It’s clear we’re going to have to gear up our arguments on right-to-work laws, dues check-off, the Rand Formula, etc. In the last year three mainstream parties have introduced proposals for right-to-work style legal changes in Canada (Brad Wall’s Saskatchewan Party, the Wild Rose Alliance, and now yesterday Tim Hudak’s
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The Progressive Economics Forum: Trans Pacific Partnership: A Few Questions
The Harper government currently lists 18 different sets of free trade negotiations “in play.” (See my recent post on this.) Today the government announced (from the G-20 meetings in Mexico) the 19th: Canada has been invited to join the Trans Pacific Partnership talks. The TPP negotiations were initiated several years
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Our Own Erin Weir Would Make a Great Sask NDP Leader!
I’ve worked closely with Erin for years, being struck by his combination of talent & passion right from the time he entered the PEF’s student essay context (which he won for the first time exactly a decade ago, awarded at the CEA 2002 meetings in Calgary). Now he is throwing
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Galbraith Lecture by Mike McCracken
I always come back from the annual CEA/PEF meetings highly energized by the companionship of so many other fine committed PEF members, and our success in engaging with the broader profession. This past weekend’s meetings in Calgary were no exception. A highlight, of course, was the 3rd Biennial Galbraith Lecture
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Canada’s Own Third World
There’s a fascinating new report from the Centre for the Study of Living Standards that calculates Human Development Index (HDI) scores for all of Canada’s provinces and territories. Here’s the citation: The Human Development Index in Canada: Estimates for the Canadian Provinces and Territories, 2000-2011, by Elspeth Hazell, Kar-Fai Gee,
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Running on Fumes
StatsCan released the first-quarter GDP numbers this morning, and the deafening silence you hear is of champagne corks not popping. Quarterly growth was 0.5% (1.9% annualized): uninspiring but not disastrous. Erin Weir has aptly pointed out the leading role of government spending cuts in dragging down growth. Erin noted that
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Promoting Trade and Signing Free Trade Deals are NOT the Same Thing
DFAIT’s web site currently lists 18 different trade deals currently “in play” (and that doesn’t count the Trans-Pacific Partnership, where Ottawa is so far just flirting). But Harper’s push to sign as many FTAs as possible while he has a majority will not improve Canada’s actual trade, which is deteriorating
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Energy McCarthyism
The high-and-mighty virtiol which greeted Tom Mulcair’s comments last week about the downside of oil-powered currency appreciation is lamentable (repeating the over-the-top reaction to Dalton McGuinty’s similar comments a few weeks ago). Mulcair made two modest and empirically substantiated statements: the loonie is sky-high as a result of the oil
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Temporary Foreign Workers and the Labour Market
Further to recent commentary regarding the Harper government’s dramatic expansion of the Temporary Foreign Worker (TWF) program, consider this shocking factoid: Even before the expansion of the program envisioned in the current omnibus “budget” bill, temporary foreign workers (who do not have the same rights as other Canadian workers, and
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Canada’s Oil: For Sale to the Highest Bidder
Want to know why Canada’s currency is sky-high despite our sluggish recovery, our large and persistent current account deficit, and our lousy export performance? Check out this fascinating story in Friday’s National Post, by Yadullah Hussain, on why Canada’s oil reserves are such a uniquely hot commodity in the eyes
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: If You Could Change One Thing
I had a great change of pace last week, when I stayed out at the CAW Family Education Centre at Port Elgin to teach a 5-day course on “Economics for Trade Unionists” through the CAW’s Paid Educational Leave program. While I have guest lectured many times at Port Elgin, I
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: The Oil Price-Loonie Transmission Mechanism
The most interesting comments from Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney last week, in releasing the Bank’s semi-annual Monetary Policy Report, dealt with the relationship between the price of oil and the Canadian currency. The Globe and Mail reported Carney as publicly questioning why currency traders automatically presume such a
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: How Much Will YOU Lose from OAS Deferral??
Announcing a bad policy 10 years in advance doesn’t make it a good policy. So the fact that the Harper government is giving people at least 10 years to prepare for 2 years of life without an important source of income, hardly makes it OK — as so many media
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Upstream Supply Chain as Sector Development Strategy
My column in Wednesday’s Globe and Mail suggested that Canada implement a “Buy Canadian” strategy associated with major natural resource developments, with the goal of enhancing Canadian content in the overall value chain. Can we utilize our strong foothold in resource extraction, and try to leverage greater investment and value-added upstream
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: More on Declining Labour Force Participation
As a supplement to the excellent (and more timely!) posts from Andrew and Erin this morning, let me add a few points on the most striking feature of today’s Labour Force Survey: namely, the accelerating decline in labour force participation. The part rate (seasonally adjusted) fell to 66.5% of the
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Who Wants “Closer” Ties With China?
The Prime Minister’s trip to China last week sparked a flurry of media coverage regarding prospects for “closer” economic ties between Canada and China. Some even speculated that another free trade agreement is in the works (as soon as the Harper government inks its planned deals, of course, with the
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Caterpillar and the Investment Canada Act
There’s been some good public debate about the need for changes to the Investment Canada process in light of Caterpillar’s incredible actions in London. They showed up uninvited in 2010, took over a long-standing productive profitable plant, demanded money (from workers and government alike), then left — leaving behind a
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: Canadian Triumphalism Increasingly Bizarre
Prime Minister Harper went to Davos yesterday to sing Canada’s praises. No sooner had he finished reciting a long list of our national achievements, however, then he launched into a list of the sober, realistic, inevitable things that must be done in Canada to ensure “sustainability” in the long term.
Continue readingThe Progressive Economics Forum: When Management Locks the Doors
Quick: what do U.S. Steel, Rio Tinto, and Caterpillar all have in common? They’re all enormous, flexible global companies, given carte blanche by the Canadian government to purchase important long-standing profitable assets here with few if any conditions, who promptly locked out their Canadian workers in an effort to extract
Continue readingCanadian Dimension Feed: The Global Economic Crisis—Part 1
The 2007-08 financial crisis marked a major turning point in the world economy. From your perspective, why was the recovery so weak and why did economic stagnation continue to characterize the core capitalist countries? Back in July 2009, just ten months after the Lehman Brothers collapse, Bank of Canada Governor
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