“Generation Squeeze” may not vote in transportation tax plebiscite: Professor

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VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) – A UBC policy professor thinks many people under 40 won’t bother to vote in the transportation sales tax plebiscite even though they probably should.
Paul Kershaw who is behind the “Generation Squeeze” campaign believes governments aren’t doing enough for younger people in terms of policies and spending, instead only focusing on those in their retirement years. He says that neglect can turn off voting for those from generation X and Y.

“The demographic of those in their 40s and younger are perhaps not going to turn up to vote in either the plebiscite for the transit referendum or an election more generally because we’ve got this culture that’s convinced us that government’s simply is not working for us…we’ve been so convinced that politics isn’t about us and we’re frustrated with how it works is convincing us actually not to get involved and vote in what favour of what our interests are.”

He says the fact there’s a plebiscite just goes to show how the province doesn’t care about finding funding to support the generation that will benefit the most from transportation improvements.
Although a low voter turnout could happen, he hopes everyone does vote “yes.”

“If we want a Canada that works for all generations and have that play out in Metro Vancouver, which is the toughest region in the country right to be a young person given what wages are doing and the high cost of housing, we need to vote “yes” in order to have a ten year plan for further transit infrastructure.”

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