It’s widely accepted by many economists that free trade promotes economic growth, fights poverty, reduces inequality and is beneficial to all countries that participate, on both sides of the trade. Yet, an important piece of the international free trade puzzle, the...
Trade
Alberta’s Growing Foreign Policy Presence
When thinking of foreign policy, one thinks of the processes and actors involved with federal governments making decisions about how to best pursue national interests and interact in an increasingly complex world. But many aspects of foreign policy formulation have...
Prairies Will Benefit From Canada-EU Free Trade Agreement
The Canada-Europe Free Trade Agreement is a major milestone for the country. The potential impact will be hugely positive, especially for prairie agriculture. Among the greatest beneficiaries would be cattle ranchers in several provinces. Increased duty-free access to...
It’s Time For Government to Start Thinking Bigger
When governments hand out cash for infrastructure projects, it’s easy to think small. Politicians love summer festivals, hockey rinks, small craft harbours and city parks. The money gets out the door quickly and everyone can see the results. Grants can be geographically matched to political objectives. And projects typically face little opposition.
Featured News
How to Turn Free Citizens Into Compliant Serfs
Free citizens have minds of their own and want to pursue their lives as they see fit. This is inconvenient for the elites, who wish to be in charge of everyone’s lives so that they can show their superiority and gain benefit for themselves and their friends. So the...
Demographia International Housing Affordability – 2023 Edition Released
Demographia International Housing Affordability rates middle-income housing affordability in 94 major housing markets in eight nations: Australia, Canada, China, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States. This edition covers the third...
Next Time Will Be Different
The U.S. has grown into a hostile place where special interest groups and protectionism rule. Financial Post Once the housing market recovers in the US, they may want to think twice about challenging Canadian lumber industry practices and attempting to place duties...
Captive Customer, Captive Supplier – Captive Government?
The discussion and debate related to usage-based billing of broadband communications essentially comes down to one problem. Residential customers in Canada for the most part are captive customer of one, two or three alternative service providers due to the nature of their connection from the residence to the network.
What most people forget is those connections, whether they be twisted pair copper cables or coaxial CATV cables, were deployed under a regulated monopoly regime mandated and enforced by public policy. When deregulation and competition was introduced into those sectors, the process did not include un-bundling that last mile link so that open and vigorous competition could emerge for the demand of residential customers.
KFC > Chairman Mao
Apparently, KFC is absolutely booming in China. They love the stuff over there. The most amazing line from this story : In China, KFC has achieved such dominance over McDonald’s and local rivals that Colonel Harland Sanders’s image is a far more common sight in many...
No Surprise- Government “Nagging” Hasn’t Boosted Productivity
Now, I for one am not baffled that government “nagging” hasn’t resulted in private sector productivity gains!
Public Policy and History
Quebec MP Maxime Bernier argues that Quebec and Alberta are at risk of losing the Supreme Court reference case against the federal plan to create a single securities regulator. They may lose, he says, unless the provinces' account includes the reality that the...
Manitoba’s Immigration Record Hailed: Nominee plan envy of nation
“Manitoba’s provincial nominee immigration program has been a rousing success thus far but still has room for improvement, a new report concludes.”
Media Release – Abusing Canada’s Generosity and Ignoring Genuine Refugees:: An Analysis of Current and Still-needed Reforms to Canada’s Refugee and Immigration System
The asylum system in Canada is broken. It is unable to distinguish readily between migrants and genuine refugees. Canada spends more on refugee claimants than the budget of UN agency responsible for caring for 43.3 million refugees and others in camps around the world. A powerful lobby of special interests has blocked most reforms to fix it, and Canada now lags behind most asylum-granting countries in their legislation.
Global Trade: Should Saskatchewan be an Australia or a Tasmania?: The breadth of human collaboration has defined prosperity for eons.
Open trade drives prosperity by allowing specialised labour and the exchange of new ideas, a forward looking Premier should not be saying things like “he doesn’t understand how we could benefit” from foreign investment such as BHP Billiton’s investment in PotashCorp. Through the long lens of human history the answer is obvious.
On Infrastructure, Time to Dump the Ideology
“President Obama has proposed a new $50 billion infrastructure program that would expand and repair highways and transit systems, while refurbishing airport runways and implementing long-overdue air-traffic-control reforms to improve the reliability of air travel.”