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Social (Continued from page 1) which "matches seniors and sole support parents who need housing with people who have the housing," says Ginsler. ‘"We cover a lot of turf. We get involved in social policy health, legal and planning policy â€" everyâ€" thing from tax referm to racism and everything in between." * With that kind of mandate, the Ginsler believes the council has a finger on the pulse of the underprivileged of the region. â€" ‘"‘The major issues in the community are (the shortage of) affordable housing, unemployed youth, insufficient affordable child care and insufficient social assistance payments. ‘"When you have 260 people showing up at a soup kitchen, you‘ve got a hunger problem," said Ginsâ€" ler. dard social assistance payments, and minimum wages that are set to low. Insufficient income is also a function of service sector employment which is lower paying than factory work. The problems are often interrelated, he said. © ‘They‘re all functions of each other. Insufficient income is a function of unemployment and substanâ€" "Affordable housing is a function of insufficient income. If you‘re on social assistance at $426 a month and it costs as much as $300 for a room only, that‘s not affordable. people in Waterioo, despite the city‘s seitâ€"promotion as an affiuent and tochnobl:g{ city, and things can be done ty to heip them, says Emmie Ginsler, the executive director of the social planning council. "If you‘re paying more than you can afford for housing, you don‘t have sufficient money for food. So then you get soup kitchens. ‘"You can afford day care if you‘re very poor or very rich. If you‘re middle income or just over the subsidy threshold, it can run $5,000 a year per child. You have to be making a major income to afford$10,000." Things are going to get worse before they get better, unless major changes in national and local priorities are made. ‘"What‘s happening socially, and it‘s affecting this community, is we‘re getting a polarization of Have you ever discovered a fact that questioned a strongly held personal belief? I did this week. Actually, I didn‘t discover it. It was raised by someone I was interviewing for a story on the poor in Waterloo. Yes, it turned out, there are poor and disadvantaged in the heart of highâ€"tech Canada â€" wellâ€"hidden it is true, but right here, in this city. But that is not the discovery which shook me. Deep down we all know that the underprivileged, the people who didn‘t have the good luck that we did, are all around us. We just find it hard to open our eyes, and really see what‘s there. You see, I was interviewing Ernie Ginsler, the executive director of the social planning council and he said something that immediately demanded proof (as a reporter, I try not to accept anything at faceâ€"value). Ginsler said, "What‘s happening socially, and it‘s affecting this community (meaning Waterloo region), is we‘re getting a polarization of wealth. The rich are getting richer and the poorer are getting poorer, and the middle is weakening." We‘re moving toward a society of have‘s and have not‘s." Now hang on a minuté, I thought. I want proof of that, not an opinion off the top of your head, or a cliche about the rich getting richer. You see, I‘ve spent four years in business manageâ€" ment, and a year editing a serieg of business magazines before coming to the Chronicle. I always thought that the history of North American society was one of a gradually increaging standard of living for a gradually increasing number of people. lan Kirkby photo Locally, there‘s much that can be done. Individuâ€" als can volunteer to help at organizations such as the House of Friendship at 63 Charles St. E in Kitchener (which puts together food hampers) or the Working Centre at 58 Queen St. S in Kitchener (which operates a soup kitchen). "If you look at the housing that‘s being built in the northâ€"west quadrant of Waterloo, there is virtually nothing in that entire area for middleâ€"inâ€" come firsttime home buyers. There‘s almost no rental construction in the city. The housing that‘s being created is for the relatively affluent. wealth," Ginsler says. ‘"The rich are getting richer and the poorer are getting poorer and the middle is weakening. ‘"‘We‘re moving toward a society of have‘s and have not‘s." City hall can also make a larger contribution, said Ginsler. ‘"We‘ve advocated for some time that the city should form a municipal nonâ€"profit housing corporation. The city should get involved in land banking for affordable residential use. "And it‘s not because there are no poor people." I‘ve thought that the current economic system, combined with judicious government intervention in business, and a progressive income tax system, was adequately redistributing wealth while maintaining the economic incentive necessary for individual motiâ€" vation. That is, I‘ve always believed that the middle class was getting bigger, not shrinking. I politely asked Ginsler what he based his statement on. He gave me two references to research â€" a Statistics Canada study called "Changes in the Distribution of Wealth in Canada 1970â€"1984" and a May 1987 article in Scientific American titled "A Surge in Inequality" by Lester C. Thurow, a noted M.LT. economist. I dutifully spent Sunday in the university library. Ginsler