Canada-Europe Deal Not About Trade
I have the following letter to the editor in today’s Prince Albert Daily Herald: Canada-Europe Deal Not About Trade In their letter of Dec. 3, Darryl Hickie and other Sask.…
Erin Weir
Weir vs. Wall on Potash Profits, Dividends and Royalties
Earlier this week, PotashCorp laid off 440 workers in Saskatchewan. Here are the closing paragraphs from today’s front-page story reporting a letter from Premier Brad Wall asking the company to…
A Part-Time, Do-It-Yourself Job Market
Statistics Canada reported that employment grew by 22,000 in November. But 20,000 of those new jobs were part-time. The proportion of all Canadian jobs that are part-time rose to an…
PEF Session at the House of Commons Finance Committee
The Progressive Economics Forum (PEF) normally hosts sessions at the Canadian Economics Association’s annual conference. But the House of Commons finance committee threw most of the union economists testifying in…
A Nuclear Error: Uranium Royalty Cuts
On Thursday’s Lang & O’Leary Exchange (at 24:45 in this CBC video), I noted that while the Government of Canada just signed a deal with Kazakhstan allowing Cameco to invest…
Black Friday GDP: Consumption Slows, But Inventories Jump
Ironically, Statistics Canada’s third-quarter GDP report on Black Friday showed the growth rate of consumption being cut in half. Final consumption expenditure grew by 0.4% in the third quarter compared…
Job Market Stuck in a Rut
The words “little change” appear eight times in today’s Statistics Canada press release on the Labour Force Survey. The figures for October are indeed remarkably similar to September. This lack…
The Perils of Passivity
Almost a year ago, Paul Krugman wrote a blog post entitled “Inaction is the Greatest Risk.” He was addressing American monetary policy, but the same theme applies to Saskatchewan politics.…
Do C. D. Howe’s Numbers Support its Policies?
The basic storyline of today’s C. D. Howe Institute “E-Brief”, “Canada Lagging Peers in 2013 Business Investment Growth,” is that corporate tax cuts helped boost investment per worker in Canada…
Fossil-Fueled GDP Growth
Yesterday, Statistics Canada reported that the Canadian economy had a month of fossil-fueled growth in August. Overall GDP was up by 0.3%, only half as much as in July but…
Wordsmithing 80,000 Jobs
Last week’s federal throne speech stated, “The Government will soon complete negotiations on a comprehensive economic and trade agreement with the European Union . This agreement has the potential to…
Raising Ontario’s Minimum Wage
On Friday, the United Steelworkers made the following submission to Ontario’s Minimum Wage Advisory Panel. The United Steelworkers union endorses the Ontario Federation of Labour’s (OFL) call for a minimum…
Canada’s Trade Deficit with the EU Doubles
On last night’s Lang & O’Leary Exchange, I debunked the claim that the trade deal between Canada and the European Union (EU) will create 80,000 Canadian jobs. The conservative panelists…
Grounding the Toronto Island Airport’s $1.9-Billion Claim
As part of its push to expand to accommodate jet flights, the Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport has been advertising that it contributes $1.9 billion to Toronto’s economy. This claim…
When a Lower Unemployment Rate is Bad News
Today, Statistics Canada reported an unemployment rate of 6.9% for September. One might have expected Canada’s unemployment rate falling below 7% for the first time since 2008 to be cause…
This is Not the Saskatchewan NDP’s Official Position
I have the following opinion piece in the latest (September 2013) edition of The Commonwealth, accompanied by this disclaimer: “The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent the…
Royalties should be the Keystone of Saskatchewan’s Petroleum Policy
The Saskatchewan Party has appropriated the province’s name, flag and football team. More recently, it asserted a new symbol of Saskatchewan patriotism: the proposed Keystone XL pipeline. Earlier this year,…
Sask. Party Spin Outstrips Population Growth
Sask. Party spin appears to be growing even faster than the province’s population. Today’s Saskatchewan government news release quotes Premier Wall as saying, “We have the strongest job growth and…
Regina’s P3 Columnists
As the referendum on whether to privatize Regina’s wastewater plant nears, the Regina Leader-Post is printing a column a day advocating the P3: John Gormley on Friday, Bruce Johnstone on…
Inflation Slump Validates Low Interest Rates
Today, Statistics Canada reported inflation of 1.1% for August, even lower than June and July. But even at this anemic level, inflation is eating up three-quarters of wage gains. The…