When most Western and Asian countries were in lockdown with the pandemic, the African continent remained largely without restrictions. This shows that Africa is not afraid of the future and has a lot of opportunities opening up. China’s strong influence here is one...
Economy
Carbon Border Taxes: A Counterproductive Idea Which Will Lead to Penalized Customers
Carbon taxes at the borders are becoming a popular idea among some countries and world regions. For example, the European Commission, the EU executive institution, is proposing environmental tariffs “on imports from countries with less stringent climate-protection...
Three Facts Minimum-Wage Loyalists Ignore
Minimum wages are on the rise again in Ontario. As of October 1, the province’s incessant central planners have not one but six higher price controls for labour. These hurt the most vulnerable Canadians and do the bidding of unions. However, vociferous proponents...
Raw-Milk Prohibition Reveals Policy Backwardness
Prohibitionists Dig In Heels for Supply Management, Ignore U.S. Success There is a legal way to consume raw milk in Canada: buy it in the United States and bring it home. Of the 13 states bordering Canada, 12 have legal raw milk. More than 40 have it legal in some...
Featured News
No Evidence of Climate Crisis
In his annual State of the Climate report published on April 14, 2022, Dr. Ole Humlum, Emeritus Professor at the University of Oslo, examined detailed patterns in temperature changes in the atmosphere and oceans together with trends in climate impacts. Many of these...
It Is Time to Move On
I wrote an opinion column immediately following the May 27, 2021 announcement of the “shocking discovery of 215 bodies found in a mass grave at the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School.” In that column, I correctly stressed the need to wait for real...
Dependence On Any One Foreign Nation is Unhealthy; In the Case of China, All Too Literally So
Of late, it has been remarked that most of the active ingredients for key pharmaceuticals in North America come from abroad - usually from China; in the case of generics, often from India. In turn, India often imports its key ingredients from China. So, diverting...
Canada is Learning from Europe on Coronavirus, but Could Still do More
Earlier this week, Canada passed an unprecedented relief package designed to minimise the impact of the coronavirus pandemic. Legislation worth $107 B CAD received Royal Assent on Wednesday, following a dramatic rise in unemployment benefits claims. While no economy...
Gold’s Rise Could Be Signalling Chaos
Gold is a strange commodity. While it has some industrial uses, it mostly ends up in jewelry or money-surrogates such as coins and ingots; the latter often in central bank vaults. Unlike other metals, it accumulates and circulates in the economy and society; it is not...
Stakeholder Capitalism’s Sleight of Hand
The Trojan horse of social engineers has crossed the gates. At the latest World Economic Forum in Switzerland, the Davos Manifesto 2020 replaced the original from 1973. The new one lays down a company’s duties towards “stakeholders” rather than shareholders. This...
What Canada Can Do to Oppose Chinese Tyranny
As Temperature Rises, Great White North Must Side with Trump A Vancouver court is the battleground for two different visions of Canada’s future. The United States wants the extradition of Meng Wanzhou, the top Huawei executive, while Beijing wants Canada to let her...
Canada is Losing Its Competitiveness
Canada is gradually losing its competitiveness. According to the Institute for Management Development (IMD)1, a graduate business school and research centre, we are down three spots from 2018 to 13th. Canada is now ranked below the USA and Switzerland, as well as...
Brexit Could Boost Canada’s Agricultural Industry by Billions
Britain has officially left the European Union and now faces the challenge of negotiating a new trading relationship with the bloc before the end of the transition period on 31st December 2020. As a net importer of most food products, the United Kingdom faces a choice...
Lies and Damned Government Statistics
“This is the best number I’ve ever seen in my life!” Jim Cramer told CNBC. The Bureau of Labour Statistics (BLS) had just reported a 3.5 percent unemployment figure in the United States. The November 2019 percentage was the lowest in fifty years. Others would say that...
Billionaires, Beethoven, and the Beatles Enrich Us All
According to many devotees of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, their ideological counterparts in left-wing circles in Canada, and even 62 percent of the audience at a recent TVO debate hosted at the University of Toronto, confiscatory taxes should be levied...