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Canada’s Commitment to Equality: A Gender Analysis of the Last Ten Federal Budgets (1995-2004)

Report by Armine Yalnizyan

The background context of Armine Yalnizyan’s paper is Canada’s adoption in 1995 of the Beijing Platform for Action. This agreement set out a detailed plan for addressing women’s poverty, economic security, and health. Yalnizyan asks whether women in Canada are better off in 2004 than they were in 1995. This is a difficult question to answer, since some women report a marked improvement in their quality of life, while others point to the ways in which life seems harder. However, the author attempts to answer the question in measurable terms.

Yalnizyan tracks a decade of federal fiscal policy, looking at what the Government of Canada said it would do (budgets), and what it actually did (public accounts). She argues that, whether the government has a surplus or a deficit, federal priorities actually run counter to the promises made 10 years ago to improve economic security for women. To support her argument, she cites evidence that, while the economy grew by 62 percent between 1994 and 2004, a growing number of women encountered stagnant pay rates combined with rising costs for basic necessities.

The author divides her analysis into two parts: the first section examines the deficit era (1995-97); the second examines the surplus era (1998-2004). Yalnizyan argues that during the surplus era the government did not redress the damage done during the deficit era, let alone advance the agenda for action promised to Canadian women in 1995. She asserts that most fiscal initiatives essentially redistributed resources toward those already more advantaged.

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Policy Publication Details

Author(s):	Armine Yalnizyan;
Publisher:	Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives [ Visit Website ]
Year Published:	2005;	Publisher Type:	Research Institute
Publicly Available:	Yes	Research Focus:	National;
Registration Required:	No	Language:	English
Payment Required:	No	Publication Format:	Adobe PDF

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Subjects / Categories:

Policy Articles / Fiscal & Budgetary / Federal & Provincial Budget
Policy Articles / Fiscal & Budgetary / Federal & Provincial Budget / 2005
Policy Articles / Fiscal & Budgetary

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Keywords / Tags:

Beijing Platform in Action; gender in the federal budget; women's economic security; surpluses; deficits; fiscal initiatives;