A quarter of a century and not much change : 2014 New Brunswick child poverty report card

Although the plan called for annual adjustments for inflation, the minimum wage has not increased and it is now tied for lowest in the country with the Northwest Territories;! • in September 2012, the province introduced. [...] The thorny issues of the amount that employers will contribute and the level of subsidy for low income families and individuals have yet to be decided; ! • in April 2014 the government tabled legislation amending the Small Business Investor Tax Credit, to allow for the creation of Community Economic Development Investment Funds in order to provide greater access to capital for social enterprises a [...] The graph below from the Broadbent Institute’s report Haves and Have-nots: Deep and Persistent Wealth Inequality in Canada (Broadbent Institute, September 2014) illustrates the disparity in distribution of wealth in Atlantic Canada, with those in the poorest decile actually having debt rather than wealth. [...] Their recommendations for this area include:! “Support the most vulnerable families with young children by rationalizing the current alphabet soup of federal child benefits – including the Canada Child Tax Benefit (CCTB), the Universal Child Care Benefit (UCCB) and the Children’s Fitness Tax Credit – into a new Child Well-Being Benefit.”! “Invest in predictable, stable funding at the federal and p [...] Further, the lower the family income, and the longer poverty persists, the more severe is the effect on adult outcomes.”! (Source: Food Banks Canada (2014).