Is new coal export infrastrucutre in the best interest of BC and Canada
Today’s CBC Edition Business Panel focused on the proposal by Fraser Surrey Docks to build a new coal terminal on the Fraser river to export US thermal coal (if you…
big business
GDP: Resource Exports Cover for Domestic Weakness
Statistics Canada reported today that GDP grew by 0.6% in the first quarter. The volume of energy and mining exports expanded by more than 5%, offsetting lower exports of many…
Ontario Budget: All Quiet on the Revenue Front
As others have noted, last week’s Ontario budget combined modest social investments in areas requested by the NDP with austerity for overall expenditures. Ontario program spending, already the lowest per…
More Dead Money
The sector and financial-flow accounts released with today’s GDP figures indicate an expansion of the pool of dead money flagged by this blog and by Mark Carney. The National Balance…
Jimbo Flaherty and the Con Country Snatchers
Oh goody. Another episode of The Invasion of the Con Country Snatchers. And tonight it's one of the scariest ones ever !!!! For as Jim Flaherty prepares to meet with…
Agrium Halves Potash Royalties
Agrium reports that it paid half as much to the people of Saskatchewan in the second quarter as it had in the same quarter of last year. The company’s quarterly…
Taking Over Nexen
The China National Offshore Oil Corporation’s (CNOOC) bid to acquire Nexen is a large and complex proposal. Canadians should call for a more thorough and transparent review than other foreign…
Baskin-Robbins and the Walmartization of Ice Cream
It’s been an unusually hot summer, and soaring temperatures have boosted sales of that quintessential summer food, ice cream. But Baskin-Robbins has decided to shut its production facility in Peterborough,…
Mosaic Profit Argues for Higher Royalties
Today’s Mosaic quarterly report provides further evidence that the Government of Saskatchewan should improve its royalty and tax structure to collect a better return on the province’s non-renewable resources like…
The Economics of Deception
The following is a guest post by Robyn Allan, the former president of the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia who appeared with me on TVO’s recent panel about Dutch disease.…
Santa Claus Delivers a Positive Quarter Despite Corporate Scrooges
The Month: Christmas Gift Canada’s economy was buoyed by Christmas cheer as a December bounce more than offset slight declines in October and November to turn the fourth quarter positive.…
In the Wake of the Crisis: Bully Capitalism
A shorter version of this article appears today at Economy Lab, the Globe and Mail’s on-line business feature. Capitalism has entered an ugly new era, one that may work well…
Wall of Silence on Canpotex
Saskatchewan’s newspapers reported today that BHP Billiton intends to sell the province’s potash outside of Canpotex, the marketing board that helps to maximize the price for which Saskatchewan potash is…
Unrest in Bill’s Republic of Doyle
PotashCorp CEO Bill Doyle waded into Saskatchewan’s election campaign on Friday with an op-ed in the province’s two largest newspapers. It was accompanied by a paid advertisement from PotashCorp in…
Inequality is bad for business
In August Canadian Business magazine published my article on why inequality is bad for business. It is produced in full below. Last week the International Monetary Fund, not well-known for…
Copyright on Campus
A recent article by George Monbiot in The Guardian takes a critical look at academic publishers, apparently with a focus on the United Kingdom. The article makes the following points:…
When Business and Progressives Agree
It was news, not so much because of what was said, as who said it: The Conference Board of Canada released a report on rising inequality in Canada today, noting…
A July 1 Portrait of Corporate Canada
My copy of the Globe and Mail the other day included the July edition of the Report on Business magazine, featuring its annual ranking of the top 1000 publicly-traded corporations…
The Underground Economy and Business Tax Evasion
Statscan have produced interesting and important new estimates of the upper bound size of the “underground” or “non observed” economy, putting it at a seemingly modest 2.2% of GDP in…