All workers deserve access to a safe and secure retirement. But neoliberal governments set up a dynamic where the retirement of some is predicated upon the exploitation of many. In the late-1980s, Ontario’s government, financial sector, and labour movement collaborated on a major restructuring of the province’s public sector pensions. The result? The unlocking of a vault containing billions of dollars, suddenly open to be privately invested in capital markets. All this occurred as Ontario’s manufacturing economy got smaller, its care economy got bigger, and its labour movement got weaker.
In Invested in Crisis, Tom Fraser traces the rise of the province’s mega-pension-funds by melding history, geography, and political economy to situate this growth in the context of Ontario’s deindustrialization, the rise of finance, and the global politics of the built environment. Fraser delves deep into the sordid stories of the public sector pension fund investment world: the massive real estate projects, the infrastructure privatization debacles, how unions fight back, and what needs to be done so we can all save for a better future.
What People Are Saying
“Invested in Crisis offers a compelling and insightful examination of the profound yet often overlooked influence of public sector pension investments on our cities and communities. From infrastructure development to real estate investment trusts, Tom Fraser brings clarity to the complex financial arrangements shaping our built environment and our everyday lives. Going beyond the policy debates, Fraser provides a grounded analysis that elegantly demonstrates what is at stake, exposing how the contradictions of pension fund capitalism play out in urban development and public sector struggles.” Chris Hurl, associate professor, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Concordia University; coauthor of The Consulting Trap
“Invested in Crisis should be required reading for every public sector worker and trade unionist in Canada. But it will make you squirm. Our marketized pension funds are driving privatization and residential displacement around the world.” Steven High, author of The Left in Power: Bob Rae’s NDP and the Working Class
“With a focus on the scale and impacts of recent Canadian public sector pension investments in real estate and the care economy, this book shows how workers’ capital has been deployed by finance to extract rentier profits and undermine working-class interests.” Andrew Jackson, former director of social and economic policy, Canadian Labour Congress; author of The Fire and the Ashes: Rekindling Democratic Socialism
“Invested in Crisis is an incisive and well-written study of pension funds in Canada. Retirement plans for unionized government workers hold the bulk of Canadian pension assets—worth a staggering $2 trillion. By zeroing in on the shift of pension assets to real estate, Tom Fraser explores the irony of profit-seeking pension plans for government workers displacing the social logic of public housing provision, thereby exacerbating Canada’s housing crisis.” Sanford Jacoby, distinguished research professor, UCLA
“In Invested in Crisis, Tom Fraser reveals how the welfare state and its infrastructure are being systematically dismantled and privatized—all in the name of public workers’ retirement. Combining Marxist feminist and political economic theory with his accessible and vivid journalistic style, Fraser tells a compelling story of the increasing global reach and power of Ontario-based pension fund giants OMERS and OTPP. His account gives us a clear explanation of how public workers’ pensions are being used to erode their very living conditions in Canada and around the world through the global processes and state support of financialization.” Priya S. Gupta, associate professor, Department of Law, McGill University; author of Financializing Urban Governance
About the Author
Tom Fraser is a union researcher based in Tkaranto/Toronto. With an academic background in labour history, his research focuses narrowly on Ontario’s long-term care sector and more broadly on deindustrial political economy. His writing on labour, pensions, and infrastructure policy has appeared in Jacobin, Canadian Dimension, and The Globe and Mail.
Table of Contents
| Acknowledgements | |
| Introduction | Mapping the Pension Fund Landscape |
| Chapter 1 | Making a Public-Private-Public Welfare State |
| Chapter 2 | Pensions, Property, and Poverty |
| Chapter 3 | Local Labour, Global Infrastructure |
| Conclusion | Building a Just City, Building a Just Retirement |
| Notes | |
| Index |
