Beyond traditional advocacy and public awareness efforts, and beyond media attention, a new economic discourse about literacy, from about 1985, has been very important. There has been a new policy attention to the economics of literacy, and a shift in the nature of the economic arguments. Earlier economic arguments for literacy had focused primarily on issues of access to the labour market, and unemployment and welfare costs. The central term of discussion had been "cost." It changed to "competitiveness." The "changing literacy demands of the workplace," as part of the "flexibility" and "adjustment" necessary for "productivity," are central themes of the new discussion. International and Canadian government reports called attention to literacy as a workforce training issue.39 When the 1986 Speech from the Throne announced federal action for literacy, specific attention was drawn to "the literacy skills that are prerequisite to participation in an advanced economy." Employment and Immigration Canada, which had neglected to mention literacy in a policy overview at the beginning of the decade,40 labelled it a significant issue in a policy overview at the end of the decade.41

Other processes must have supported the growing interest in literacy when when this economic rationale took hold in the mid-1980s. Certain processes, for example, arise at the intersection of literacy and governmental safety regulations, and governmental provision of health services. Legal protections have been introduced for workers using hazardous materials, requiring that they understand hazards and safety measures. Rising costs of medical services have led to patient education and preventive medicine being seen as cost-effective for the health system.42 Both these processes — and likely others — have contributed to a governmental concern with people's capacity to use written information.43 But a strong case can be made that a new policy attention to the economics of illiteracy in particular has been the central driving force behind governmental willingness to take adult literacy more seriously.

39 In 1986 a European Management Forum report on the competitiveness of the OECD economies ranked Canada low on the basic workforce skills needed to adjust to change, as well as on the quality of skilled labour. In 1987, the National Advisory Board on Science and Technology (advisory to the Prime Minister) recommended a major effort to eradicate illiteracy. See Leon Muszynski and David. A. Wolfe, "New Technology and Training: Lessons from Abroad," Canadian Public Policy/Analyse de Politiques 15:3, 1989, 245-64; Lynn Burton, "Basic Job Retraining and Paid Educational Leave," in Maurice C. Taylor and James A. Draper (eds.), Adult Literacy Perspectives, Toronto, Culture Concepts, 1989, 325-35.
40Labour Market Development in the 1980s, Employment and Immigration Canada, 1981.
41Employment and Immigration Canada, Success in the Works: A Profile of Canada's Emerging Workforce; and Success in the Works: A Policy Paper, Ottawa, 1989.
42Cf. Health and Welfare Canada, Achieving Health for All: A Framework for Health Promotion, Ottawa, Ministry of Supply and Services, Canada, 1986. Health problems related to limited literacy, and literacy-conscious strategies for public health organizations, are discussed in Ontario Public Health Association and Frontier College, The Literacy and Health Project: Making the World Healthier and Safer for People who Can't Read, Phase I, Toronto, 1989.
43It is remarkable that, within policy discussions, the consequences of limited literacy for community and political participation have scarcely been developed at all, and official statistics have no method for accounting the "human costs" that are often mentioned in political rhetoric.