Save the present Liberal party or build a new one, I don't care. But please, please, we need a party that takes economics seriously.
Canadian real GDP per capita has fallen for six consecutive quarters now, and is at the level it reached in the last quarter of 2014. I recognize that GDP is not everything, but it is the basis for our stanfdard of living. In particular, all the different social programs must be financed, now and in the future, and the resources to do so must come from somewhere.
This may well be a CPC talking point, but is not any less true for all that. Pointing it out is not an automatic support for Mr. Poilievre, but rather an invitation to face reality. If you want a progressive state, you must arrange the means to do so. And no, redistribution won't cut it. There is only so much redistribution you can do before you start shrinking the size of the pie.
It is not hard to increase the GDP per capita. Just implement a few tax heaven measures for corporations and they will recognize their corporate earnings in Canada. No individual Canadian will benefit from this.
It is much better to look at real wages per capita (that is inflation corrected wages per person). Canada is doing very well in that regard.
Well, according to CUPE, the average weekly wage in Canada is now $1205 per week. That's up $39 from 2013, after taking inflation into account. That's pretty flat.
As for increasing GDP per capita by lowering corporate tax rates, none of the OECD countries Canada is regularly compared to, is a tax haven either. On the other hand, many heavily subsidize foreign firms to come and do business in their country. Canada is no exception, of course.
However, 3.5% increase after inflation is meaningful (and by the way some industry sectors see much greater growth).
The point regarding tax heavens and GDP is that GDP is not a measure of people being able to pay the bills. Nor is it a good measure of productivity or innovation. A good example of this is Alberta. Since 2008, oil production has tripled. However in the same period unemployment has gone from 3% to 6%. How does this make sense? Well, the construction of the oil production facilities (focus in 2008) is labour intensive and the production of oil (focus of today, not too many new construction projects) requires a lot fewer people. In other words, the nature of the economic activity has a much bigger influence on employment and wages than the absolute value of the economic activity (data can be found on Alberta Economic Dashboard).
Kudos for using actual data with sourcing in your comment.
Thank you for also using real data and attribution. This should happen more often in forums (fora?) like this.
I agree that different snapshots will reveal different aspects. I also note that percentage living in poverty has dropped, a very good thing in my opinion. (That is perhaps the most important single indicator, more important than declining inequality).
GDP certainly doesn't capture all that is going on in the economy. However, its growth generally correlates well with other important indicators. Of particular interest, it is an indicator of the tax base available to governments, and hence of the size of social programs that are sustainable over time. In this regard, the tax base is increased if foreign companies come to benefit from lower taxes. Ireland's rapid growth is an example of how that can work. But in the longer term, countries do take measures to limit this. For example, most OECD countries have agreed to a minimum 15% effective tax rate on profits. Unfortunately, there is no such international coordination to limit subsidies to corporations, resulting in subsidy wars, such as the recent one Canada won to attract EV battery production.
I’ve done my part by not voting for any of Trudeau’s Liberal elections and voting Green.
I’m happy the collective zeitgeist ended up with Trudeau in a marginal majority or minority government, but was never prepared to vote for his party, even the first time. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
I’d be happier if Trudeau lived up to his 2015 promise of electoral reform. And he’d be happier if he did too at this point.
Canada is a 50+% progressive majority, splintered into bits. But that beats a 40%+ Conservative minority splintered into bits.
The PPC-aligned part of the Conservatives would love to march to the beat of their own drum. Let them. They’re weird and few in number - and only gain power by subsuming the empty soul of the larger Conservative Party. Which, sadly, they have.
Poilievre makes Mulroney look entirely acceptable, and I grew up detesting the man. If today’s Tories were Joe Clark or Bill Davis types, I’d vote for them. They’re rather scarily not.
Immigration is changing Canadian political support very quickly. Immigrants polling shows are more likely to lean right than old stock Canadians, especially in Ontario.
In 14 months or so we will read a mea culpa from Evan here to tell us that after all Trudeau was the right leader for Liberals to take on Poilievre. I am not saying this because I am such a fan of Trudeau, but because I am convinced that Canadians will get tired of the negativity and dishonesty by Poilievre. Poilievre has only one gear and we have seen that any time his team tries to change gear, the Poilievre engines stalls rather quickly.
The Liberals have been late to respond coming out of Covid, but in 12 months or so they will be able to show progress on housing, inflation, adjusting immigration, dental and pharma care, interest rates etc. And if they are able to shift the conversation finally to what is provincial and what is federal (and upcoming provincial elections will help with that), they have a good shot to getting back to 2021 support levels, perhaps better.
Evan, your column just popped up in my email and I saw the headline and I had to respond. I am responding to the damned headline and once I post this I will go back and read the rest.
NO, DAMNIT, THE LIBERAL PARTY IS NOT WORTH SAVING AND SHOULD BE PUT OUT OF OUR MISERY. What misery, you might ask. Well, the misery that arises from the lies, the persecution, the activity (and non-activity) of the current government.
