The word capitalism has no stable definition and should probably be permanently retired. That won’t happen, however, because too many people are invested in its use and abuse. I’m long over trying to push my definition over someone else’s understanding, generally...
Fall harvest is in the storehouse. Now, let’s put away all proposals to cap fertilizer inputs to save the earth. Canadian farmers are ensuring food security, not fueling the droughts, fires, or storms that critics unfairly attribute to them. The Saskatoon-based Global...
Solving Canada’s housing crisis shouldn’t require more than a single lesson in economics. When prices are high, a free market always responds and supplies more. Yet amidst Canada’s severe problems of housing affordability, this foolproof mechanism is continually...
Manitoba’s provincial government is finding itself in a financial downturn even as it is set to receive an historic 24 per cent bump in its equalization payments. Something is clearly amiss in the land of polar bears, bison, and Slurpees. The problem is the government...
The indictment of former U.S. president Donald Trump for crimes invented by his political opponents is the most egregious example yet seen of the weaponizing of the law. The United States is now full of examples. However, in Canada, we also see the law being...
OTTAWA, REGINA - Last week, two things happened that could have profound impacts on natural resources development in Saskatchewan. One is a hint the federal government might want to take control of natural resources away from the provinces, and the other is the...
Bill C-282 currently sits in the Canadian Senate and stands on the precipice of becoming law in a matter of weeks. Essentially, this bill seeks to bestow immunity upon supply management from any potential future trade negotiations without offering increased market...
A friend of mine, always with a keen eye on interesting things, passed on an interesting quote from the CERA Week energy conference the other week. The head of the International Energy Forum mentioned a surprising statistic, as quoted by Javier Blas on Twitter:...
Big Topics & Big Ideas
An analysis of Alberta’s labour market highlights how political leadership shaped (and hurt) its economic environment
Canada’s productivity performance has been dismal, having not increased over the last nearly ten years. Economists calculate productivity as the value of output divided by hours worked to generate that output. However, the numerator, being the value of the goods and...
It is taking a while, but a prolonged period of elevated interest rates, at both the short end set by the Bank of Canada and the Federal Reserve Board of the United States, and at the long end in the bond market set by domestic and foreign investors, is coming to be...
Alberta’s close brush with possible rolling blackouts stiffens Moe’s resolve to keep the lights on. Moe reiterates: “We will not attempt the impossible when it comes to power production” The past weekend proved to be a close-run thing for the Alberta electrical...
Brownstone
Despite credit cards, e-transfers and online banking having already made money go pretty much digital, the Bank of Canada is busily working on a much bigger transformation. Canada is one of about 100 countries that – in uncanny synchronicity – several years ago joined...