The Council of Canadians organized a set of news conferences across Canada on March 31, the day before TILMA came into force for local governments in Alberta and BC. I was one of four speakers at the Toronto event. There are obviously larger and more important economic issues facing Canada today than interprovincial “free trade” deals. However, the free-market approach […]
Read moreIt makes my blood boil when I see headlines like this one from the Globe online: “Economic optimism boosts markets”. They are, of course, not talking about the markets that matter for most families’ day-to-day lives – those markets are still tanking. No, the Globe is talking about the stock market, as if an uptick of optimism among our financial […]
Read moreOnce in a while, I come across a blog post that is so on-point I cannot add much more than a link to it. With CBC broadcasting this year’s edition of Canada’s Next Great Prime Minister tonight, I highly recommend this post on the contest’s boneheaded entry requirement. The rule is as follows: “It is a condition of entry and […]
Read moreAmid speculation that the Government of Ontario may harmonize its provincial sales tax with the GST, today’s Toronto Star reports, “The government has offered no analysis to determine how much of a benefit or a drain harmonization would be on the provincial treasury.” I have seen at least one estimate from outside government. Michael Smart and Richard Bird wrote a […]
Read moreAndrew Coyne takes on public pensions in the current edition of Maclean’s (which does not yet seem to be available online). He not only criticizes the Caisse de Dépôt’s lousy investments, but calls for doing away with the Canada and Quebec Pension Plans (CPP and QPP). Coyne’s secondary headline (and primary argument) is, “Compulsory plans like the CPP expose older […]
Read moreJeffrey Simpson has a good assessment in today’s Globe: Mr. Obama’s budget – hugely consequential for the United States and of importance to Canada, too – represents a U-turn from the disastrous policies of the Bush administration and of the Republican political revolution that began decades ago. Imagine a U.S. budget that simultaneously offends rich farmers, everyone making $250,000 a […]
Read moreThe deal, unveiled yesterday by the Premiers of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, is not actually called PEAR, but PARE: Partnership Agreement on Regulation and the Economy. Like TILMA, it was signed pursuant to Article 1800 of the existing Agreement on Internal Trade to further “liberalize trade, investment and workforce mobility.” Unlike TILMA, it does not establish an enforcement mechanism […]
Read moreWhile the GM and Chrysler bailouts have prompted discussion of governments taking equity stakes in those companies, Business Week reports that Ford’s effort to restructure without government loans may make the United Auto Workers its largest shareholder. Henry Ford famously said, “Failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.†It seems unlikely that worker ownership is […]
Read moreJim’s posting of his excellent Globe column prompts me to review Canadian labour op-eds, and responses to them, on the “Buy America” controversy. The CAW’s Ken Lewenza was first out of the gate, writing in The Financial Post (Feb. 3) that Canada should mirror Buy America with its own “Buy Canadian” policy. My National Post op-ed (Feb. 5) argued that such […]
Read moreI just returned from the Steelworker Mecca of Hamilton-Burlington, where the Michael Coren Show is taped. It will be broadcast at 8pm tonight through the Crossroads Television System (CTS) on cable in Ontario and Alberta, and on satellite across Canada. Sarah Blackstock of the Income Security Advocacy Centre and I squared off with two Kevins, one from the Canadian Taxpayers […]
Read moreThe heads of Canada’s largest industrial unions just presented the following appeal to use government procurement policy to maintain and create Canadian jobs. UPDATE: It seems that Peggy Nash (from CAW) and I (from USW) will be taking calls about Buy America and Buy Canadian policies on CP24, a Toronto news TV station, between 9pm and 10pm on Wednesday. UPDATE (Feb. […]
Read moreInternational Trade Minister Stockwell Day is claiming credit for an amendment to the US stimulus bill affirming that its Buy America provisions will be “applied in a manner consistent with US obligations under international agreements.” Canada tops the list of countries to which the US has such obligations. However, Day and his colleagues demanded the complete removal of Buy America […]
Read moreAlarmist media reports on “Buy America” rules for steel used in US public infrastructure projects have emphasized the value of Canadian steel exports allegedly threatened, but have largely ignored the similar value of American steel imported by Canada. In fact, in the most recent month for which data is available (November 2008), Canada bought more steel from the US than […]
Read moreThe Fraser Institute, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Informetrica, Bank of Montreal, and yours truly square off in today’s Toronto Star (page A17).
Read moreThere was a noteworthy discrepancy in how our two national newspapers covered the $64-billion leak. The secondary headline printed in yesterday’s Globe and Mail began, “Finance Department’s deliberate leak . . .” While the story’s text identifies the leaker only as “a senior government official,” a pull-out quote in the print edition identified him or her as a “Finance Department official.” […]
Read moreI watched this movie last night and highly recommend it. I am often struck that criticism of Israeli military operations is more accepted in Israel than in North America. However, the movie won a Golden Globe and was just nominated for an Academy Award, which may add some welcome nuance to the dominant North American perspective.
