Money and the ethnic vote: part 2 of 3

Ineffective policy

At its simplest level, the Progressive Conservatives pronatalist policy is aimed at increasing family size within Newfoundland and Labrador. Women will receive a bonus of each child delivered or adopted.

The pronatalist policy should be rejected since it does not work and therefore is a waste of scarce public money. Experience across the globe over the past 30 years demonstrates that cash incentives do not change fertility levels to an appreciable degree. The average number of children born per couple of child bearing age remains generally the same. The policy may produce some temporary fluctuations but overall, fertility rates in major industrialized countries remain the same after pronatalist policies as before.

In jurisdictions where pronatalist policies have been tried, they tend to be very expensive. Quebec's decade long cash-bonus program cost an average of $15,000 per child but was abandoned because it was ineffective. Where policies did affect the birth rate modestly,they include measures inconsistent with a modern democracy. Franco's Spain banned birth control, for example. However, once the dictatorial methods disappeared with the move to democracy in countries such as Poland or the former German Democratic republic, birth rates moved in directions experienced in other democratic countries. Overall, the policies simply do not work.

On another level, the cash incentive policy is touted as a way of dealing with a declining population size; more people are leaving Newfoundland and Labrador either through emigration or death than are immigrating or being born.

Migration is driven primarily by economic considerations – people leave to find work or come to take advantage of opportunities. Paying a cash bonus of any size will not affect that simple motive, either for new immigrants or as a way of attracting former residents to return. Family size is driven by complex factors, centred mostly on individual choice about lifestyle. None of these factors are affected by the limited policy announced by the Progressive Conservatives and certainly none are affected by the $1000 bounty placed on a set of diapers.

Randy Simms and others have pointed out these inherent flaws in the policy as a policy aimed at addressing demographic issues facing Newfoundland and Labrador in the decades ahead. Their criticisms are well-founded. However, they have ignored other aspects of the policy which make it not merely ineffective but socially and politically regressive.

There are two aspects to the demographic problem facing Newfoundland and Labrador. One is the declining population which reduces the available workforce. This can be addressed, most effectively by increased immigration. Workers will be needed now. We have already arrived at the start of the worker crunch and this situation – fewer workers – will only increase in the years immediately in front of us, if present trends continue. A cash bonus for children - even if we imagine that it will be effective here where it has failed everywhere else - will not produce new productive members of the economy for the better part of two decades.

The second aspect of the demographic problem is the changed makeup of the population. The dependent portion of our society increases as the population increases. That is, where once there were more people employed people than children and seniors, we are already in the state of having more children and seniors than wage workers.

This has an obvious economic consequence in that each worker must produce - on average - more revenue for the treasury so that the existing public services can be maintained. Paying a bonus for having children does nothing to increase productivity or increase average wages.

Part of the flaw in the proposed policy is the emphasis on the declining population size. The adverse implications of the demographic changes taking place in Newfoundland and Labrador do not flow from the size of the population alone. In the fishery, for example, it is well established that the industry will have to change from its labour intensive production in order to remain competitive. Fewer people will be needed. it is possible to have a vibrant, viable economy with a smaller population or even one with a high rate of dependency - more non-workers than workers - than currently exists in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Ignoring the evidence

That said, it is instructive to look at Danny Williams' comments to reporters:

We've had some lengthy discussions on this in caucus and at cabinet... and what we've done is we've looked at the jurisdictions across Canada, to the best of our ability, and as quickly as we could in advance of the election, government had started to do this process, but it's a very detailed process, and we want to make sure we follow through.

We're also looking at some precedent in Europe, and other modern countries, trying to encourage young families to have children. It's a clear problem, and it's an economic problem... This government is open to suggestions, and good suggestions... It's probably one of the key points in our platform, that we feel very strongly about. It's something we'd certainly like to implement as soon as possible. It hasn't been budgeted. One of the best jurisdictions and one of the most successful, of course, was Quebec. And they have found it to be one of the most successful initiatives. But I'd be remiss in [not] saying that we're still preliminary on this. [Emphasis added]

The policy was obviously hastily assembled. It is also obvious that the claim that Quebec's program was successful fly in the face of evidence. The current administration clearly appreciates that the demographic issue is an economic problem.

