Resources – Page 7 – The Progressive Economics Forum

Exports and Greenhouse-Gas Emissions

September 26, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

Today, Statistics Canada released a very interesting study on the economic demand that is driving greenhouse-gas emissions. Between 1990 and 2002, exports outstripped Canadiansâ€™ personal expenditure as the leading source of Canadaâ€™s industrial emissions. Indeed, exports accounted for essentially all of the increase in these emissions. Canadian Industrial Emissions (in megatons) Final-Demand Category 1990 2002 Exports 176.4 264.4 Personal Expenditure […]

Raising Albertaâ€™s Royalties

September 24, 2007 Erin Weir 4 comments

Last week, the Royalty Review Panel recommended that Alberta raise its oil and gas royalties. Its 100-page final report, Our Fair Share, has generated healthy debate on a critically important subject. The basic message follows: Albertans do not receive their fair share from energy development and they have not, in fact, been receiving their fair share for quite some time. […]

The Commodity Price-Exchange Rate Transmission Mechanism

September 21, 2007 Jim Stanford One comment

Well, it happened. The petro-fueled loonie broke parity with the greenback yesterday, and is headed higher still. I can’t believe that so many people still interpret this as a symbol of our national renaissance.Â In fact, the reverse is true.Â The dollar’s flight both reflects, and simultaneously reinforces (in fine Kaldorian fashion) our regression into serving once again as a […]

Cut Interest Rates

September 20, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

The Canadian Labour Congress sent the following letter to the Bank of Canada today. September 20, 2007 David A. Dodge Governor Bank of Canada 234 Wellington Street Ottawa, Ontario K1A 0G9 Dear Governor Dodge: I write to urge you to reduce interest rates by 0.5% on October 16th to match the recent US rate cut. My letter of June 27th […]

Alberta Tar Sands Loom Large as Source of New Global Supply

September 19, 2007 Andrew Jackson One comment

CIBC World Market recently put out quite an interesting report on the future of world oil supply and demand and the implications for Canada. ( OPEC’s Growing Call on Itself.) http://research.cibcwm.com/economic_public/download/occrept62.pdf The major point is that OPEC countries plus other major oil producing countries such as Russia and Mexico are consuming a fast-rising share of their own oil output at […]

Danny Williams and Oil Royalties

August 25, 2007 Erin Weir One comment

In April 2006, Newfoundland Premier Danny Williams walked away from proposed Hebron development because the multinational oil companies were not offering sufficient benefits for his province. The national media and federal government heaped scorn on this decision. A couple of days ago, Williams secured a new deal that gives the province a 4.9% equity stake in Hebron, a 6.5% “super […]

Alberta Distortions

August 8, 2007 Jim Stanford 5 comments

I am big on big investment spending.Â Iâ€™ve argued for years that weak business investment undermines our job creation, our productivity, our incomes, and our competitiveness.Â Iâ€™ve proposed lots of policy measures to stimulate more investment spending: public as well as private. But whatâ€™s happening in northern Alberta is enough to nauseate even a Soviet-esque advocate of mass capital accumulation […]

Chavez and the Venezuelan Economy

July 26, 2007 Andrew Jackson 2 comments

New CEPR Paper Looks At Venezuela’s Economy During the ChÃ¡vez Years For Immediate Release: July 26, 2007 Contact: Dan Beeton, 202-293-5380 x104 Washington, DC: A new paper from the Center for Economic and Policy Research looks at the Venezuelan economy during the last eight years and finds that it does not fit the mold of an “oil boom headed for […]

Foreign ownership in the resource sector

July 19, 2007 Marc Lee 4 comments

A centrepiece of Canada’s industrial policy is attracting foreign investment. This seems to me a lack of imagination on the part of our elites; rather than develop genuine industrial stategies, so much the better to just let foreign capital come and create the jobs for us. And in the resource sector, the flipside of investment is that we lose control […]

Mel Watkins on Foreign Take-overs

June 28, 2007 Andrew Jackson One comment

http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/opinion/story.html?id=6c433a24-f12a-4584-9706-9f123ded8234 A good piece from today’s Ottawa Citizen. I’ve been similarly struck by the concern re foreign state involvementÂ in our resource sector, combined with evident lack of concernÂ about loss of domestic control of resourceÂ development. Whether we would get that fromÂ greater Canadian capitalist ownership of resource companiesÂ as opposed toÂ more public owneship and regulation is a […]

