Assorted content to end your week. – Paul Taylor comments on the rifts in our social fabric which are being highlighted by COVID-19. And Graham Riches argues that the food banks which are being pushed to the limit by the pandemic would never have been necessary if our economy wasn’t
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Accidental Deliberations: Friday Morning Links
Assorted content to end your week. – Mark Rowlinson points out how the obvious frailty of our current supply chains highlights the need to develop Canadian manufacturing. And Amanda Follett Hosgood notes the importance of localized food production in particular. – Bill McKibben calls out the oil industry’s attempts to
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Ten things to know about the 2018 Saskatchewan budget
I’ve written a ‘top 10’ blog post about the recently-tabled Saskatchewan budget. Points raised in the blog post include the following: -This year’s budget was quite status quo. -Last year’s budget, by contrast, included a series of cuts to social spending. Last year’s budget also announced cuts to both personal
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Wednesday Morning Links
Miscellaneous material for your mid-week reading.- Brent Patterson points out the continued dangers of extrajudicial challenges to laws under the CETA. And John Jacobs examines (PDF) the likelihood that reduced tariffs under the Trans-Pacific Partnersh…
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Empty Conservative Rhetoric on Pipelines
Letter to the editor in today’s Regina Leader–Post (page A10): A Tory Stunt The Oct. 9 photo accompanying the story “Tory candidates laud pipeline industry” showed pipe produced at Evraz stored outside the fence of another company, where this Conservative campaign stunt was held. The story did not mention that
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: New column day
Here, taking a look at the voter pools the NDP will be looking to win over in order to come out ahead in if this fall’s federal election turns into a two-party race. And I’ll note that while Alberta may serve as the most recent precedent, similar patterns can be
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: ROCHON: Harper in closet over the economy as Canada heads toward another recession
This guest blog post has been written by Louis-Philippe Rochon. You can follow him on Twitter @Lprochon – Harper’s recent incarnation as an anti-terrorist crusader has caught many Canadians by surprise. Harper is spending considerable political energy beating the drums of war against terrorists, and introducing a far-reaching, and much
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Rochon Asks: “Is the Canadian economy unraveling?”
In a recent CBC blog post, Louis-Philippe Rochon assesses the current state of the Canadian economy. The link to the blog post is here. Follow him on Twitter @Lprochon.
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Banks and Balanced Budgets
The Bank of Canada surprised most analysts this week when it decided to cut rates by 25 basis points. The move comes after the price of oil has tumbled below $50 / barrel, oil producers announced huge cuts to business investment for 2015, Target announced a mass layoff of 17,600
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Emmanuel Saez and Gabriel Zucman look into the spread of wealth inequality in the U.S., and find that it may be worse than we already knew. And Paul Krugman discusses how toxic anti-government ideology is preventing the U.S. from both getting its
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: The Blackberry mess and what Canada needs
Another year, another dead Canadian tech giant. Blackberry was sold yesterday for scrap to the Toronto private equity firm Fairfax. The purchase price of $4.7 billion is essentially valued at its cash of $2.6 billion and the value of its patents. Blackberry’s active businesses are being valued at essentially nothing.
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Industrial Policy, Manufacturing Employment, and the Loonie
The Institute for Research on Public Policy has published a very interesting overview study on the resuscitation of “industrial policy” in economic policy circles. It points out that industrial policy levers are used widely by countries around the world–despite hypothetical efforts (through trade deals and other institutions) to limit their application.
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Manufacturing Slump Threatens Q2 Growth
Statistics Canada reported today, “Manufacturing sales fell 2.4% in April to $48.2 billion — the fourth decline in five months and the largest monthly percentage drop since August 2009.” That gets the second quarter off to a bad start. Strong economic growth in the first quarter of this year (January,
Continue readingThe Canadian Progressive: Federal Budget 2013: CAW demands full national manufacturing strategy for Canada
By: Canadian Auto Workers Union | Press Release: Billions in new federal supports for Canadian industry is a partial, but important, step forward in assisting the country’s embattled manufacturing sector, said CAW President Ken Lewenza, in response to Finance Minister Jim Flaherty’s budget released today. In his budget, Minister Flaherty outlined the federal
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Dutch Disease is Dead … Long Live Dutch Disease!!!
In the hyper-polarized context of Canadian energy policy debates, even suggesting that there might be a downside to the untrammeled energy boom centred in northern Alberta is enough to get you labelled a traitor or an economic illiterate — or both. Conservative political leaders in both Ottawa and Edmonton, backed
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: The IMF and the Canadian Manufacturing Crisis
A background study for the latest IMF report on Canada (see pages 42 to 51) adds further weight to the argument that the rise in the exchange rate of the Canadian dollar, driven in large part by high commodity prices, has underpinned a sharp decline in the US market share
Continue readingAccidental Deliberations: Tuesday Morning Links
This and that for your Tuesday reading. – Jacob Chamberlain discusses the all-too-familiar pattern of corporate insiders using their wealth and influence to try to attack basic social supports for less-privileged citizens: CEOs from America’s largest corporations—including its biggest banks, retailers, and insurance companies who helped drive the country into
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Macdonald-Laurier Institute on Dutch Disease
Here is my Economy Lab piece on the study by Philip Cross released yesterday. On close examination, his “expanding sectors” turn out to be low value-added resource processing and his argument that Canadian manufacturing is not in decline does not hold water. The decline in output has been far greater
Continue readingOntario Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak and party admits Dutch Disease contributes to decline in Ontario jobs.
I was reading through the Ontario Progressive Conservatives White Paper on unions, and I came across a most interesting part. Page 6, emphasis mine, When the Canadian dollar had a low value relative to the American dollar, many Canadian business were slow to increase productivity. For a time they could
Continue readingOntario Progressive Conservative leader Tim Hudak and party admits Dutch Disease contributes to decline in Ontario jobs.
I was reading through the Ontario Progressive Conservatives White Paper on unions, and I came across a most interesting part. Page 6, emphasis mine,When the Canadian dollar had a low value relative to the American dollar, many Canadian business were sl…
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