who has told the contractor what the wage rate is, what are acceptable conditions, maximum allowable hours, et cetera. HCL in turn pays the employees. While the contractor is responsible for fulfilling his contract, he has little control over his workforce because he has no employees. Many contractors, although facing contractual deadlines, cannot afford to pay workers the overtime required to complete the work on schedule. Ironically, the government cannot borrow or tax enough to pay the contractors to complete the $1.2 billion VIHP on schedule either. Sections of the highway have been eliminated and others delayed, only to be re-introduced at a later time as all new extensions to the original project. These are the outcomess of a state monster that bureaucratizes life, and a populace hoping to suckle at its teat until death. Suckling is an Inalienable Right Suckling in Canada is not exclusive to unions of course. It includes pensioners, artists, students, patients, minorities, injured workers, the unemployed, the down-trodden, the stressed-out, the pissed-off, the devious, the sick and the needy. As far as these are concerned suckling is an inalienable right. Which explains the unions’ arrogance at least, for whenever their contracts expire their right to wage increases and less stressful work is clearly being violated. Yet–all arrogance aside–the seemingly endless flow of money cannot truly be endless even for those eager to join the plunder. The blinders seem to be falling from the eyes of the older plunderers and they must be sensing what all the plundering has cost, for ironically they have begun to take their hopes for comfort, security, and cash to another government agency. Once or twice a week they slide a part of their meager pension money across a counter to a clerk and hope in return the government gives them their due. But at this agency there is only a 1 in 14 million chance the government will pay up. According to a poll taken last week, for many of Canada’s pensioners the last stop in a life of government mazes is the line at the government lottery wicket. Fourteen percent are counting on winning the jackpot to secure them in retirement. Given their chances, they’re best off consoling themselves with a view of the life cycle in Canada. By buying a government lottery ticket they’re helping pay a nurse, a doctor, or a construction worker – until, in turn, it is time for the latter to seek similar jackpots. Orwell and Huxley created frightening societies; but their inventions are only entertaining simulacra of this statist crapshoot. -30- from The Laissez Faire City Times, Vol 3, No 4, Jan. 25, 1999 ----- Published by Laissez Faire City Netcasting Group, Inc. Copyright 1998 - Trademark Registered with LFC Public Registrar All Rights Reserved Disclaimer The Laissez Faire City Times is a private newspaper. Although it is published by a corporation domiciled within the sovereign domain of Laissez Faire City, it is not an "official organ" of the city or its founding trust. Just as the New York Times is unaffiliated with the city of New York, the City Times is only one of what may be several news publications located in, or domiciled at, Laissez Faire City proper. For information about LFC, please contact [EMAIL PROTECTED] ----- Aloha, He'Ping, Om, Shalom, Salaam. Em Hotep, Peace Be, Omnia Bona Bonis, All My Relations. Adieu, Adios, Aloha. Amen. 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