You can argue that there needs to be a leftish political party and I will refer you to the party formed by the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and the Canadian Labour Congress all those years ago. I find the current iteration of that party, the NDP to be incoherent and frequently foolish (particularly under their current "leader") but I don't at all find them as dangerous to Canada as the Liberal Party of Canada.
So, Sir, I say that the LPC should be killed off and allow the NDP to take it's place.
Oh, and I admit that I am somewhat on the rightish side of the spectrum; not wildly so but somewhat so.
Something worth discussing in this context is that if a rebuild is necessary the Liberal Party is never going to have more resources for it than they do now
If they get hammered down to 60-80 seats, that represents an enormous loss of talent. Potential leaders who lose their seat, staffers, constituency assistants. Money and credibility and influence. There’s a big difference fundraising for a leadership race to be PM, even if precariously, than a race to be the leader of a party on the opposition benches for the foreseeable future.
And it’s not like the Liberals have deep institutional strength these days. They effectively don’t exist as a provincial party anymore. There’s no constituency associations west of Ontario. Whatever party resources they have right now is what they have to work with. There’s no rookie team waiting in the wings to step up. They’re two bad federal elections in a row from simply not existing. And if you think that’s an exaggeration, look at the trajectory of any of the Liberal provincial parties
In a sports metaphor, waiting until after the election to do a rebuild is like a team waiting until all their trade capital leaves in free agency for no return before they do a rebuild. It’s only going to prolong the process and make it more painful once it finally starts
Chretien had no choice in the austerity budgets. Ultimately it is the bond markets that dictate what you can do, and Canada ran out of credit. The alternative was default and Canada becoming much more like Argentina, but without the nice weather and good food,
As for the early 2000s tax cuts, that was to keep high skilled and high income Canadians from leaving the country for the US. In that era Canadian companies were literally leaving everyday and brain drain was the biggest demographic problem.
Save the present Liberal party or build a new one, I don't care. But please, please, we need a party that takes economics seriously.
Canadian real GDP per capita has fallen for six consecutive quarters now, and is at the level it reached in the last quarter of 2014. I recognize that GDP is not everything, but it is the basis for our stanfdard of living. In particular, all the different social programs must be financed, now and in the future, and the resources to do so must come from somewhere.
This may well be a CPC talking point, but is not any less true for all that. Pointing it out is not an automatic support for Mr. Poilievre, but rather an invitation to face reality. If you want a progressive state, you must arrange the means to do so. And no, redistribution won't cut it. There is only so much redistribution you can do before you start shrinking the size of the pie.
We must start taking the economics seriously.
It is not hard to increase the GDP per capita. Just implement a few tax heaven measures for corporations and they will recognize their corporate earnings in Canada. No individual Canadian will benefit from this.
It is much better to look at real wages per capita (that is inflation corrected wages per person). Canada is doing very well in that regard.
Well, according to CUPE, the average weekly wage in Canada is now $1205 per week. That's up $39 from 2013, after taking inflation into account. That's pretty flat.
https://cupe.ca/real-wage-trends-industry
As for increasing GDP per capita by lowering corporate tax rates, none of the OECD countries Canada is regularly compared to, is a tax haven either. On the other hand, many heavily subsidize foreign firms to come and do business in their country. Canada is no exception, of course.
This analysis looks less flat:
https://centreforfuturework.ca/2024/01/21/real-wages-are-recovering-and-thats-good-news/
However, 3.5% increase after inflation is meaningful (and by the way some industry sectors see much greater growth).
The point regarding tax heavens and GDP is that GDP is not a measure of people being able to pay the bills. Nor is it a good measure of productivity or innovation. A good example of this is Alberta. Since 2008, oil production has tripled. However in the same period unemployment has gone from 3% to 6%. How does this make sense? Well, the construction of the oil production facilities (focus in 2008) is labour intensive and the production of oil (focus of today, not too many new construction projects) requires a lot fewer people. In other words, the nature of the economic activity has a much bigger influence on employment and wages than the absolute value of the economic activity (data can be found on Alberta Economic Dashboard).
Kudos for using actual data with sourcing in your comment.
Thank you for also using real data and attribution. This should happen more often in forums (fora?) like this.
I agree that different snapshots will reveal different aspects. I also note that percentage living in poverty has dropped, a very good thing in my opinion. (That is perhaps the most important single indicator, more important than declining inequality).
GDP certainly doesn't capture all that is going on in the economy. However, its growth generally correlates well with other important indicators. Of particular interest, it is an indicator of the tax base available to governments, and hence of the size of social programs that are sustainable over time. In this regard, the tax base is increased if foreign companies come to benefit from lower taxes. Ireland's rapid growth is an example of how that can work. But in the longer term, countries do take measures to limit this. For example, most OECD countries have agreed to a minimum 15% effective tax rate on profits. Unfortunately, there is no such international coordination to limit subsidies to corporations, resulting in subsidy wars, such as the recent one Canada won to attract EV battery production.
