“we are facing a human crisis unlike any we have experienced” and our “social fabric and cohesion is under stress.” — Amina J. Mohammed. (6)

Everyone is scared of COVID-19 and is afraid of being infected by the virus. Under the circumstance where each individual feels dreadful, what is our society suffering from?

“All countries need to review their strategies now,” says Dr. Michael J. Ryan, WHO Informal Advisory Group member. (5)

The current outbreak in Canada is not as dire as in the United States, but its population is not as intense as other countries such as China, India, and so on. Fortunately, the Canadian government took precautions at the very beginning, requiring elementary, middle to high school, and even universities to switch to online teaching. The government also shut down all business except hospitals and supermarkets ( life essentials). Then, the government strongly recommends that each person should stay home until COVID-19 ends.

This decision is uneasy for all of us because it has a significant effect on Canada’s economy.

“A new report from the Conference Board of Canada predicts that the COVID-19 impact will impact the county’s economy for years to come.” (4)

“In comparison with our baseline scenario, the bigger negative impact on the Canadian economy is the result of lower energy and resource investment, weaker exports, and a drastic decline in household spending.” (4)

(Figure 1) IMF forecasts for the annual percent change in real GDP for select countries 

According to the chart above, professionals predict that the economy will shrink by 6.2% in 2020 because most Canadians have become jobless. (1) Although the government is giving citizens 2K per month to maintain their life, some small and middle businesses are still shutting down. (3) It sounds like 2K is sufficient, but what if you have mortgages? What if you have to pay property tax and maintain a fee without any positive income? What if you have to pay for your workers with a drop in clients? Overall, as the number of infected people increases, the economy will continue dropping. 

As the drop in GDP, larger businesses such as transportation and warehousing, industries dependent on trade, also dropped 1.7%, and professionals predict it will keep dropping until COVID-19 ends. (3)

The best way to stop the spread of the virus is to reduce human contact, therefore, every country reduces the number of air transportation. “Air transportation declined 2.7 per cent, as movement of both goods and passengers decreased,” it read. (3)

“In the coming years, Canada and many other countries will need to deal with the economic fallout of COVID-19, which will likely leave households, governments, and businesses deeper in debt than they were prior to the crisis” (4)

Overall, the impact of COVID-19 on the economy is very large, from everyone to the whole country. During the epidemic, as a student, I didn’t need to go to school, as a working person, I didn’t need to go to work in the company, I was at home every day, which reduced the efficiency of people’s work. Traffic has also been reduced, from buses, subways, to airplanes. This series has slowed down our economy. (2)

Sources: 

1. https://www.thestar.com/business/2020/04/14/canadian-economy-to-take-massive-hit-from-covid-19-and-oil-will-see-largest-contraction-since-1921.html 
2. https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2020/04/08/covid-19-having-a-profound-effect-on-the-lives-of-canadians-survey-shows.html  
3. https://www.canada.ca/en/public-health/services/diseases/2019-novel-coronavirus-infection.html?topic=tilelink 
4. https://lethbridgenewsnow.com/2020/03/25/report-covid-19-will-have-long-lasting-effects-on-canadian-economy/
5. https://www.ehstoday.com/health/media-gallery/21126031/8-quotes-from-the-world-health-organizations-covid19-media-briefing
6. https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/covid-19-action-call-8-apr/

I really enjoyed reading James’s second long blog. He mentioned the problem of homeless people in the city of Toronto. He provided some reasons showing why there is an increase in homeless people. And I like how he format his essay.

He did a great job on finding resources and citing them.

After browsing the tenant list at 401 Richmond, I found Between the Lines attracts me the most because it presents so many great ideas and new challenge for their readers. Their writers focus on analyzing historical events and current issues that are not trendy. It is important for the city having an organization like this because it helps introducing so many small problems. I’m dropping a photo of the organization and its website down below. If you are interested in knowing “secrets” of the city, just go check it out.

http://www.btlbooks.com

As the largest city in Canada, there are tons of wealth business people, however; numbers of poor people warns us to notice that the gap between these two types continues to grow.

According to research, Toronto has the largest income gap compared to other Canadian metropolitan areas. As the gap continues growing, there are more people concern about their future. So, this blog will take you to explore two main factors which drive the gap expanding insanely.

