PM Justin Trudeau's Canada

[Northern Light]

And now for.....another Federal budget pre-annoucement:

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/national-school-food-program-announcement-1.7160384

A national school lunch program......... Hmmmm

But wait up.............there's a catch somewhere..........

There are nearly 5,000,000 students in elementary and secondary schools in Canada, and news coverage says this will help 400,000 children. So ~8% of students get lunch?

The press release isn't out yet, but this is obviously a scoped program.

 

[lenaitch]

They say the definition of 'insanity' is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.

 

[kEiThZ]

If CCB was so successful and child poverty is supposedly down, why is Food Bank usage skyrocketing and why do we need a school lunch program?

They should get rid of CCB and simply make a fully universal school lunch program, universal daycare and universal before and after school care. Even with co-pays, that would be better than CCB.

These guys keep building programs that the middle class can't access. Not even with co-pays. Basically what Wynne did. They'll earn the same result.

 

[Northern Light]

If it's $1B for 400k students, that's $12.5 per student per day (assuming 200 school days per year). That is actually very expensive. The only way that price is justifiable is if these kids are getting food on par with the famous French school lunch program:

* 1B over 5 years.

I don't have the details/rollout plan, so it may be one that ramps up (back loaded) but its def. not 1B per year.

And France famously has seasonal 4-5 course meal served family style at the table.

I quite like this program, myself.

So a program that costs per meal the same as one of the most renowned in the world, but will only serve a small percentage of families.

I agree this would be a problem.

If the government really wants to go down this road so something that most middle class families would benefit from. Cut CCB and make school lunches universal like the French program. I'd trade the $150/mo in CCB for a high quality school lunch program and universal before and after school care. Heck, I'd even be willing to pay some towards that. But building programs that my family can't even access with co-pays doesn't make me want to vote for these guys.

Totally get ya on this.

I don't think taking the CCB away from the lowest income families would work, as many need it pay for housing.

However, removing CCB or phasing it down to a lower sum for higher income households in favour of a quality lunch program with a modest co-pay might be workable. I'd need more financial data points to assess the number.

*****

On the school lunch side, I'll use Ontario's numbers, because the number of school days is slightly variable across the country.

There are about 2.1M students in Ontario (elementary and secondary) and 194 school days in the elementary calendar (less for HS).

Using the elementary number, feeding every kid, every day, would equal 407M meals per year, and if the budget were, for argument's sake $6 per meal from the state + co-pay of $2 from parents you would have an annualized cost in Ontario of 2.44B per year (scaling that nationally, its ~6B annually)

A program exactly on par with France, with no copays ( straight exchange rate) would mean a budget of $10.65 per student per meal and that would equate to 10.8B per annum. Big number!

 

[Northern Light]

If CCB was so successful and child poverty is supposedly down, why is Food Bank usage skyrocketing and why do we need a school lunch program?

They should get rid of CCB and simply make a fully universal school lunch program, universal daycare and universal before and after school care. Even with co-pays, that would be better than CCB.

CCB did show a material difference immediately after its introduction.

However, the cost of living for low-income earners (particularly housing + food) has risen much faster than CCB benefits.

When introduced, the maximum CCB was $6,400 per year, per child for children 5 and under, and $5,400 for children 6-17 years of age.

The current maximum is $7,437 per child under 6. or an increase of ~$1,000 over 7 years.

Straight-line CPI would have the number at $7,800 per year (Bank of Canada Inflation Calculator); but we all know CPI underweights housing significantly. (its weighted at 28% of CPI)

Housing inflation in Canada in the same period exceeded 60% (vs CPI at 22%); its difficult to extrapolate what 'real' inflation to the average person is like, but for Toronto, we know many low income earners spend 45% or more of their income on housing.

Using that weight, and adding the difference in housing inflation (or 38 extra basis points) and adding that back to CCB (very crude, I admit) would give you a CCB rate of

$8,894 maximum payment.

I think that's not a 1/2 bad explanation for the rise in child poverty.

We've also had minimum wages and social assistance fall further behind as well.

And market income growth.

Minimum wage under the Ford gov't in Ontario has risen in line with CPI, not actual cost-of-living growth.

If we did the latter, using my math, we add an extra 17% to the current number which would boost it to $19.36 per hour from $16.55

Ontario Works (welfare) rates were frozen last year by Ford (no inflationary increase at all) and none has been announced for this year either.

 

[kEiThZ]

* 1B over 5 years.

I don't have the details/rollout plan, so it may be one that ramps up (back loaded) but its def. not 1B per year.

Deleted my post because of that error. $2.5 per meal is the opposite problem. It's ridiculously low and now they'll have to convince the provinces to sign up.