Alberta Opposes Rate Hike

June 21, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

Relatively high inflation in Alberta seems to be the only justification for raising Canadian interest rates. In this context, it is tremendously significant that the Government of Alberta itself opposes increasing rates. Of course, higher interest rates imply a higher Canadian dollar. Alberta sells oil and gas, the prices of which are denominated in US dollars. As the Canadian dollar […]

CIBC and Oil Royalties

June 21, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

More fascinating stuff from that CIBC report follows: While many of the big names in the mining and metal processing industry have been spoken for, there are even larger capital inflows potentially still ahead in the energy sector. Thanks to the oil sands, and a still laissez-faire attitude towards ownership of those resources, Canada represents anywhere from 50-60% of the […]

Caveat emptor: natural gas deregulation

June 16, 2007 Marc Lee 4 comments

Around lunchtime I got a knock on the door, and a good-looking young woman was there to make a sales call for Univeral Gas. She was seeking to convert my natural gas supply under a newly deregulated market. I asked her if she would leave behind materials so that I could think about it. No dice. She wanted me to […]

The Keystone Pipeline

June 6, 2007 Andrew Jackson Leave a comment

The National Energy Board is holding hearings into the proposal to ship Alberta tar sands bitumen to the US for further refining – something of a reductio ad absurdum in terms of resource-led development. Fred Wilson from CEP is writingÂ a daily blog from the hearings where his union, the Parkland Institute and other Alberta progressives are intervenors. If you […]

Pumping Cash, Not Oil

June 6, 2007 Andrew Jackson Leave a comment

Business Week (May 28 issue) documents how US big oil is ploughing the windfall gains from high prices into share buy backs rather than new production. Exxon MobilÂ – the world’s most profitable company – pumped out $49 Billion in operating cash flow last year, just 40% went into new capital expenditures, down from 50% in 2000. The other 60% […]

Alcan and Interest Deductibility

June 4, 2007 Erin Weir 5 comments

The following op-ed, which is printed in todayâ€™s Vancouver Sun, picks up some key themes from this blog: Â Â Subsidizing the transfer of jobs abroad Vancouver Sun Monday, June 4, 2007 Page: A7 Section: Editorial Byline: Erin Weir Source: Special to the Sun At a time when Kitimat and many other Canadian communities are losing manufacturing jobs, why would […]

Tory Tantrum

May 11, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

By walking out on Gordon Laxerâ€™s testimony about the SPPâ€™s potential impact on Canadian energy security, the Conservatives have given him far more mediaÂ coverage than he otherwise might have received. Today, the following story appeared in The Montreal Gazette, The Ottawa Citizen and The Edmonton Journal: Tory chair storms out of SPP hearing Freezing in the dark ‘not relevant’ to […]

Hewers of Minerals, Drawers of Oil and Gas

May 9, 2007 Andrew Jackson 2 comments

Yesterday’s International Merchandise Trade Annual Review from StatsCan confirms the Mel Watkins thesis that Canada is rapidly reverting to its historical role as a commodity producer for the global economy. http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/070508/d070508a.htm From 2002, the Canadian dollar began to appreciate rapidly against the US dollar (and Asian currencies tied to the US dollar) in response to a commodity price boom, itself […]

The China Syndrome

May 5, 2007 Erin Weir One comment

The following,Â from today’s Toronto Star,Â includes some commentary from yours truly: The China syndrome: A new condition characterized by the apparent reluctance of a certain national government to embrace an emerging, global economic power May 05, 2007

Alcan

May 1, 2007 Erin Weir One comment

The Globe and Mail has run three major stories about Alcan in the past few days: Act I: “Alcan says tax makes it takeover bait” (April 27) Act II: “B.C. town may fight Alcan” (April 28) Act III: “$7-billion project deepens Alcan’s Gulf ties” (May 1) Alcan is a major Canadian-based multinational that produces aluminum. Bauxite, the basic raw material, […]

Staples and Beyond – Selected Writings by Mel Watkins

May 1, 2007 Andrew Jackson One comment

New from McGill- Queen’s Press, this collection of Mel’s writings – edited by Hugh Grant and David Wolfe with an introduction by Wally Clement- is Canadian political economy at its very best. http://mqup.mcgill.ca/book.php?bookid=2001 Not only is Mel the leading post Harold Innis exponent of Canadian political economy, he was a key architect of the important synthesis between this intellectual tradition […]

Resource Dependence and Trade with China

May 1, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

For more on the themes highlighted below by Jim, my note on trade balances and jobs is now available through the CCPA.