First, Globalization is an important cause of inequality. [1] Indeed, globalization brings a lot wealth for some people, but for most populace, it does not work out. Even worse, some people are hurt by it. Rich become richer; poor become poorer. The current economic structure is the rich economy. Economy system in current days is that a few people are rich and most people are relatively poor. For example, the traditional financial industry used to serve the economy, but now if we say that a large number of rich people are generated in the financial industry. In fact, the traditional economic industry has produced a large number of managers, and middle class people. In the current financial industry, if you go to Wall Street as an investor, you will realize there is a few workers, just a large number of computers. Therefore, the hiring of actual labor decreased. The decrease of the need makes the employ market more competitive. But, that is one of the new ways to make money. So, the financial industry can produce a very small number of rich people, but can not produce middle class people anymore, the poor is even more impossible. [2]

Second, housing affordability plays a huge role in creating inequality between rich and poor. [1] As we all know, housing prices in the city of Toronto are growing rapidly, but people’s wages are not increasing as fast as the housing price. Unless you are an entrepreneur or boss of a company, you could adapt to the changes. Nonetheless, many people are not that lucky, they can’t afford to live in Toronto easily, especially in Downtown Toronto. For example, the price of a one-bedroom apartments in Downtown costs between $550,000 – $650,000, and the monthly management fee for a one-bedroom apartment is between 200 – 600 Canadian dollars. What’s more, people have to pay for electricity and network. A common banker makes $2500 per month only, so the housing price is actually pretty pressure. For rent, a studio apartment charges around 1k7 – 2k2. In December 2010, the average selling price of house prices in Toronto was $378,500, but until the February of 2020, the average sold price becomes $911,742. [3] According to research, average annual salary in Ontario is $53,595. [4] But, many people don’t meet the average salary. So, it is reasonable why the gap between poor and rich is growing, it’s hard for many people to afford a decent home in the GTA. They use a large amount of their income to pay for their rents or mortgage. They have no more leisure money to invest.

In conclusion, the problem of the gap between rich and poor is very difficult to repair, because of these two reasons above.

References:

[1] https://sevenpillarsinstitute.org/causes-economic-inequality/

[2] https://zhidao.baidu.com/question/1963038019786823580.html

[3] https://toronto.listing.ca/real-estate-price-history.htm

[4] https://www.jobillico.com/blog/en/average-canadian-salary/

COVID-19 is growing and spreading so fast that can transmit easily from a person to another. It is vital to notice that everyone has responsibility to reduce the impact of COVID-19 so let’s put a mask on our face and wash our hands frequently with warm water, hand sanitizer, or soap to help its rapid transmission speed.

It is horrifying for humans to experience such an outbreak in a sudden, especially it spreads quickly and easily. To me, I’m so scared of the eruption of the virus. So, I try my best staying home instead of going outside. I stocked up a good amount of food and life supplies. ( I don’t want to see an eruption in Canada, but I just want to be prepared.)

The pausing of schools reflect the significance, destructive effect of the virus and indicates that the government strives to reduce the effect of the virus in Canada.

In my school, there’s only few people still coming to class. It is reasonable because people don’t want to be transmitted by other people.

The People

The ROM, the largest museum in North America, has more than one million visitors every year. The founder Sir Byron Edmund walker built a team of people to make the Rom a world-class museum. He also built foundation and gave direction to many large institutions such as the University of Toronto and the Canadian Bank of Commerce ( He was the president of CIBC in 1907). He was super influential that his success cannot be separated with his connections with other influential people in the society. When he was working in New York, galleries and museums in NYC inspired him a lot that he wanted to pursue his cultural interests by founding a major museum in the city of Toronto. Yet, after many years of planning and negotiating, the Royal Museum officially opened to the public on March 19, 1914. He retired from the position until the end of his life journey.

Alone we can so little; together we can do so much. Walker had an idea of what he wanted for the museum but he only knew something of the humanities and their practitioners. So now, Walker needed a favourable archaeologists to collaborate with him to make his dream real. His son’s friend Charles Trick Currelly was his best choice.

The Architecture

The Italianate and Neo-Romanesque building was made of rounded arches and segmented windows. The original structure was in good shape except it doesn’t fit in the contemporary minimal art taste. The Crystal is the current version of the ROM that is a renovation which costs a multimillion-dollar.

Social Factors

“The story of how the ROM became a world-class cultural institution stretches from Toronto to China and covers major cultural shifts that shunted Canadian Methodism from piety to social engineering, the rise of the Toronto plutocracy, and the importance of a randomly placed postcard, among other things.”

Walker’s Efforts on The Museum

The Rom focuses on combining nature and culture due to Walker’s own wide-ranging interest. He started ” his collecting journey with fossils, which he donated to the ROM with his paleontological library to the Rom.” Then, he started ” the funding of dinosaur digs in the badlands of Alberta. One of the new species found there was named after him—Parasaurolophus walkeri. He was equally fascinated with world cultures and his impressive collection of Japanese ukiyo-e was donated to the Museum upon his death. Walker also established a tradition of continued philanthropy at the ROM, forming a fundraising group in 1917 called The Twenty Friends of the Arts. ”

The Development of Galleries

Originally, there were only five different galleries in the museum. They were archaeology, geology, mineralogy, palaeontology and zoology . The interior of the museum was very traditional that the specimens of insects and animals were glued on on the wall with glass pieces.

