On May 28th, 61 Canadian economists (myself included) signed the following letter urging the federal government to instruct the Bank of Canada to consider full employment and not only inflation when conducting interest rate decisions. It was through the great organization of Mario Seccareccia that this was made possible and has
Continue readingAuthor: David Macdonald
The Progressive Economics Forum: New child benefit impact on child poverty overblown
In September, I expressed my concerns that the new Canada Child Benefit (CCB) may not be responsible for a 40% reduction in child poverty as claimed by the Minister of Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC). Using Statcan’s tax modelling software SPSD/M, I calculated that you’d get a 14% drop
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Small Business Taxes, Big Loopholes
by: Kaylie Tiessen & David Macdonald Small business taxes made the news last week when, during a CBC interview, federal Liberal leader Justin Trudeau suggested many business owners are using the small business tax rate as a de facto in-country tax shelter. Responding to the interview, Conservative leader Stephen Harper
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: Austerity through infrastructure Cuts: Budget 2013
One the most amazing things about this budget is that one of its three focuses will actually be the opposite of what it’s touting. You’ll likely hear that $14 billion will be spent on infrastructure over the next 10 years (actually you may hear much bigger numbers but they just
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Household debt going from bad to worse
Canadians are now more indebted than either Americans or the Brits at the peak of their housing bubble. Statistics Canada today revised the national accounts. The result on the household debt front was that instead of Canadian households having a debt to disposable income ratio of 154, it has now
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Freedom from government services day
Well well, another misinformed tax freedom day has come and gone on June 12th. To mark the occasion this year I wanted to skip over the very serious methodological flaws that others have pointed out, and take a look at several other items that Canadians are “free of” at various points. By
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: US family net worth crushed by financial crisis
The US Federal Reserve today released its triennial examination of incomes and net worth of American households in the Survey of Consumer Finances. It shows the crushing effects on net worth of a housing and financial bust unparalleled since the great depression. The shocking results of this study overviewed in
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Complete details of 2008-09 Bank Support
Readers of this blog will have hopefully read my report “The big banks big secret” which examines the $114 billion that Canada’s banks received during the 2008-09 financial crisis. Its major finding was that at some point three of Canada’s five big banks had received support worth more than their market capitalization,
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Federal jobs cuts: Clarity is always one year away
I’ve commented on federal job cuts many times before (here, here, here & here) and in the interests of beating this particular horse good and dead (no animals were harmed in the writing of these reports), the CCPA today is releasing my latest update on the matter: Clearing away the
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: The Big Banks’ Big Secret
The CCPA today released my report: “The Big Banks Big Secret” which provides the first public estimates of the emergency funds taken by Canadian banks. The report bases its estimates on publicly available data from CMHC, the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions, US Federal Reserve, the Bank of
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: PBO Strikes Again
I wanted to tip my hat to the hard working folks at the PBO for a particularly revealing Economic and Fiscal Outlook that was published today. While the PBO has more than once eaten my lunch on various issue they’ve done a superb job of looking at Canada’s economic and
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Federal Job Cuts…the Real Numbers
Thankfully the federal budget has started to fill in some of the details of its latest round of cuts. In particular, it now estimates 19,200 positions lost due to its latest round of cuts (Federal Budget 2012, pg 221). Although it is nice to have an initial estimate, this hardly
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Federal cuts could push unemployment to 8%
Now that the government is planning for an $8 billion cut, the potential job losses could drive job losses to between 99,000 and 108,000 full time positions across Canada. At this much higher level, the federal government could be single-handedly responsible for pushing national unemployment from its current 7.5% to
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