Any proposal to increase the minimum wage by any amount in any province or territory seems to be met with dire warnings of massive job losses and impending economic doom. The problem for critics of the minimum wage is, neither history nor academic research backs these notions up.

The Alberta government should reverse decades of failed experimentation in the delivery of critical social services in the province by re-establishing the proper balance between services delivered by Alberta Human Services and the province’s non-profit sector. A much-needed first step is to develop an accurate picture of the current relationship between the government and non-profits.

While the promise to ban corporate and union donations to political parties is a positive step in making much-needed changes to Alberta’s political finance laws, more comprehensive reform is necessary to remove the longstanding influence of money in provincial politics.

At least 40 percent of Alberta’s projected deficit for fiscal year 2015/16 could be eliminated by simply returning to the royalty formulas in place prior to 2009.

The gap between the rich and the poor in Alberta is the widest in the country, and the disparity between those Albertans at the top of the income ladder and those at the bottom has been growing faster than in any other province, according to the findings of a new fact sheet released today by the Parkland Institute.

With Albertans in the early days of another provincial election cycle, a new report released today by the Parkland Institute says that the values of Albertans are much more diverse than over 43 years of unbroken Progressive Conservative rule would suggest, and don’t fall neatly into left-versus-right polarization.

The report, A Monochrome Political Culture? Examining the Range of Albertans’ Values and Beliefs, is based on public opinion surveys conducted by the University of Alberta’s Population Research Laboratory in 2014. 

Edmonton - The 2015/16 provincial budget tabled this afternoon by Finance Minister Robin Campbell is a missed opportunity to make the structural changes necessary to stabilize provincial revenues and equitably wean the province off its overdependence on resource revenue, according to the Parkland Institute.

In late February, Premier Jim Prentice betrayed his lack of vision for post-secondary education in the province, saying: “There are always carrots and sticks.” But what’s the objective?

A week before the Prentice government introduces its 2015/16 provincial budget, a new fact sheet released today by the Parkland Institute challenges the often-repeated claim that Alberta’s current fiscal woes are due to overspending by the provincial government.

Alberta is the richest jurisdiction in North America. But women living in the province are among the most disadvantaged in Canada, facing higher income gaps, unpaid work gaps, and after-tax income gaps than women living anywhere else in the country.

And despite the renewed and expanded commitments made in Canada to women’s equality in 1995, Alberta women’s equality has markedly deteriorated since then.

One day after International Women’s Day is the perfect time to ask why.