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1. Don’t believe doomsday predictions about a ‘tech-driven’ employment apocalypse

   Appeared in the National Post, July 10, 2019 Media reports often paint a dire picture of technological change and automation, spawning a future world of massive job loss and less employment. And yet, a labour shortage—not a glut due to mass unemployment ...

2. Proposed police transition in B.C.’s second-largest city—weighing the costs and benefits

   Surrey, the second-largest city in Metro Vancouver, recently released a plan to transition from the RCMP as its provider of policing services to its own municipal police force. This will likely be a contentious issue given that the ...

3. 19th century thinking drives China’s trade and economic policy

   China’s economic success has been driven by relatively unfettered and often nonreciprocal access to the rich developed markets of the world, with only a partial liberalization of its own economy, which is still dominated by state-owned or ...

4. Ford government counting on revenue growth to outpace spending

   Well, it’s been several weeks since the first Ford government tabled it’s first budget and a more detailed analysis suggests it’s a fiscally gradualist budget whose aim is to reduce expenditure growth below the rate of revenue growth to ...

5. Ontario unemployment numbers—the devil’s in the details

   According to recent Statistics Canada’s labour force numbers, Ontario—including its major urban areas—are experiencing low and declining unemployment rates. In 2009, after the recession hit, the average annual monthly unemployment rate in ...

6. Ontario government must freeze nominal spending to close fiscal gap

   Next week, the Ford government will table its first budget and Ontarians will get the clearest signals to-date of this government’s fiscal plans. According to recently-revised fiscal numbers, Ontario has been running deficits since 2008 ...

7. Spending, not lack of revenue, driving Ottawa’s red ink

   As budget season approaches in Ottawa, attention will turn—for a moment, at least—to what the Trudeau government projects for federal revenues, expenditures the deficit and the debt. This government can already lay claim to the two ...

8. Wartime presidents added most to U.S. federal debt-to-GDP ratio

   The total federal debt of the United States has grown steeply in recent years and now stands at almost $22 trillion or about 107 per cent of GDP. While it’s tempting to conclude that the buck always stops with a sitting president, every ...

9. U.S. outperforming Canada where it matters most—capital formation

   President Trump’s State of the Union Address this week highlighted the recent strong economic performance of the U.S. economy, noting that the United States over the last two years has created millions of new jobs along with many new ...

10. The realities of central banking

    President Trump’s recent attacks on the U.S. Federal Reserve and its Chair (Jerome Powell) underscore the important role independent central banks play in fostering a smoothly functioning economy. These attacks should also remind us that ...