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.…
gdp
GDP: Austerity Bites
Canada’s economy grew by half a percent in the first quarter of 2012, staying on pace for unimpressive annual growth of two percent. The good news is that business investment…
Mining in the NWT: Who Gets What?
In a recent blog post at Northern Public Affairs, Stephanie Irlbacher-Fox looks at the issue of ‘who gets what?’ when a mine is developed in the Northwest Territories (NWT). Here…
Canadian Mining and Manufacturing Stumble
Statistics Canada reported today that the economy shrank in February, driven by declines in resource extraction and manufacturing. Oil and gas extraction as well as hard-rock mining decreased due to…
McGuinty Budget Would Cut Over 100,000 Jobs
Last week, the Ontario Public Service Employees Union released an interesting report by the Centre for Spatial Economics on the economic impact of proposed provincial budget cuts. It provides a…
Lockouts Almost Derail GDP Growth
Statistics Canada reported today that economic growth dropped to a bare 0.1% in January. The New Year began with Rio Tinto locking out former Alcan employees at Alma, Quebec, and…
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.…
GDP Turns Negative
Statistics Canada reported today that the economy shrank in November for the first time in six months. This decline was driven by reduced energy production, which partly reflected maintenance shutdowns…
Canada Goose Egg
This morning, Statistics Canada reported zero economic growth in October. While growth had been driven by strong mining and fossil-fuel exports during the third quarter, Canadians got a lump of…
Jobs Waning, Debt Mounting, Wages Slipping: A Bleak Outlook
Here are some followup comments that supplement my last post. The emerging picture of the Canadian economy is bleak. Inscribed as every government in the Western world is in neoclassical…
Canada’s Petro-Recovery
Statsitics Canada released the third quarter GDP numbers today, and on the surface they seem pretty upbeat, considering all the doom and gloom lately. Headline real GDP grew at an…
No Technical Recession, Not That It Matters
Today’s GDP numbers (a sprightly gain of 0.3% at basic prices in July) ensure that there will not be a so-called “technical recession” in Canada — at least, not yet.…
Time to end growth?
According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Canada's economic prospects are looking good. In its latest global forecast of economic activity, this year we will have the highest GDP growth…
GDP Report: Awfully Weak Tea Leaves
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty was unusually blunt on CTV’s Question Period yesterday, saying he was worried about the possibility of another recession. (Finance Ministers are usually very cautious about using…
The Better Life Index is a better measure
The search for a better measure of standard of living just got a big boost with the launch of Your Better Life Index by the OECD. The need for an…