The Difference Between the Elderly and the Disabled.

Louis Shalako

My journey began May 4, 1989, when a plank in a scaffolding broke beneath me and I fell to my death.

Unfortunately, in some opinions, I survived. I have three compression fractures, at the T-6, L-3 and L-4 vertebrae. I saw a doctor the next day and he didn’t even bother to order an X-ray, although he did write a scrip for Tylenol-3s, 30-milligrams of codeine per tablet.

I’ve learned a lot, since then.

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“You can earn up to a certain amount without telling us and without losing your benefits. For 2018, this amount is $5,500.00 (before taxes). This amount may increase in future years.”

At one time, a person on the Canada Pension Plan (Disability) benefit could earn as little as ten dollars and, because they were capable of doing some work, they would lose the benefits. 

That has since changed. Looking at the website, you can now earn up to $5,500.00 annually. 

What is really interesting is that you don’t even have to report it.

On the Ontario Disability Support Program, clients can only earn $200.00 per month, $2,400.00 a year.

In terms of operating a business, the paperwork takes me a couple of hours a month, including income, mileage and expense reports. People who are working for scab employers fill out a different form and for the most part, are too fucking dumb to claim expenses. It would be good if the Province of Ontario were to bring its policies more in line with the federal disability pension system. Note that the rates might be different in the two cases, my impression from years ago was that the federal system actually paid less than ODSP.

“For 2016, the average monthly CPP disability benefit is $933.82 and the maximum monthly amount is $1,290.81. You will receive the basic monthly amount fixed for all recipients ($471.43), plus an amount based on how much you contributed to the CPP during your entire working career. If you are receiving a CPP disability benefit, your dependent children may also be eligible for a children's benefit. In 2016, the flat monthly rate your child can receive is $237.69. Read more about the CPP benefits amounts.”

So, that part's not very good. 

I did apply for CPP(D) but did not qualify, this was in 1994 or 1995. A recent news story indicates that fewer Canadians are qualifying for benefits. According to this story, there are serious problems at or with CPP(D) and that’s certainly credible based on my experiences with this whole industry—and an industry it is, one that employs thousands in relatively good-paying government jobs. At the provincial level, it takes up a good chunk of the budget.

As we can see, the elderly, (who can be equally vulnerable) are sort of favoured over the disabled, who may, admittedly, be younger. That is the only distinction that I can see—other than the fact that old age pensions are paid into by those who are employed. The disabled may never have been employed, and therefore, there is no public fund for their maintenance. I was employed for about twelve years—all my other work experience has been an entrepreneurial, hand-to-mouth sort of subsistence. I didn’t make contributions, and I didn’t qualify for unemployment insurance. Let’s just say I didn’t starve to death and leave it at that—

Anyways, the statute of limitations has run out and perhaps that is a good thing.

Disabled persons on CPP(D) have to have recently paid into the system. How much, and for how long, would appear to be closely-guarded secrets.

Such programs are notoriously underfunded. It is a hallmark of all such systems.

Retirees of sixty-five or seventy years of age can work while receiving regular Canada Pension Plan benefits with no penalty. There is no limit—you can earn a million bucks and still get this pension benefit. This is why scab employers such as Walmart, Tim Horton’s, McDonalds, Burger King, and a thousand grocery stores across the province and the nation love to hire retirees. Walmart greeters are famous for their average and collective age. But they don’t have to live on the money, whether it is full, or more likely part-time employment. 

They are using the additional earnings for luxuries, Christmas presents, travel, spoiling the grand-kids, (and rightly so), or simply attaining some quality of life not offered by a base government pension and no savings, no private pension in many cases.

Retail isn’t the only industry that relies on subsidized labour. When I worked as a security guard, it was surprising, just how many people were retired from the military, ex-cops, and ex-firemen. But they had their pension already, they were bondable, they had some relevant experience, and they didn’t have to live on the money. It is also true some had been bankrupted by divorce (sometimes multiple divorces), and genuinely needed the money. 

There was some poverty there, as anyone drinking home percolator coffee from a Thermos and eating stale, single-slice bologna sandwiches with a thin scrape of butter and mustard on a long midnight shift can attest. I saw many of those along the way, guys without much education but also no criminal record. If nothing else, they were bondable, although they might have rolled up their own smokes on the kitchen table in a kind of quiet, genteel, Canadian desperation.

A bunch of people must have had their applications in. A bunch of us were called in one day…there was a strike on, and the money was good.

I went from $14.00 per hour on strike duty (where we crossed the picket lines twice a day), to $5.35 per hour when the strike ended and we were lucky enough for the company to take at least some of us on. That company is still in existence today, and I have no doubt that their basic practices haven’t changed. One of the company principals was also involved with a temporary placement company—an employment company.

They’d get you a minimum-wage job somewhere and then take a percentage of your cheque for the first six months. Since it was a temporary job, one has to wonder how many folks ever got out from under that. These guys will exploit the vulnerable, the desperate, or even just the stupid. They’re not all that picky.

What’s interesting is that on polling day, election day, the place is crawling with senior citizens. While 12.6 % of Canadians suffer from some form of disability, it’s like they just don’t vote or something.

Or maybe it’s just that no one cares—unless they’re running a food bank for forty-five thousand a year and bucking for sainthood on the front page of some crummy little Canadian newspaper somewhere with all kinds of feel-good, bullshit glorification of Canadian food banks.

END

Louis has all these books and stories on Smashwords. ( - ed.) 

Thank you for reading.