News
‘Coronaphobia’ is spreading in Canada
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TORONTO —
An inflated perception of the risks of COVID-19 could be spurring xenophobia and impacting the mental health of Canadians, according to two professors now cautioning against “coronaphobia.”
In a new editorial in the scientific Journal of Anxiety Disorders, University of Regina psychology professor Gordon J.G. Asmundson and University of British Columbia psychiatry professor Steven Taylor write that they worry fears about the novel coronavirus are “having a significant psychological impact” on the public.
They cited a public opinion poll from early February by Angus Reid which found that, out of roughly 1,300 Canadians polled, one in three were worried about becoming infected.
Twelve per cent said that they had started avoiding public spaces, and 33 per cent said that they were not confident that their province’s health services would protect them in the event of the virus spreading across Canada.
The potentially deadly virus has been dominating headlines since before it was given an official name. The virus has captured public attention due to uncertainties over how the disease spreads as well as the rapid escalation in confirmed cases.
As of Friday, more than 76,000 people have contracted the virus globally, with the vast majority of those cases occurring in China, where the outbreak began. More than 2,100 people have died.
Although reporting on the outbreak is important, the professors say that being unable to escape discussion of COVID-19 may be affecting Canadians’ behavior and decisions to a degree that is disproportionate to the risk they face from the disease itself.
There have been nine confirmed cases of the virus in Canada. Since receiving treatment, three people from Ontario have officially recovered in hospital, including the very first person to test positive in Canada.
Nevertheless, surgical masks have sold out in many stores across Canada, and more than 40 per cent of Canadians reported in the Angus Reid poll that they were consciously washing their hands more frequently.
XENOPHOBIA RISING
However, the authors write that the most visible way that “coronaphobia” may be affecting Canadians’ behavior may not be changes to their hygiene practices, but an increase of reports of xenophobia within the country.
The editorial pointed out that since COVID-19 emerged in Wuhan, China, “there have been numerous reports of xenophobia directed towards Chinese people.”
They cite examples of Chinese restaurants seeing a downturn in business in Canada, Chinese nationals being barred from certain restaurants and cruise ships refusing Chinese travellers.
They aren’t the first to flag the discriminatory attitudes. This week, a non-profit group supporting Chinese restaurant owners put out a press release saying that business has dropped “by at least 50 per cent,” with some restaurants seeing an 80 per cent decrease.
The Calgary Chinese Community Service Association released a statement in early February saying they worried that rhetoric around the virus was “demonizing,” their community.
Ming Yang told CTVNews.ca that her holiday plans were ruined when Norwegian Cruise Lines decided not to accept passengers with Chinese, Hong Kong or Macau passports.
“I told them Chinese people do not equal coronavirus,” she said in a phone interview last week. “This is discriminatory. This is discrimination.”
REPEATING HISTORY
Canada’s chief public health officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, posted on Twitter in late January that she was concerned about racism and “stigmatizing comments on social media directed to people of Chinese and Asian descent.”
She urged people not to make assumptions about others.
According to the new editorial, this is not unusual to see during an outbreak.
“The rise of infection-related xenophobia has been reported in many previous epidemics and pandemics, and appears to be an unfortunately common response when people are threatened with an infection that originates from outside of their community,” the professors wrote.
“More research is needed to understand the relationship between coronaphobia and coronavirus related xenophobia.”
The editorial said that in past pandemics and viral outbreaks, sensationalized headlines and misinformation have “been shown to fuel health-related fears.”
“An important question is whether healthcare systems throughout the world are ready to deal with the surge of so-called ‘worried well’ patients; that is, the surge into hospital emergency rooms of people who misinterpret their bodily sensations as signs of potential infection with the 2019-nCoV coronavirus,” the professors wrote.
“It is vitally important to understand the psychosocial fallout of 2019-nCoV, such as excessive fear (or lack of concern and due caution) and discrimination, and to find evidence-based ways of addressing these issues.”
