Mark Holmgren's Blog
Last November I published a blog on the Edmonton CDC website and more recently repeated that posting here on Anticipate. Reading it first is, I suggest, of value to fully engage this posting. The title of this posting reflects my interest in getting language "right." Living Wage and Livable Income are not synonymous. The latter … Continue reading Livable Income IN a Livable Economy (Part Two: the Impacts of AI)
Originally posted in November 2018 on the Edmonton CDC Blog. In Edmonton, approximately 140,000 workers are identified as low income earners (earning below $16.31 per hour), according to the Edmonton Social Planning Council (source, page 79). Four in five of these workers are over the age of 20 and 60% are women. The Canadian Payroll … Continue reading Living Wage IN a Livable Economy
Note: In addition to writing about community change and penning commentary, I am a story teller. I write fiction and spoken word. This piece is a mix of fact and fiction, often called "faction." One of my small luxuries in life is having someone come to my house weekly and clean it. I tell myself … Continue reading LIVING POOR: KAREN’S STORY
Precarious Employment is the jargon people like me use to describe the employment conditions and experiences of a growing number of workers in our country. Here is what that jargon means: Precarious employment is in effect sub-standard employment that offers low wages that typically are not enough to live on, and that does not offer … Continue reading Ending Precarious Employment – A Game-Changer Strategy
When an employer won't allow a worker more than 25 hours a week but requires that worker to be available for work 7 days a week, people become little more than commodities on the open market of Precarious Employment. Lately I have made an effort to talk with folks that work at places like Shopper's … Continue reading Precarious Work
Yes, perhaps an odd title for a posting, but bear with me. I was on my way back home from meeting downtown with Alberta Government colleagues who also work in the poverty reduction arena and I heard this call-in show about winter tires and more to the point about whether or not winter tires should … Continue reading Mandatory Winter Tires and Poverty
Big change doesn't just click on. It occurs over time, starting out often as weak signals of the change to come. Sometimes it's like the old frog in the boiling water story. Put the frog in when the water is cool and turn up the flame and eventually the frog realizes its plight, just too late … Continue reading Signals of Coming Disruption