Green Strategy and the SPP

April 16, 2007 Erin Weir 3 comments

At the conference a couple of weeks ago where Elizabeth May mused about income trusts, she also committed to make opposition to the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP) the centrepiece of the Green Partyâ€™s forthcoming election platform. The SPP is an arrangement between Canada, the US, and Mexico that seeks to accelerate tar-sands development, among other objectives. It is very […]

Strategic Oil Reserve

April 3, 2007 Erin Weir One comment

Thomas Palley credibly suggests that the Bush White House has been driving up oil prices by expanding this reserve, but then lowering themÂ during American elections by depleting the reserve. I have also heard suggestionsÂ that the Clinton White House depleted the reserve at election time, but am not sure whether it expanded the reserve outside of elections. Manipulating the ReserveÂ by Thomas […]

Trade Balances and Jobs: Canada, the US and China

April 2, 2007 Erin Weir 2 comments

The following note, including tables, is available on the Canadian Labour Congress website: Free trade was promoted to Canadians on the famous promise of â€œjobs, jobs, and more jobsâ€ and is widely defended on the basis that Canada’s large trade surplus with the US contributes to Canadian employment. Meanwhile, American commentators are concerned that the US trade deficit displaces American […]

Harper Meets Labour Leaders

March 28, 2007 Erin Weir 5 comments

Ken Georgetti and leaders of major manufacturing unions just finished meeting with the Prime Minister about Canadaâ€™s ongoing manufacturing crisis. The Canadian Labour Congress briefing note quoted by The Globe and Mail online follows: The Manufacturing Crisis Overview Canadaâ€™s manufacturing sector is in crisis. High energy prices, a high dollar, and worsening trade deficits with Asia have caused many Canadian […]

Jack Mintz on Budget 2007

March 22, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

In yesterdayâ€™s Financial Post, Jack Mintz repeated the notions that the Budget featured “no broad tax relief” and big spending. He wrote, “Certainly, the idea of making the tax structure more efficient, fair and simple takes a back seat to the rash of special politically driven measures.” However, the tax measures that Mintz specifically endorses – the Child Tax Credit, […]

More on the Conference Board and TILMA

January 8, 2007 Erin Weir Leave a comment

Ellen GouldÂ has notedÂ that the Conference Board’sÂ reportÂ projects gains for industries that are explicitly exempted from TILMA: utilities, energy, mining, forestry, and fishing. The Conference Boardâ€™s analysis was based on a “draft negotiatorsâ€™ text” (see page 39). However, the actual agreement whollyÂ or partly exempts the industries listed above (see pages 19-20 and 22). These exempt industries could conceivably still benefit from lower […]

Hewers of Wood, Pumpers of Oil and Gas

January 3, 2007 Erin Weir One comment

The Dominion Institute has recruited twenty great Canadian thinkers to write about what the country might look like in 2020. The fourteen essaysÂ currently posted include Don Drummond’s neo-classical analysis of manufacturing and productivity and Jim Stanford’s excellent analysis of Canada’s reliance on natural resources. Jim’s main argument, that Canada’s unmanaged resource boom is damaging other industries and our natural environment, […]

Manufacturing Shipments Fall

December 14, 2006 Erin Weir Leave a comment

An article in Statistics Canadaâ€™s Daily notes that the value of Canadian factory shipments hit a two-year low in October. Because manufacturing includes petroleum products, this development largely resulted from the recent oil-price drop. The inclusion of resource-processing industries means that the value of “manufacturing” shipments partly reflects commodity prices. In my view, the more interesting statistic is that the […]

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