Using the elementary number, feeding every kid, every day, would equal 407M meals per year, and if the budget were, for argument's sake $6 per meal from the state + co-pay of $2 from parents you would have an annualized cost in Ontario of 2.44B per year (scaling that nationally, its ~6B annually)

A program exactly on par with France, with no copays ( straight exchange rate) would mean a budget of $10.65 per student per meal and that would equate to 10.8B per annum. Big number!

Except that a huge chunk of the program would be paid for by removing or reducing CCB and maybe even some co-pays. This is also an activity where economies of scale work. The long term health benefits would also be substantial. We know from childhood obesity figures that way too many kids are fed crap in this country. Giving them at least one healthy seasonal meal per day would be beneficial in the long run.

I don't think taking the CCB away from the lowest income families would work, as many need it pay for housing.

However, removing CCB or phasing it down to a lower sum for higher income households in favour of a quality lunch program with a modest co-pay might be workable. I'd need more financial data points to assess the number.

Adjust CCB downwards by the cost threshold of the lunch program for school aged children. For example, our $150/mo amounts to $7.5 per day. So if the program was set to cost $7.5/day, we'd be zero on CCB. We'd be okay with this, if we knew that the meals provided were as good or better than what we pack. Then we are saving time and maybe the kids eat healthier with social pressure. If we give up CCB and they get pizza and french fries or just subs with cold cuts everyday then no.

On the point about housing costs for poor. That needs to be addressed through housing policy. Not CCB. In fact, CCB actually exasperates housing inflation because it gets included as income in mortgage calculations, allowing people to simply bid up housing.

Also this focus on the poor. All I'll say is good luck with that. Not many people go to the ballot box thinking about the poor especially when their own budgets are stretched. People will actually vote against these kind of scoped programs. Saw this with Wynne.

 

[Northern Light]

Except that a huge chunk of the program would be paid for by removing CCB. This is also an activity where economies of scale work. The long term health benefits would also be substantial. We know from childhood obesity figures that way too many kids are fed crap in this country. Giving them at least one healthy seasonal meal per day would be beneficial in the long run.

I'm not opposed to the idea, just noting that we have to offset any adverse impact from it on the most marginal. Kids going from hungry to well fed is great, but not if they end up homeless.

Adjust CCB downwards by the cost threshold of the lunch program for school aged children. For example, our $150/mo amounts to $7.5 per day. So if the program was set to cost $7.5/day, we'd be zero on CCB. We'd be okay with this, if we knew that the meals provided were as good or better than what we pack. Then we are saving time and maybe the kids eat healthier with social pressure. If we give up CCB and they get pizza and french fries or just subs with cold cuts everyday then no.

Agree in principle.

On the point about housing costs for poor. That needs to be addressed through housing policy. Not CCB. In fact, CCB actually exasperates housing inflation because it gets included as income in mortgage calculations, allowing people to simply bid up housing.

That's interesting. Considering CCB ultimately disappears, as your kids age, is that weighted into the calculation? I hadn't realized it was included.

Also this focus on the poor. All I'll say is good luck with that. Not many people go to the ballot box thinking about the poor especially when their own budgets are stretched. People will actually vote against these kind of scoped programs. Saw this with Wynne.

I agree, I favour universal programs for this very reason. I would prefer fewer, better programs, rather than a smattering of niched, scoped stuff.


*****

One big thing to consider about this; most schools in Ontario do not have commercial kitchens/cafeterias where food could be made on-site. (as in the French programs). As it stands, at most schools, food would have to be brought in from a commissary by truck on warming racks.

Refitting every school with a proper kitchen would be pricey; if a dedicated cafeteria is also required that adds further dollars (my high school had a gym that had cafeteria seating that pulled down from the walls); but the capacity was only enough to allow maybe 20% of the student body to eat there, at one time, at a push, we had 2 lunch periods, so that would be 40%. Many schools lack dedicated eating space, and a gym re-fit might not be sufficient, if feasible.

 

[kEiThZ]

That's interesting. Considering CCB ultimately disappears, as your kids age, is that weighted into the calculation? I hadn't realized it was included.

I didn't either until I talked to a mortgage agent a few weeks ago. She pointed out that the amount is not insignificant for families with lower incomes and they know that anything that reduces CCB will basically reduce risk (because higher income), so they count it. At a macro level though, this is terrible for housing. All it will do is give families more room to bid up prices.

One big thing to consider about this; most schools in Ontario do not have commercial kitchens/cafeterias where food could be made on-site. (as in the French programs). As it stands, at most schools, food would have to be brought in from a commissary by truck on warming racks.

Refitting every school with a proper kitchen would be pricey; if a dedicated cafeteria is also required that adds further dollars (my high school had a gym that had cafeteria seating that pulled down from the walls); but the capacity was only enough to allow maybe 20% of the student body to eat there, at one time, at a push, we had 2 lunch periods, so that would be 40%. Many schools lack dedicated eating space, and a gym re-fit might not be sufficient, if feasible.

