Registration information at: www.policyresearch.gc.ca
Risk, Insecurity and Economic Well-being
| Chair:
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Ian Stewart (former Deputy Minister of Finance)
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| Presenters: |
Lars Osberg (Dalhousie University) "Risk, Insecurity, and the Welfare State"
Keith Banting (Queen's University) "The Human Capital Approach to Risk and Economic Security: Strengths and Weaknesses"
Andrew Sharpe (CSLS) "Approaches to Labour Market Risk and Economic Security in OECD Countries"
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The objective of this panel session is to examine the different approaches that have been taken to managing risks to economic security in Canada and OECD countries. In the first presentation, Lars Osberg, McCulloch Professor of Economics at Dalhousie University, will look at how the welfare state has developed in Canada to deal with the risks arising from unemployment, illness, single-parent poverty and poverty in old age and maintain the economy security of the population. He will focus on the risks that in his view have been inadequately offset by private and public action.
In recent years, increased education and training has been advocated as a way to minimize societal and individual risks to economic security. In the second presentation, Keith Banting, Stauffer-Dunning Professor of Political Studies and Director of the School of Policy Studies at Queen's University, will address the strengths and weaknesses of this human capital approach. The presentation will pay particular attention to the groups for whom investments in human capital will have a limited payoff and for whom transfer payments will continue to be the key to economic security.
In the third presentation, Andrew Sharpe, Executive Director of the Centre for the Study of Living Standards, will provide an international perspective on how OECD countries have treated risks arising from the labour market, looking in particular at unemployment and inadequate wages, and how these different approached have affected labour market well-being across countries.
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