On July 17, the Trudeau government cut the Canada Recovery Benefit (CRB) by 40 percent. The CRB is the Liberal Party’s main COVID-19 benefit for unemployed workers who lack sufficient hours to qualify for employment insurance. The cut will change the CRB from $500 per week to $300 in advance of the program’s termination on September 25.

The Liberals are pushing forward with the cuts even though the party acknowledges that many of the jobs wiped out by the pandemic aren’t coming back at the same rate of pay. In place of additional worker supports, however, the party is instead doubling down on its commitment to tech entrepreneurialism.

It’s yet another sign that Justin Trudeau’s party is reconciling itself to a post-pandemic austerity regime in which employers will impose a new regressive standard on working people across Canada, leading to widening inequality and rising precarity in the labor market — all in the name of innovation.