Read moreLast year was a momentous one for Relentlessly Progressive Economics. Of course, some of us continued using the blog to disseminate media commentary on behalf of our respective organizations. However, the Progressive Economics Forum (PEF) itself attracted media coverage a couple of times. Early in the year, The National Post and other CanWest papers cited it for documenting some striking similarities […]
Read moreThe Maclean’s cavalry has ridden over the hill to help Bill Robson defend the conventional wisdom against Keynesian fiscal policy. Here are four problems with Andrew Coyne’s “Special Report” (which I am having trouble finding online) in the latest edition of Maclean’s magazine: 1. Coyne presents as evidence of failed deficit spending a 1991 paper by Christina Romer, who is now […]
Read moreDeclan picks up on Stephen’s suggestion that economists were too diffident to raise concerns about the real estate bubble: How to square the group of economists in the front pages of the paper offering a series of right wing prescriptions supported by neither fact nor theory with the economist unwilling to point out a housing bubble because it doesn’t fit […]
Read moreEzra Klein at American Prospect has already commented on some footage that I just saw on CNN. Paul Krugman marshalled his critique of Obama’s stimulus plan from his blog onto the op-ed page of today’s New York Times. A front-page story in the same newspaper suggests that Democratic legislators have been reading Krugman. Obama responded by throwing down the gauntlet for […]
Read moreI always enjoy Gwynne Dyer’s commentary on world affairs, but do not read nearly enough of it. Very few Canadian newspapers print columns by this Canadian-born journalist. Exceptions include Dyer’s hometown newspaper, the St. John’s Telegram, as well as The Hamilton Spectator and Guelph Mercury. Dyer’s lengthy year-end column combines a review of events in most corners of the world with […]
Read moreWilliam Robson, President of the C. D. Howe Institute, mounted a rear-guard defence of the conventional wisdom against Keynesian fiscal policy in yesterday’s Globe and Mail. He argues that we should leave the economy to central bankers and monetary policy instead of calling on governments to use fiscal policy. There are at least four problems with his op-ed: 1.) Far […]
Read moreBriarpatch printed my article, “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap: Saskatchewan’s Multi-billion Dollar Resource Giveaway,†in its December 2008 edition. The magazine’s editor has a knack for excellent rock-themed titles: my previous contribution on Saskatchewan’s business tax cuts was entitled “Money for Nothing, and the Sultans of Spin Get Their Tax Cuts for Free.†When I submitted the article and spoke […]
Read moreThis blog has often criticized columns by Neil Reynolds. But he had quite an interesting one in yesterday’s Globe and Mail. In a nutshell, the column argues that used clothing donated from western countries has limited the emergence of garment manufacturing in Africa, thereby stunting that continent’s industrial development. Reynolds emphasizes this research as an example of the unintended consequences […]
Read moreLast week, The Toronto Star ran a front-page story, “Cut tax or risk jobs, banks say,” on the Canadian Bankers Association (CBA) pre-budget submission to Queen’s Park. While acknowledging the elimination of Ontario’s corporate capital tax and the slashing of federal corporate income taxes, the bankers argue that it is also imperative for Ontario to cut its provincial corporate income […]
Read moreIn November, prices fell for a second consecutive month and annual inflation fell for a third consecutive month. The Consumer Price Index declined from 3.5% in August to 3.4% in September, 2.6% in October, and 2.0% in November. A few more months of decline could turn this annual rate negative. While steadily falling prices would be a boon to individual […]
Read moreSaturday’s Toronto Star featured the following op-ed from the United Steelworkers’ Ontario-Atlantic Director: Fix EI system to help those who didn’t cause the crisis TheStar.com – Opinion – Fix EI system to help those who didn’t cause the crisis Federal government, coalition or minority, should bolster benefits for the unemployed December 13, 2008 Wayne Fraser As all Canadians familiar with […]
Read moreThe front page of today’s New York Times notes that the United Food and Commercial Workers have organized “the world’s largest hog slaughterhouse” (some 5,000 employees in North Carolina). The front page also features an article on the United Auto Workers’ battle with Southern Republicans over the auto bailout. The second page reports the success of a Chicago plant occupation […]
Read moreLast night, Andrew Coyne prematurely began celebrating the demise of the US auto bailout and proclaimed the death of “any last lingering justification for†a parallel bailout in Canada. Now that American and Canadian governments have committed auto industry support, he pans Canada’s pledge as being “disproportionately large.†(Disproportionate to what, he does not specify.) Coyne links to a CTV […]
Read moreBy desperately clinging to the facade of a balanced budget, today’s Economic Statement rules out a meaningful stimulus package. The federal government optimistically assumes an economic slowdown rather than a sustained recession (it projects real GDP growth every year). To avoid the modest annual deficits that a slowdown would cause, the government proposes to reduce overall expenditures, sell public assets, […]
Read more