Search results for “site/pharmacare”

  • Stagnant economy may mean more cuts to come

    The federal government released its annual fall update on the country’s finances today. Despite the upbeat messaging around the “Update of Economic and Fiscal Projections” there are concerning underlying trends with the country and its finances. For regular Canadians, there is no explosive growth expected in the job market to make up…

  • The Limits of Demography

    Here is a piece I wrote for today’s Globe Economy Lab re the Department of Finance report on the costs of an aging society. The key point is that the mainstream doom and gloom projections of the costs of falling labour force growth  ignore the positive impacts which can be expected as…

  • Tax Increment Financing and Social Enterprise

    Promoting Equitable Community Revitalization in Winnipeg Currently, Manitoba is one of only two provinces in Canada that utilizes Tax Increment Financing (TIF) as a means for financing community revitalization projects in municipalities, although it has a long history of use in the United States. In a TIF financing scheme, the…

  • CETA’s Harmful Constraints on Ontario

    Trade deal with Europe threatens many costly ill-effects The governments of Canada and the European Union (EU) are in the final stages of negotiating a sweeping agreement that would impose unprecedented constraints on federal, provincial, territorial, and municipal governments’ capacity to put public interests ahead of corporate interests. The agreement…

  • Capitalism is the Crisis (Part II)

    Corruption, corporate power, inequality must all be curbed India’s poor rural majority has benefited little from the country’s economic boom, and in fact has seen its position worsen. The same pro-free-market economic reforms that have made India attractive to Western capital and benefited the urban-based middle and upper classes have…

  • Climate Justice Project

    Subsidizing dirty industries with expensive clean electricity is a recipe for major rate hikes

    Premier Clark’s recent decision to cap the BC Hydro rate increases next year may have ratepayers breathing a sigh of relief. But it’s a short term fix that will only delay addressing the major financial challenges now facing our Crown utility. Once the 2013 election is over, whoever forms BC’s…

  • Climate Justice Project

    Few jobs, massive emissions from oil and gas: look to green investments for stronger economy, says report

    CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE FULL REPORT OTTAWA—Accelerated oil and gas extraction will boost profits but won’t drive major employment gains, says a report released today by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA). Instead, embracing a “green industrial revolution” will allow Canada to meet its climate change commitments while…

  • Managing Oil Wealth

    The Alberta/Canada Model vs. the Norwegian model The post-2000 petroleum-led resource boom is substantially reshaping the Canadian economy. It has driven up the dollar exchange rate from 62 cents to parity with the U.S. dollar, squeezing out other export sectors: traded services, tourism, forestry, and most notably manufacturing, where it…

  • A Tale of Two Austerity Hardliners

    Conservative soul mates, Stephen Harper and British Prime Minister David Cameron, were in Davos, Switzerland a month ago lecturing Eurozone leaders on how to get their collective act together. As they have done since the G-20 meeting in Toronto, both were preaching fiscal austerity as the solution to Europe’s, and…

  • Slow and easy will win energy race

    It is hard not to detect a note of desperation in the provincial government’s recently unveiled natural gas strategy. In announcing it, BC Energy Minister Rich Coleman notes that we are “in a foot race” with Australia, Qatar and the United States to push as much of our natural gas…

  • Labour Matters

    Federal spending cuts will cost more than 60,000 jobs: study

    CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE FULL REPORT OTTAWA—Federal cutbacks announced in the 2010 and 2011 budgets will result in more than 60,000 job losses, says a study released today by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA). Any additional cuts in the upcoming federal budget would result in even more…

  • Contrived deficit from tax cuts excuses Harper program cuts

    The economy is cleverly being used to trump the environment in both Canada and the United States, largely by exploiting people’s ignorance of economic matters. As part of deficit reduction, the Harper government has announced cuts of 776 jobs at Environment Canada; the Federal Fisheries’ budget has been cut by…