Don't need any of that. There are already caterers that provide various school lunch services of various kinds. School kitchens like France are actually rather inefficient. Much easier to have larger industrial kitchens and simply deliver food carts to each school. There's a good video from a Canadian who lives in Japan explaining how school lunches work for kids there. It's a high quality, low cost, plant forward, seasonal menu, served family style in class by students, to each other. And it's made in school or centralized kitchens (location dependent) daily. Highly recommend watching this:

Example of a centralized Japanese school lunch kitchen servicing a whole bunch of schools:

Here's an Indian kitchen that feeds 75 000 kids per day:

And this is an example of a Korean megakitchen that produces 10 000 meals for office workers at 7000 won (about CA$7) each:

Japan and Korea are not low wage, low cost countries. What they have in common is that they industrialize the process, focus on seasonal ingredients and limit expensive proteins like meat and cheese. What they produce is not only cheaper, but healthier and tastier. These kitchens also creates high quality employment for cooks and chefs normally working in hard-driven restaurant environments.

 

[lenaitch]

Don't need any of that. There are already caterers that provide various school lunch services of various kinds.

Perhaps in larger urban areas. I doubt they exist in smaller rural communities, certainly not at the scale that could support a school on a daily basis. Any program would have to work in every place where a school exists.

 

[kEiThZ]

Look at this story:

Demand doubles at food bank in Oromocto, N.B., driven in part by Canadian Forces members - New Brunswick | Globalnews.ca

Demand has doubled at a food bank in Oromocto, N.B., its executive director says. Members of the Canadian Forces and more seniors needing support are part of the increase.

globalnews.ca

I think it's getting obvious that the underlying problem in all these stories are housing costs. Offering school lunch programs (a goal I broadly support) is a bandaid on the sucking chest wound that is housing costs.

 

[kEiThZ]

Perhaps in larger urban areas. I doubt they exist in smaller rural communities, certainly not at the scale that could support a school on a daily basis. Any program would have to work in every place where a school exists.

My point here was that the private sector is already building the infrastructure and meeting demand without much government support. These kind of programs are actually lucrative for the business sector. They'll set up the giant central kitchens and run them if they have guaranteed demand.

For really small communities with small schools? Local restaurants will happily fill the role. I think we'd be surprised too at what kinds of solutions emerge. I could see some restaurant owner in a small town building a kitchen to service both school lunch programs and a restaurant out front. Could let them service other demands, from nursing homes to any industrial employment (like say a slaughterhouse with hundreds of workers).

 

[Brands]

I know we have to add supply, however isn't the best way to do that is the Bank of Canada cutting interest rates?

 

[Brands]

* 1B over 5 years.

I don't have the details/rollout plan, so it may be one that ramps up (back loaded) but its def. not 1B per year.




I quite like this program, myself.



I agree this would be a problem.



Totally get ya on this.

I don't think taking the CCB away from the lowest income families would work, as many need it pay for housing.

However, removing CCB or phasing it down to a lower sum for higher income households in favour of a quality lunch program with a modest co-pay might be workable. I'd need more financial data points to assess the number.

*****

On the school lunch side, I'll use Ontario's numbers, because the number of school days is slightly variable across the country.

There are about 2.1M students in Ontario (elementary and secondary) and 194 school days in the elementary calendar (less for HS).

Using the elementary number, feeding every kid, every day, would equal 407M meals per year, and if the budget were, for argument's sake $6 per meal from the state + co-pay of $2 from parents you would have an annualized cost in Ontario of 2.44B per year (scaling that nationally, its ~6B annually)

A program exactly on par with France, with no copays ( straight exchange rate) would mean a budget of $10.65 per student per meal and that would equate to 10.8B per annum. Big number!

Many Provinces already have some form of a school food program. The Federal program is intended to compliment exists programs. The cost will not be as high.

 

[Northern Light]

Many Provinces already have some form of a school food program. The Federal program is intended to compliment exists programs. The cost will not be as high.

The federal press release clearly identifies the numbers of students to be assisted, which is clearly 8% of current elementary and high school enrollment.

Even a 50% cost-share, of a program at the proposed federal per student, per meal rate that was anywhere near universal would involve 10x the level of spending. There's really no way around that.

 

[afransen]

It's a shame, as a LNG terminal piping from Alberta out of Churchill, MB would give real economic benefits to the north, and give Canada a place in the game as every other arctic nation is opening up trade routes.

Western Energy Corridor — Home Page

www.westernenergycorridor.ca

Honestly, LNG seems like a stranded asset. Let the private sector take the risk. I see no value in the government subsidizing this.

It's incredibly wasteful to transport gas between continents.