In 1960, the museum began to open more in-depth exhibitions, among which the most famous object was a giant dinosaur fossil. The trend of exhibiting giant ancient fossils continues to this day.

In 1980, the museum built an artificial bat cave and received widespread attention after. Indeed, this bat cave was extremely advanced that it utilized sound, light and gentle air flow to simulate a real bat cave so as to provide the best experience to the spectator.

After many times of evolution, the ROM now is mainly divided into two parts: the Natural History Galleries and the World Culture Galleries.

In Conclusion

Most people choose to engage in business and engineering related fields now, because their thoughts lead them to believe that is the way to make their fortune. With the growth of the society, more people participate in this concept, and fewer people are paying tuition to learn knowledge related to Literature and history. However, history teaches us not only what happened in the past, but also the wisdom of people in the past, such as getting inspiration by visiting cities, finding partners to cooperate, and using technology to achieve goals. We should all appreciate the existence of the museum since it records many significant societal tendency.

Citations

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Royal_Ontario_Museum

https://www.rom.on.ca/en/about-us

Hi, Andrea

I really enjoyed reading your short blog. The content is well-organized. You wrote your first impression on the Thomas Fisher Rare Library that the architecture is absolutely beautiful. Later on, you told the reader what’s inside this beautiful designed building. You mentioned the library carries invaluable and historical artifacts/books. Last, you wrote about your personal feeling when walking in the building and listening to the speaker’s presentation.

I’m giving her blog’s link below, if you are interested in, just go read it.

In his first long blog, he wrote that the housing price in Toronto is not affordable for most people even though there was a significant drop in 2016 due to the adding of the foreign buyer tax. Nevertheless, the drop did not maintain too long that the housing price reached its peak in 2017. He inserted a graph to show the increase of the housing price from 2014 to 2019 which gives the reader a better sense of what is happening in the city. Last but not least, he mentioned that the unstoppable increase in housing price would cause unwealthy people to become homeless. In conclusion, I really enjoyed reading James’s long blog. He included a crucial fact and wrote the potential consequences that might happen in the future because of that fact. So, I think his blog is good.

I’m giving you all his link just in case you are interest in the original blog.

Toronto has about 10,000 homeless people per night. Reasons behind this social stigma are diverse — some people have no savings, employment, mental health so they ended up living on the streets. Homeless people reflect the dark side of our society because they lack safe housing, stable jobs, and enough income to cope with Toronto’s price. 

It’s tragic that rental costs and housing prices have dramatically increased over the past years. Most homeless people don’t choose to become what they are today they were forced to find an affordable shelter to live. The most cost-efficient and price-friendly place is the streets.

Some homeless people shared their stories to us.

Theresa Hamilton, a 17 years old girl who has very bad anxiety. She comes from Mississauga and has been living at Covenant House for about a year. She said she left her house because she felt like her home was too distressing and painful to stay that no one does chores and goes to school regularly. So, she decided to leave. She is super young. Some people might wonder what she does for money. The answer is that she doesn’t make money, other than $280 every month from Ontario works. She goes to school now because she thinks she needs education. In her tough life, she loves playing piano and painting when she is stressed. Her mental illness is serious so she gets shaky easily and bites her nails often. She said painting is the only method to distract her, and she gave us an example of a smoker chewing gum for smoking less. People might wonder when she wants to move out of the Covenant House. Indeed, she is not able to move out since the housing price in Toronto is super expensive so the shelter is her best choice because it is safe and cheap and helps her to find her own way.

Robbie McLeod, a 19 years old boy whose mom stopped feeding him so he had to leave his home. Her mom threw his food to the dogs. At that moment of life, he grabbed his stuff and left the house. He sleeps on a heat vent on Bay Street, yet he doesn’t like the shelter. He earns money through panhandle and he shares his average $30 income each day. When people ask him what’s the toughest part of being homeless. he responds that it is not super miserable except the cold winter. He is adapting to this homeless lifestyle that he doesn’t plan to move because he cannot afford anything by his own.

We live in decent places. It’s not a big deal to give a little extra help so I collected some ways to help them. The first approach is donating money to some nonprofit organizations whose initial mission is to serve the homeless. Donating items such as winter clothing is the second approach since one of the homeless people said the toughest time is the winter. We also can volunteer our time to pack boxes with food for them.

This place belongs to the University of Toronto, containing rare books, Canadian manuscripts, and other materials for reading and studying.