News
Canada Child Benefit payment on Friday | CTV News – CTV News Toronto
More money will land in the pockets of Canadian families on Friday for the latest Canada Child Benefit (CCB) installment.
The federal government program helps low and middle-income families struggling with the soaring cost of raising a child.
Canadian citizens, permanent residents, or refugees who are the primary caregivers for children under 18 years old are eligible for the program, introduced in 2016.
The non-taxable monthly payments are based on a family’s net income and how many children they have. Families that have an adjusted net income under $34,863 will receive the maximum amount per child.
For a child under six years old, an applicant can annually receive up to $7,437 per child, and up to $6,275 per child for kids between the ages of six through 17.
That translates to up to $619.75 per month for the younger cohort and $522.91 per month for the older group.
The benefit is recalculated every July and most recently increased 6.3 per cent in order to adjust to the rate of inflation, and cost of living.
To apply, an applicant can submit through a child’s birth registration, complete an online form or mail in an application to a tax centre.
The next payment date will take place on May 17.
News
Capital gains tax change draws ire from some Canadian entrepreneurs worried it will worsen brain drain – CBC.ca
A chorus of Canadian entrepreneurs and investors is blasting the federal government’s budget for expanding a tax on the rich. They say it will lead to brain drain and further degrade Canada’s already poor productivity.
In the 2024 budget unveiled Tuesday, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said the government would increase the inclusion rate of the capital gains tax from 50 per cent to 67 per cent for businesses and trusts, generating an estimated $19 billion in new revenue.
Capital gains are the profits that individuals or businesses make from selling an asset — like a stock or a second home. Individuals are subject to the new changes on any profits over $250,000.
The government estimates that the changes would impact 40,000 individuals (or 0.13 per cent of Canadians in any given year) and 307,000 companies in Canada.
However, some members of the business community say that expanding the taxable amount will devastate productivity, investment and entrepreneurship in Canada, and might even compel some of the country’s talent and startups to take their business elsewhere.
Benjamin Bergen, president of the Council of Canadian Innovators (CCI), said the capital gains tax has overshadowed parts of the federal budget that the business community would otherwise be excited about.
“There were definitely some other stars in the budget that were interesting,” he said. “However, the … capital gains piece really is the sun, and it’s daylight. So this is really the only thing that innovators can see.”
The CCI has written and is circulating an open letter signed by more than 1,000 people in the Canadian business community to Trudeau’s government asking it to scrap the tax change.
Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke and president Harley Finkelstein also weighed in on the proposed hike on X, formerly known as Twitter.
We need to be doing everything we can to turn Canada into the best place for entrepreneurs to build 🇨🇦<br><br>What’s proposed in the federal budget will do the complete opposite. Innovators and entrepreneurs will suffer and their success will be penalized — this is not a wealth tax,…
—@harleyf
Former finance minister Bill Morneau said his successor’s budget disincentivizes businesses from investing in the country’s innovation sector: “It’s probably very troubling for many investors.”
Canada’s productivity — a measure that compares economic output to hours worked — has been relatively poor for decades. It underperforms against the OECD average and against several other G7 countries, including the U.S., Germany, U.K. and Japan, on the measure.
Bank of Canada senior deputy governor Carolyn Rogers sounded the alarm on Canada’s lagging productivity in a speech last month, saying the country’s need to increase the rate had reached emergency levels, following one of the weakest years for the economy in recent memory.
The government said it was proposing the tax change to make life more affordable for younger generations and fund efforts to boost housing supply — and that it would support productivity growth.
A challenge for investors, founders and workers
The change could have a chilling effect for several reasons, with companies already struggling to access funding in a high interest rate environment, said Bergen.
He questioned whether investors will want to fund Canadian companies if the government’s taxation policies make it difficult for those firms to grow — and whether founders might just pack up.
The expanded inclusion rate “is just one of the other potential concerns that firms are going to have as they’re looking to grow their companies.”