In the last part of this commentary, we'll look at possible explanations for the pronatal policy that defies the obvious reasons not to pursue it.

-srbp-

Money and the ethnic vote: Part 1 of 3

[This is the first of three posts dealing with aspects of the Progressive Conservative pronatal policy and other aspects of the party platform. ]

The unasked question

Voters in the provincial general election saw a curious situation this past week.

On Tuesday, Premier Danny Williams unveiled his party’s election platform which included a policy to pay women to have more children. He used the phrase “we can’t be a dying race” when discussing the policy with reporters.

We've had some lengthy discussions on this in caucus and at cabinet... and what we've done is we've looked at the jurisdictions across Canada, to the best of our ability, and as quickly as we could in advance of the election, government had started to do this process, but it's a very detailed process, and we want to make sure we follow through. We're also looking at some precedent in Europe, and other modern countries, trying to encourage young families to have children. 

It's a clear problem, and it's an economic problem... This government is open to suggestions, and good suggestions... It's probably one of the key points in our platform, that we feel very strongly about. It's something we'd certainly like to implement as soon as possible. It hasn't been budgeted. One of the best jurisdictions and one of the most successful, of course, was Quebec. And they have found it to be one of the most successful initiatives. But I'd be remiss in [not?] saying that we're still preliminary on this.

Later in the week, a local Liberal supporter said of transportation minister John Hickey that Hickey’s lawsuit against former premier Roger Grimes was intended to show that “if you criticize my government, if you criticize my fuehrer, I will sue you.'"

In both instances, the words used are provocative and come loaded with historical meaning. Yet, while Liberal Jim Combden was rightly condemned for his apparent allusion to Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, few have commented publicly on the Premier’s use of the term race in connection with his $1000 baby bonus. The contrast in reactions is is both stark and revealing.

Not a single reporter apparently questioned Danny Williams on what he meant by the term “race”, let alone ask what race was dying. One editor called it “hyperbolic rhetoric.”

A prominent local talk radio host chastised those who – like Liberal candidate Simon Lono – questioned the use of the term. In his weekly column in The Independent, Randy Simms wrote:

While some people have taken exception to the use of the word race to describe Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, it was not meant in any derogatory way. He might just as well have said the words dying breed as opposed to dying race and it would amount to the same thing. We all know what he meant, and to try and give it any other meaning is simply being unfair. I do not subscribe to the view that the premier is any kind of racist. [Emphasis added]

They are not alone in their view. A discussion thread on nf.general produced at least two comments to the effect that ‘we all know what he meant’ and that the subject needed no further discussion.

Local freelance writer Myles Higgins, himself a staunch supporter the Premier during the election, posted a commentary on his blog Web Talk, under his usual pseudonym Patriot:

Anyone who is offended by terming the majority of people here a "race" certainly needs to be educated on their culture and history.

The unasked question knows no answer

Higgins, Simms, and the others are right. We all know – or we are reasonably comfortable in believing we all know - that Danny Williams was referring to the majority of people in the province. That is, he was referring to the white, English-speaking people of English, Irish, and Scots ancestry. That is the race to which he most likely referred.

Higgins does an excellent job of examining the term "race", incidentally. While he does not get into alternate possible meanings - such as using using race as a synonym for "breed" or merely the provincial population as a whole - his post makes the case against those interpretations implicitly. We will leave to one side the possible use of "breed" as a synonym for race devoid of a negative meaning.

The most striking feature of the premier’s comments actually came from the response in the province as a whole. Few questioned it. Most, one suspects, followed the approach of the reporters noted above and never thought of it as a potential issue or, as with others, assumed a meaning.

Rationalizing a term loaded with potential meanings or embracing it wholeheartedly suggests that the comfortable members of the majority group within the province are largely blind to the implications for society as a whole.

However, neither of these is ultimately satisfactory. Not only do we not know exactly who the ‘we’ are in that statement on "race", we simply have no idea what he meant since no one asked him.

Over the next two posts, let us take a walk into that area others seem unwilling to go. I doing so we may find some answers or potential answers to unasked questions.

First, we will examine pronatalist policy as a means of addressing the province's demographic problem.

Second, we will look at the pronatalist policy in a broader context of Progressive Conservative policy since 2003.

-srbp-