Are you an elite or a folk?  Maybe you spent your childhood in a folk part of Ontario and have since relocated to an elite city.  Perhaps you have moved between economic statuses over the course of your life, growing up as a folk and making it to the elite or, perhaps, the reverse.  But economic status and geography aren't enough to answer the question.  "Elite" and "folk" are states of mind, characterized by strong feelings about the likes and dislikes of the other.  And from the moment Ontario Premier Doug Ford took office, he saw the potential in exploiting this schism.

If, after reading the above paragraph, you have paused to contemplate your own place on the elite/folk spectrum, be completely honest with yourself.  There's no shame in being either, as long as you're not an asshole about it.  Unfortunately, a vital element of Ford's success in using the spectrum to his advantage is that there are many assholes.

Buck-a-beer is emblematic of this strategy.  For elites, it's an empty gesture for the "Dadbod Randy" hosting a cookout somewhere in the suburbs.  For folks, it's a callback to the days when Ontarians could get a 12-pack of Lakeport cheap and be happy with it, instead of paying through the nose for the "mango fruit-infused saison" that elites would have everybody drink.  (No, they wouldn't, Brian.  Mango saisons are gateways for people who don't like beer.)  The temptation to frame buck-a-beer as a matter of taste has proven too strong for many.

Somewhere beneath attacks on other people's choice of canned bread juice, there is an argument about how worthwhile this project is, especially when the LCBO and Beer Store will continue to enjoy their respective monopolies, and the tax structure that has shot the price of beer far beyond a buck will remain intact, and that, even if that structure were dismantled, manufacturing costs make $1 beer unprofitable for many, even most, brewers.  But most voters, elite or folk, aren't thinking about the underlying economics of beer sales in Ontario another crucial factor for Ford.

It's classic kitchen-table politics.  It only touches on the number people see at the cash register, or in bold type at the bottom of a bill.  Ford has spoken this way of gas, hydro rates, and Crown corporation salaries.  Whether it's in his power to change these amounts, or whether his changes will make any lasting difference, is immaterial to the folks.  At least, that's what Ford hopes to be the case; otherwise, he might have to show his work.

The substantive impact of buck-a-beer promises to be minimal, but the political impact does not.  Hardly anyone refers to themselves as "elite," except sarcastically.  But if they use buck-a-beer as an excuse to speculate about product quality, especially with "Dadbod Randy"-type epithets, they fall into a trap where Ford and his folks can categorize them as such and dismiss even their legitimate concerns about the policy.  If this approach works for beer, it'll work for something else.

But not everything else.  It would take Comaneçi-grade mental gymnastics to call school repairs an "elite" priority, or housing prices, or infrastructure.  These issues and others touch everyone in Ontario.  This is where Ford's opponents should demand action, instead of letting themselves be distracted.  If buck-a-beer is, as it were, weak beer, leave it in the cooler and crack open something stronger.

Written by Jess Morgan

Ontario Premier Doug Ford declaring the return of a buck-a-beer in time for Labour Day weekend is sure to please a lot of Ontario's lower class and university students alike.  And there's really nothing wrong with Ford's government lowering the floor price of a beer to one dollar — nevermind the left-wing hipster breweries griping about it â€” because the government really shouldn't be in the business of dictating the minimum price of any product, so lowering of the minimum price should be welcome news.

That being said, brewers have a good point when they say the price to produce drinkable beer is well above a dollar a beer now.  It's also quite silly for Ford, someone supposedly opposed to government meddling in the free market, to be giving incentives like free advertising and prime product placement to brewers who decide to make piss water at a buck a bottle.

Even more eye-roll-inducing, though, is when Ford's new government "news" Twitter account Ontario News Now has video of deputy director of communications Lyndsey Vanstone posing as a reporter saying, "Putting consumers first, the premier launched the buck-a-beer challenge, saying the days of the governments putting their hands in your pocket every time you buy a six-pack are over."

In other (non-fake) news, Ontarians still have governments and foreign-owned beer conglomerates' hands in their pockets every time they buy a six-pack.  The People Pint Brewing Company estimates Ontarians pay $0.03 in excise tax, $0.12 in Harmonized Sales Tax, and $0.14 in provincial beer tax for every can of beer they buy.  Adding to this, the Toronto Star estimated in the past that The Beer Store — vast-majority owned by Japanese-owned Sleeman Breweries, Belgian-owned Labatt Brewing Company, and multinational beer conglomerate Molson Coors Brewing Company — profits $1 billion annually from its virtual monopoly and lionshare of retail sales of beer in Ontario, which surely is due in part via gouging customers and the food and beverage industry.  (Oh, and I almost forgot to mention The Beer Store's other sweet deal with the Ontario government: Its monopoly of the Ontario Deposit Return Program, which undoubtedly makes the beer conglomerate owners of TBS even more money in processing all those empties and pocketing the deposits of all those bottles and cans that don't make it back to TBS location.)

It's odd Ford as premier hasn't called out PM Justin Trudeau's government's escalating beer tax or cut any of the provincial tax if he really wants to lower the price of beer for Ontarians.  He isn't actually helping lower the price of any of the brands Ontario beer drinkers actually drink.

What will be very telling is if this small beer move isn't followed up with a big beer move in dismantling the beer cartel's virtual monopoly of beer sales in this province.

The Ontario Liberals had a chance to disband the cartel back in late 2014 when Toronto Star columnist Martin Regg Cohn exposed TBS conspiring with the LCBO to limit the distribution of the competitors to Sleeman, Labatt, and Molson Coors.  Instead, Premier Wynne decided to do a phony show of opening up the market, allowing big grocery chain retailers like Loblaws to get a little cut of the action.  Liberal friendlies like billionaire Galen Weston Jr. cashed in on the action while Ontarians were left still getting hosed — but at least they had a little more choice in where they got hosed, even if they could only buy higher-priced six-packs or individual cans in these new locations.

Ford during the election campaign promised to open the sales of beer and alcohol to smaller retailers, but if he doesn't dismantle TBS' control over distribution and pricing it will not come close to fully dismantling the gross powers the multinational beer conglomerates have over beer sales in this province.

The Buck-a-Beer challenge is a cruel farce compared to the monumental and historical act of breaking up a beer cartel that has for far too long gotten away with bilking largely unwitting Ontarians.  Let's hope Ford is up for the real challenge of taking them on.

Written by Graeme C. Gordon