The Saskatchewan Institute of Public Policy Public Policy Paper Series Productivity and Popular Attitudes Toward Welfare Recipients in Saskatchewan, 1970-1990 by Dr.Robert Wardhaugh April,2003 Public Policy Paper 14 ISBN# 1-894918-13-4 SIPP www.uregina.ca/sipp Background: In 1999, SIPP launched the Public Policy Paper Series, which is intended to serve a variety of purposes such as background information, literature reviews, commentaries, as well as policy recommendations. This series has been very well-received in the policy community, and has been an important vehicle for information distribution. Disclaimer: This paper demonstrates the independent thought of the author. While we are pleased to be able to publish this body of work through the Public Policy Paper Series,the views expressed are not necessarily the views of the Institute. Saskatchewan Institute of Public Policy University of Regina,College Avenue Campus Gallery Building,2nd Floor Regina,Saskatchewan • S4S 0A2 General Inquiries:306.585.5777 Fax: 306.585.5780 Email: [email protected] Internet: www.uregina.ca/sipp Productivity and Popular Attitudes Toward Welfare Recipients in Saskatchewan, 1970-1990 SIPP Public Policy Paper No. 14 April 2003 Dr. Robert Wardhaugh, Post-Doctoral Research Associate (SIPP) ISBN# 1-894918-13-4 Foreword This paper examines popular attitudes toward welfare recipients in the province of Saskatchewan from 1970 until 1990. Rather than analyzing government policy, it uses as its primary sources the two largest and most significant newspapers in the province - the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix. In particular, the paper focuses on the issue of "productivity" and how this notion has entered the welfare debate in order to further "value" the contribution of welfare recipients to society. 1 Introduction The language used to describe welfare recipients in Canada has not changed significantly in the last half century. Descriptors, such as ‘lazy’, ‘bum’, ‘irresponsible’, ‘useless’, and ‘unproductive’ continue to frame popular perceptions. Yet, while the language itself has not altered over the years, the context for the use of the language has undergone changes that relay revealing transformations within our society, particularly in the way we perceive and communicate these perceptions about the poor. As Jean Swanson has recently pointed out, ‘the special language of poor-bashing disguises the real causes of poverty, hurts and excludes people who are poor, cheapens the labour of people who have jobs, and takes the pressure off the rich.’1 But how have these perceptions changed? Samuel Beer claims that Concern for the poor has fallen off since the 1960s….In the early sixties faith in the economy and in government was high. We had only recently realized how rich we were. Our newly discovered affluence assured us that we had the means to fight poverty and challenged us to do it. Government had led us out of the Great Depression and through the war with Hitler, and in the postwar years it had presided over the longest boom in the history of capitalism.…Since then the performance of the economy has taken the bloom off rosy expectations of easy material progress. Periods of slow growth have been bracketed by stubborn recessions. A sense of straitened resources has dampened enthusiasm for social spending. The confusion of economists trying to explain what has happened and how to remedy it has been matched by doubts among other social scientists that government programs can control outcomes.2 When Canadians look at Saskatchewan, they often perceive the nation’s leader in social-democratic initiatives, medicare being the obvious example. Michael O’Sullivan and Sandra Sorensen argue that it was the political tradition of regional alienation in the province that placed Saskatchewan ‘in the forefront of innovative social policy’ and into a 1 Jean Swanson, Poor Bashing: The Politics of Exclusion (Between the Lines, 2001) 2 Samuel H. Beer, ‘Foreword: A New Look at Poverty,’ Manuel Carballo and Mary Jo Bane (eds.), The State and the Poor in the 1980s (Auburn House Publishing Company, 1984) v 2 position to be ‘more generous to its less advantaged citizens.’3 But the authors go on to point out that ‘too much has been made of this latter point, to the extent of creating a myth about a socialist island in the Canadian capitalist sea.’4 According to Gerard Boychuk, provincial social assistance programs differ widely in Canada, and indeed, these systems are aimed towards qualitatively different ends as regards the market and family. Yet, even within the same province, radically different approaches can be taken toward social assistance programs by different governments. This paper examines popular attitudes toward welfare recipients in the province of Saskatchewan from 1970 until 1990. Rather than analyzing government policy, it uses as its primary sources the two largest and most significant newspapers in the province- the Regina Leader-Post and the Saskatoon Star-Phoenix. In particular, the paper focuses on the issue of “productivity”. This term, loaded with meaning, often appears in the debate around welfare. For example, the first phase of the welfare reforms ushered in by the Devine government in 1982 were based on a report entitled ‘A Productive Welfare System for the Eighties.’ As economic retrenchment came to dominate social policy, the term ominously crept into the debate, becoming a catchword for the need to streamline the welfare system, force recipients into the workforce, and formulate a more efficient notion of the welfare state. In the minds of policy-makers, ‘the relationship between the welfare state and market efficiency is assumed to be zero-sum.’5 In the world of the ‘post-welfare state,’ western 3 Michael O’ Sullivan and Sandra Sorensen, ‘Saskatchewan’ in Jacqueline S. Ismael and Yves Vaillancourt (eds), Privatization and Provincial Social Services in Canada: Policy, Administration and Service Delivery (The University of Alberta Press, 1988) 75 4 Sullivan and Sorensen, ‘Saskatchewan,’ 76 5 Gerard Boychuk, Patchworks of Purpose: The Development of Provincial Social Assistance Regimes in Canada (McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1998) xviii 3 countries have sought to ‘restructure their welfare and income-assistance programs, building exits to welfare and incentives to remain in the “productive” labour force.6 According to traditional definitions of productivity (the amount of output produced by each unit of input, where outputs and inputs are measured in physical units), welfare recipients are obviously viewed as completely “unproductive”. But within the confines of this narrow and patriarchal traditional definition, as Marilyn Waring has made so clear, even the work of women in the household, such as ‘the cleaning, decoration, and maintenance of the dwelling occupied by the household; the cleaning, servicing, and repair of household goods; the preparation and serving of meals; the care, training, and instruction of children; the care of the sick, infirm, or old people; and the transportation of members of the household or their goods,’ counts for nothing. Women, for example, who remain in the household to raise children are viewed as reproductive not productive.7 According to Karen Seccombe, Women’s roles are now in a state of flux, and poor women are no longer excused from work in order to care for their children. Our society values their cheap market labor more than it values their labor in the home. We demand that they fill the growing number of low tier service sector jobs that pay only minimum wages and offer no benefits, such as health insurance or subsidized child care, and ignore the fact that employment of this nature does nothing to lift women and children from poverty. Because of the insecurity of these jobs, poor women have on-again off-again bouts with welfare.8 Yet, while the notion of productivity remains confined to traditional economic output, and refuses to consider other forms of household or voluntary service, the term 6 Luc Theriault and David Rosenbluth, ‘Moving from Welfare to Work: Saskatchewan Social Assistance Applicants in Perspective,’ Prairie Forum (27, no. 1 Spring 2002) 59-82 7 See Marilyn Waring, Counting for Nothing: What Men Value and What Women are Worth (University of Toronto Press, 1999) xxv-xxvi and Nancy Folbre The Invisible Heart: Economics and Family Values (The New Press, 2001); SSHRC Collaborative Research Grant, Redefining Productivity to Enhance Social Development and Well-Being, University of Regina. 8 Karen Seccombe, “So You Think I Drive a Cadillac?”: Welfare Recipients’ Perspectives on the System and its Reform (Allyn and Bacon, 1999) vii 4 “unproductive” does indeed carry additional derogatory meaning. Welfare recipients are viewed as not only failing to contribute or “produce” anything of value to the economy, they are also perceived as failing to offer anything of value to society as a whole.9 To be a productive member of society, or in other words a productive citizen, translates to having a job in the formal economy. Ironically then, society refuses to broaden the traditional definition of productivity when it comes to household production, yet it does expand the definition in order to further stigmatize and de-value those at the bottom of the economic ladder. The National Context The 1960s were, for the most part, good for Canada, its economy, and the nation’s burgeoning social safety net. The federal Liberals under Lester Pearson returned to office in 1963 with the reform wing of the party in a dominant position. As Alvin Finkel points out, ‘the tide of public opinion was clearly in favour of social programs.’10 Ottawa and the provinces were relatively slow to react to the increasingly visible issue of poverty, but the issue was ‘exploding into public consciousness.’ American President, Lyndon Johnson’s ‘unconditional War on Poverty,’ announced in his 1964 State of the Union Address, resonated in Canada.