was right. The rich are getting richer, the poor are sliding rather than gaining, and the middle class is endanâ€" gered. The Statistics Canada study is the less clear of the two, being written in language seemingly intended to obfuscate rather than clarify. However, it did conclude that while the inequality of wealth distribution was reduced between 1970 and 1977, it levelled off from 1977 to 1984. Of course, being a government report, it tried to highlight the positive side of this â€" inequality did not increase in the period taking place in the distribution of income and wealth studied. â€" â€" â€" The Thurow article was more direct: "Since the late 1970‘s a significant and disturbing shift has been Gregory Sorbara, Ontario Minister of Labor and Minister Responsiâ€" ble for Women‘s Issues, will be the keynote speaker Thursday at a regional education and employment equity conference. "Our purpose is to find out where this region is at with regard to employment equity and develop a consensus statement on where the region is going in the development of employment equity," said conference organizer Joyce Stankiewicz, equal opportunity advisor for the Waterloo region separate school board. According to Stankiewicz, Waterloo region is a leader when it comes to employment equity; both school boards, Waterloo region, and the City of Kitchener have appointed employment equity officers, the City of Cambridge has designated two staff members to deal with employment equity and the City of Waterloo "has expressed a commitment to the concept‘" although no one has been hired yet. The Waterloo Region Education and Employment Equity Group is one of the first networks of its kind in the province, and Thursday‘s conference is also a first. ‘"There‘s a concern here . . . a willingness to try and determine what it means and to come to a consensus. In other communities they‘re dragging their feet, but not here," she said. Coâ€"hosted by the Regional Municipality of Waterloo and the Waterloo Region Education and Employment Equity Group, the conference is designed for policy makers and practitioners from this region‘s public sector. Theme of this first regional conference on employment equity is Education and Employment Equity: Developing a Regional Public Sector Response. Sorbara to speak at Thursday conference For example, in 1986 21.4 per cent of Waterloo county secondary school students achieved marks between 80 and 89 per cent, compared to 22.3 per cent in the province as a whole. Further, five per cent of this region‘s students scored a grade of 90 to 100 per cent, less than the 7.5 per cent across Ontario. ‘"The number of Ontario Scholars granted in Waterloo County has increased steadily over the same period (1983â€"1986), but has not kept pace with the increases for the province, particularly in the last year," said the report, prepared by a threeâ€"member committee. The study was undertaken in response to complaints from Waterloo resident John Shortreed, an engineering professor at the University of Waterloo, who told trustees that Waterloo county graduates were missing out on admissions to university programs and losing scholarships because this region‘s marking standards were too high. As a result of the investigation, each school in the county will be reâ€" evaluating its mark performance. The board will also work with the University of Waterioo to compare high school graduates‘ marks with those achieved in the first year of university. Board examines marking standard A study presented to trustees at last Thursday‘s board meeting revealed that the overall student average of 72.4 per cent reported in Waterloo county was almost identicxn to the average across the Eovince (72.7 per cent). However, the region‘s students are falling hind in the higher mark ranges of 80 to 100 per cent. in the U.S. The shares of total income going to different segments of the population have changed in such a way that the rich are getting richer, the poor are increasing in number, and the middle class has trouble holding its own. The trend can be described as a surge toward inequality," the article noted. Politically, can a class system be much behind any kind of polarization? Last year, Decima Research, the polling firm run by Tory Allan Gregg discovered a new phenomenon among Canadians â€" for the first time in (polling) history, Canadians were beginning to choose their party allegiances by the class they perceived themselves to belong to. That‘s a frightening thought. And if it is a major trend in an elephant like the U.S., it does not bode well for the mouse to the north. Of course, this has major economic and political ramifications. The left has been telling us for years that the move into a serviceâ€"sector economy means a real dollar decline in the standard of living for the average Canadian. I for one, never took that belief seriously. Perhaps they are right. Really makes you wonder if a free trade agreement makes sense, doesn‘t it? Now, if an increasing number of Canadians see themselves as "lower class", what kind of voting patterns and political system are we going to see in the future? I for one am not ready to say that the present economic system has broken down. But it is apparant thht it‘s not firing on a couple of cylinders. Perhaps something approaching that of Great Briâ€" tain?