Who was Barbara Mitchell?

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This study aims to explain the link between the regulation of auto insurance markets and the effect of this regulation on consumers, and to help identify public policies that are most likely to produce superior results. Among the 60 jurisdictions analyzed over the years 2003, 2004, and 2005, the Canadian provinces as a group had a higher regulatory burden or more government control over auto insurance and ranked relatively poorly on market quality in all three years studied. Of the 60 jurisdictions studied, only four have public monopoly or government-run auto insurance systems. These four are the Canadian provinces of British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, and Quebec. The data show that public monopoly or government-run auto insurance systems consistently produce the worst outcomes for consumers.

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The Fraser Institute’s twentieth annual waiting list survey finds that province-wide wait times for surgical and other therapeutic treatments have increased in 2010. The total waiting time between referral from a general practitioner and delivery of elective treatment by a specialist, averaged across all 12 specialties and 10 provinces surveyed, has risen from 16.1 weeks in 2009 to 18.2 weeks in 2010. Compared to 1993, the total waiting time in 2010 is 96 percent longer. Patients in Ontario experience the shortest wait (14.0 weeks) followed by Manitoba (17.5 weeks), and British Columbia and Quebec (18.8 weeks). Canadians wait nearly 3 weeks longer than what physicians believe is “reasonable” for elective treatment after an appointment with a specialist. Throughout the provinces, in 2010 people are waiting for an estimated 825,827 procedures. Assuming that each person waits for only one procedure, 2.45 percent of Canadians are waiting for treatment.

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This study is the fifth installment in an ongoing project aimed at understanding and, more importantly, documenting the public policies that contribute to, and sustain, positive investment climates. The study assesses empirically and then ranks the investment climates of the Canadian provinces based on a number of public policies that were identified by investment managers as contributing to a positive investment climate. The Fraser Institute surveyed senior investment managers in Canada on a variety of issues from 1998 to 2004 and these surveys were used to assess and rank the investment climate of the Canadian provinces. Canadian Provincial Investment Climate: 2010 Report uses the results from those surveys to create a quantifiable index of provincial investment climates.

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This report presents an overview of North America’s natural gas resource endowment, recent historical gas price patterns, and the continental natural gas supply, demand, and out look. It then examines the uncertainties and risks that constrain the development of natural gas production and transportation facilities, and identifies barriers to such investment.

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This is the seventh report on economic freedom in the Arab world. The first was published by the same authors in the Arab World Competitiveness Report 2005 (Lopez-Claros and Schwab, 2005). The second and subsequent editions were published by the International Research Foundation (IRF) of Oman and the Fraser Institute. In 2008, the Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Liberty, Cairo office, also became a co-publisher.

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This paper compares the economic performance of Canada’s health insurance system against the health insurance systems of 27 other countries that are members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). Economic performance is defined by the availability of medical resources and the output of medical services, as well as the associated level of national health spending as a percentage of GDP. The value for money produced by a country’s health insurance system is defined relative to the economic performance of the health insurance systems of its international peers . Our analysis uses the most recent internationally comparable data reported to the OECD by its member countries, current to the year 2007, for the 28 OECD countries reporting sufficient data for comparison.

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Measuring the Fiscal Performance of Canada's Premiers

Since there is no measure of how provincial premiers are performing, it is difficult for Canadians to hold the premiers accountable for the relative performance of their fiscal policies. This report provides Canadians with an objective, empirical assessment of how Canada’s premiers have managed their province’s public finances and whether they have pursued sound long-term economic policies.

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