I've spent a good deal of time recently looking at the Ontario budget recently. Something that jumped out to me is that healthcare funding has massively increased under Doug Ford, even though popular wisdom is that he's been cutting it. The reason is that we're in a fertility crisis, where Canada is getting older both in terms of the number of seniors and the proportion of the population that are seniors. It's tempting to assume that are healthcare systems are falling apart from inefficiencies, but in reality, this is an inevitable part of having such an old population. No politician has the courage to say this, but taxes have to go up if we want to continue to have universal healthcare.
I am a retired educator (BC). I have sat on curriculum committees (1990's) and I have a reasonable idea of how much it costs for these committees - travel, accommodation, meals, substitute teachers back home. I have experienced how the government people at the table skew the focus of a discipline to reflect the ideology of the few. Then there is the cost of workshopping the teachers in the new curriculum, supporting the implementation in the districts, the new texts etc., etc. I read somewhere that some universities are offering remedial programs in reading and writing for their first year students.
Your comment on healthcare is disconcerting but reflecting on it, it might be the case.
My impression speaking with numerous front line workers in the medical profession is that administrative bloat is a very real thing and that satisfying the demands of various levels of administration takes away from the ability of those front line workers to deal with patients. That impression may be based somewhat on anecdotal evidence but usually where there is smoke there is fire.
I feel like questions like yours should be easily measured, yet it seems clear that the data on public sector employment (at least publicly available) is actually designed to confound all attempts at analysis. Looking at the Ontario Sunshine List, there are nine thousand (!) different job titles listed for workers in the Hospitals and Boards of Public Health sector. And of course that only covers those workers earning $100k or more.
That's a good point - it does suggest that someone's not interested in providing useful metrics. But there actually is useful information on the Sunshine list: my research into curriculum-related job roles (https://www.theaudit.ca/p/does-provincial-curriculum-policy-matter) definitely pointed to something strange.
For education, I would look first at the focus on ideological indoctrination over instruction and competence. And I've written that many of the problems faced by healthcare systems may simply have no solutions.
I've spent a good deal of time recently looking at the Ontario budget recently. Something that jumped out to me is that healthcare funding has massively increased under Doug Ford, even though popular wisdom is that he's been cutting it. The reason is that we're in a fertility crisis, where Canada is getting older both in terms of the number of seniors and the proportion of the population that are seniors. It's tempting to assume that are healthcare systems are falling apart from inefficiencies, but in reality, this is an inevitable part of having such an old population. No politician has the courage to say this, but taxes have to go up if we want to continue to have universal healthcare.
I am a retired educator (BC). I have sat on curriculum committees (1990's) and I have a reasonable idea of how much it costs for these committees - travel, accommodation, meals, substitute teachers back home. I have experienced how the government people at the table skew the focus of a discipline to reflect the ideology of the few. Then there is the cost of workshopping the teachers in the new curriculum, supporting the implementation in the districts, the new texts etc., etc. I read somewhere that some universities are offering remedial programs in reading and writing for their first year students.
Your comment on healthcare is disconcerting but reflecting on it, it might be the case.
My impression speaking with numerous front line workers in the medical profession is that administrative bloat is a very real thing and that satisfying the demands of various levels of administration takes away from the ability of those front line workers to deal with patients. That impression may be based somewhat on anecdotal evidence but usually where there is smoke there is fire.
Perhaps it's not too many administrators that are causing a lot of the trouble, but too much administration *control*.
Good point but the effect is still the same. Time away from patient interaction moved to administrative interaction.
I feel like questions like yours should be easily measured, yet it seems clear that the data on public sector employment (at least publicly available) is actually designed to confound all attempts at analysis. Looking at the Ontario Sunshine List, there are nine thousand (!) different job titles listed for workers in the Hospitals and Boards of Public Health sector. And of course that only covers those workers earning $100k or more.
That's a good point - it does suggest that someone's not interested in providing useful metrics. But there actually is useful information on the Sunshine list: my research into curriculum-related job roles (https://www.theaudit.ca/p/does-provincial-curriculum-policy-matter) definitely pointed to something strange.
This looks like good news for a change.
The problems with those two sectors are real, but at least they can't all be blamed on rogue HR departments.
This are interesting findings.
I am wondering what you would suggest regarding where we look.
For education, I would look first at the focus on ideological indoctrination over instruction and competence. And I've written that many of the problems faced by healthcare systems may simply have no solutions.