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1. Will the CAI solve our climate-policy problem and end eco-micro-management?

   The CAI. Not the CIA, which may or may not be working on our climate-policy problem, who knows? It works on lots of things so it may be working on that, too. Rather, the CAI is the Trudeau government’s new “Climate Action Incentive,” ...

2. Changing equalization won’t be easy—partly for good reason

   You hear a lot these days about reforming equalization. If Jason Kenney’s United Conservative Party wins the next Alberta election, you’ll likely hear more. As it is, Saskatchewan has already put a reform proposal on the table: keep ...

3. Cut the growth of growth commissions

   I hardly ever disagree with Jack Mintz, former president of the C. D. Howe Institute, former director of the University of Calgary School of Public Policy, and for the past decade or two the dean of Canadian policy economists. But I do ...

4. My ‘Aha! Moment’ on minimum wages… and more

   If firms don’t collude, and there are lots of them around, wages will rise until they’re equal to worker productivity. ...

5. Canada’s shadow economy—a shadow of its former self

   The International Monetary Fund, or IMF, has some interesting new estimates out on the size of different countries’ shadow economies. We in Canada are about to undergo a rare economic experiment in which part of the economy that has been ...

6. Outlaw the taxes, not the tax escalators

   I hardly ever disagree with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, which in its 27-year existence has been a clarion for fiscal sanity. But every once in a while my economist’s training makes me take issue with their single-minded dedication ...

7. How can people so smart understand economics so little?

   Everybody complains about the pace of change these days, but most people seem to adapt pretty well. One way things are different now is podcasts. They’re the medium of choice for more and more people while driving, exercising or, in my ...

8. How StatsCan wants you to pay taxes till you drop

   That’s not quite fair. Or rather, it’s not at all fair. Statistics Canada’s employees presumably have their own views on whether taxes should be higher or lower. It wouldn’t be surprising if, as government employees, many favoured higher ...

9. The Watson family inequality crisis

   In our family, inequality has reached levels the CBC and Toronto Star would consider outright scandalous. There are four of us in the family and we are now, all of us, tax-filers—even if some of us file mainly to register for various ...

10. On balance, a Netflix tax would be better than this

    Comparisons with friends suggest lots of Canadians’ daily TV now involves: some live sports, in our case the Montreal Canadiens, viewed on delay so as to fast-forward through commercials and between periods; some live news, also delayed ...