CHAPTER 9

ILLITERACY AND THE LABOUR MARKET

Illiteracy and Poverty

The brief overview of Canadian economic history presented in the foregoing chapter suggests that it was the capitalist economic structure which was. responsible for the existence of both, illiteracy and poverty among what has been termed the surplus population in the 1950's and 1960's period in Canada. In more formal terms, the economic structure is the independent variable and illiteracy and poverty are dependent ones.

Clearly, on its face this conclusion contradicts the liberal view. However, adherents of the liberal perspective might reply that this argument from historical data does not negate what appears to be a solid fact: i.e. that lack of literacy and numeracy skills is a significant obstacle to desirable employment for the poor. Regardless of the history of the genesis of poverty, the movement of the poor into better jobs appears to depend on their receiving education and training. Adherents of this view would point out that since the 1950's, large numbers of jobs at higher skill and education levels have become available, and that even in. 1982, in the midst of a recession, many such jobs cannot be filled for lack of sufficient skilled workers. With education and training, presently unskilled and ill-educated workers could take advantage of them. Thus, even if it is conceded that illiteracy is not a long-range or fundamental cause of poverty, it can still be seen as a short-range or immediate cause of considerable importance.

We will now critically weigh this argument--i.e. that there exists a short-range or immediate casual relationship between illiteracy and poverty. To do so, we must refine our analysis of the capitalist economic structure and focus on a single crucial institution within it: the capitalist labour market.

Dual Labour Markets

We can begin by pointing out an important change that took place in this institution as a result of the intensification of the uneven development of economic sectors in the 1950's: i.e. the emergence of two distinct markets for labour in Canada where there had previously been only one. This Is often referred to as the phenomenon of "dual" or "segmented" labour markets.1 On one hand, workers in the "primary" labour market competed for relatively high paying, secure, usually unionized jobs in capital-intensive "monopoly" sector industries like automobiles, steel, petrochemicals, etc. On the other hand, workers in the "secondary" labour market were limited to competing for low-wage non-unionized, insecure and often physically exhausting work in the labour-intensive "competitive sector", including jobs in personal services and in low-wage manufacturing (as well as the most menial positions in monopoly sector industries). 2