He said the rejigged tax is also an affront to high-skilled workers from low-innovation sectors who might have taken the risk of joining a startup for the opportunity, even taking a lower wage on the chance that a firm’s stock options grow in value.
But Lindsay Tedds, an associate economics professor at the University of Calgary, said the tax change is one of the most misunderstood parts of the federal budget — and that its impact on the country’s talent has been overstated.
“This is not a major innovation-biting tax change treatment,” Tedds said. “In fact, when you talk to real grassroots entrepreneurs that are setting up businesses, tax rates do not come into their decision.”
As for productivity, Tedds said Canadians might see improvements in the long run “to the degree that some of our productivity problems are driven by stresses like housing affordability, access to child care, things like that.”
‘One foot on the gas, one foot on the brake’
Some say the government is sending mixed messages to entrepreneurs by touting tailored tax breaks — like the Canada Entrepreneurs’ Incentive, which reduces the capital gains inclusion rate to 33 per cent on a lifetime maximum of $2 million — while introducing measures they say would dampen investment and innovation.
“They seem to have one foot on the gas, one foot on the brake on the very same file,” said Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business.
A founder may be able to sell their successful company with a lower capital gains treatment than otherwise possible, he said.
“At the same time, though, big chunks of it may be subject to a higher rate of capital gains inclusion.”
Selling a company can fund an individual’s retirement, he said, which is why it’s one of the first things founders consider when they think about capital gains.
Mainstreet NS7:03Ottawa is proposing a hike to capital gains tax. What does that mean?
Dennis Darby, president and CEO of Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters, says he was disappointed by the change — and that it sends the wrong message to Canadian industries like his own.
He wants to see the government commit to more tax credit proposals like the Canada Carbon Rebate for Small Businesses, which he said would incentivize business owners to stay and help make Canada competitive with the U.S.
“We’ve had a lot of difficulties attracting investment over the years. I don’t think this will make it any better.”
Tech titan says change will only impact richest of the rich
Toronto tech entrepreneur Ali Asaria will be one of those subject to the expanded capital gains inclusion rate — but he says it’s only fair.
“It’s going to really affect the richest of the rich people,” Asaria, CEO of open source platform Transformer Lab and founder of well.ca, told CBC News.
“The capital gains exemption is probably the largest tax break that I’ve ever received in my life,” he said. “So I know a lot about what that benefit can look like, but I’ve also always felt like it was probably one of the most unfair parts of the tax code today.”
While Asaria said Canada needs to continue encouraging talent to take risks and build companies in the country, taxation policies aren’t the most major problem.
“I think that the biggest central issue to the reason why people will leave Canada is bigger issues, like housing,” he said.
“How do we make it easier to live in Canada so that we can all invest in ourselves and invest in our companies? That’s a more important question than, ‘How do we help the top 0.13 per cent of Canadians make more money?'”
News
Canada Child Benefit payment on Friday | CTV News – CTV News Toronto
More money will land in the pockets of Canadian families on Friday for the latest Canada Child Benefit (CCB) installment.
The federal government program helps low and middle-income families struggling with the soaring cost of raising a child.
Canadian citizens, permanent residents, or refugees who are the primary caregivers for children under 18 years old are eligible for the program, introduced in 2016.
The non-taxable monthly payments are based on a family’s net income and how many children they have. Families that have an adjusted net income under $34,863 will receive the maximum amount per child.
For a child under six years old, an applicant can annually receive up to $7,437 per child, and up to $6,275 per child for kids between the ages of six through 17.
That translates to up to $619.75 per month for the younger cohort and $522.91 per month for the older group.
The benefit is recalculated every July and most recently increased 6.3 per cent in order to adjust to the rate of inflation, and cost of living.
To apply, an applicant can submit through a child’s birth registration, complete an online form or mail in an application to a tax centre.
The next payment date will take place on May 17.
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