I’ve done my part by not voting for any of Trudeau’s Liberal elections and voting Green.
I’m happy the collective zeitgeist ended up with Trudeau in a marginal majority or minority government, but was never prepared to vote for his party, even the first time. Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
I’d be happier if Trudeau lived up to his 2015 promise of electoral reform. And he’d be happier if he did too at this point.
Canada is a 50+% progressive majority, splintered into bits. But that beats a 40%+ Conservative minority splintered into bits.
The PPC-aligned part of the Conservatives would love to march to the beat of their own drum. Let them. They’re weird and few in number - and only gain power by subsuming the empty soul of the larger Conservative Party. Which, sadly, they have.
Poilievre makes Mulroney look entirely acceptable, and I grew up detesting the man. If today’s Tories were Joe Clark or Bill Davis types, I’d vote for them. They’re rather scarily not.
Immigration is changing Canadian political support very quickly. Immigrants polling shows are more likely to lean right than old stock Canadians, especially in Ontario.
In 14 months or so we will read a mea culpa from Evan here to tell us that after all Trudeau was the right leader for Liberals to take on Poilievre. I am not saying this because I am such a fan of Trudeau, but because I am convinced that Canadians will get tired of the negativity and dishonesty by Poilievre. Poilievre has only one gear and we have seen that any time his team tries to change gear, the Poilievre engines stalls rather quickly.
The Liberals have been late to respond coming out of Covid, but in 12 months or so they will be able to show progress on housing, inflation, adjusting immigration, dental and pharma care, interest rates etc. And if they are able to shift the conversation finally to what is provincial and what is federal (and upcoming provincial elections will help with that), they have a good shot to getting back to 2021 support levels, perhaps better.
Evan, your column just popped up in my email and I saw the headline and I had to respond. I am responding to the damned headline and once I post this I will go back and read the rest.
NO, DAMNIT, THE LIBERAL PARTY IS NOT WORTH SAVING AND SHOULD BE PUT OUT OF OUR MISERY. What misery, you might ask. Well, the misery that arises from the lies, the persecution, the activity (and non-activity) of the current government.
You can argue that there needs to be a leftish political party and I will refer you to the party formed by the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation and the Canadian Labour Congress all those years ago. I find the current iteration of that party, the NDP to be incoherent and frequently foolish (particularly under their current "leader") but I don't at all find them as dangerous to Canada as the Liberal Party of Canada.
So, Sir, I say that the LPC should be killed off and allow the NDP to take it's place.
Oh, and I admit that I am somewhat on the rightish side of the spectrum; not wildly so but somewhat so.
It is much more likely that the NDP folds on the federal level, just like the provincial Liberals have folded west of Ontario (perhaps even Quebec).
So, basically irrelevant.
Something worth discussing in this context is that if a rebuild is necessary the Liberal Party is never going to have more resources for it than they do now
If they get hammered down to 60-80 seats, that represents an enormous loss of talent. Potential leaders who lose their seat, staffers, constituency assistants. Money and credibility and influence. There’s a big difference fundraising for a leadership race to be PM, even if precariously, than a race to be the leader of a party on the opposition benches for the foreseeable future.
And it’s not like the Liberals have deep institutional strength these days. They effectively don’t exist as a provincial party anymore. There’s no constituency associations west of Ontario. Whatever party resources they have right now is what they have to work with. There’s no rookie team waiting in the wings to step up. They’re two bad federal elections in a row from simply not existing. And if you think that’s an exaggeration, look at the trajectory of any of the Liberal provincial parties
In a sports metaphor, waiting until after the election to do a rebuild is like a team waiting until all their trade capital leaves in free agency for no return before they do a rebuild. It’s only going to prolong the process and make it more painful once it finally starts
.. i don’t recall you responding to my question re St. Pauls & the ‘going rate to buy Votes..
or do you wish to pretend Vote Buying is not a ruthlessly pragmatic Tactic ?
- nor do I recall any response re ‘Character Attack as ‘conservative’ Campaign Policy..
Matter of fact - a lot of my prior ‘Comments included other pertinent Questions..
Do you actually believe Jenni Byrne just ‘bided her time for almost 10 years ?
‘capture the ‘Media & the Palace is ‘de facto yours.. the Contemporary coup d’état
Pierre Poilievre et al Inc are now attempting to force themselves into Power currently
via ‘the Polls.. the Polls & insulting little rich kid Jagmeet Singh - Retail Membership ‘Leader
That aside they’re just dying to humiliate Trudeau into cutting & running
via Endless Polls & Yellow Media 24/7 ‘walk in the snow venomous SPECULATION..
If you’re going to ‘use Polls as Your Basis with zero mention of The Question Asked-
the Responding Stable of those ‘Polled.. the Context.. or Who Specifically Paid for the goddam Poll
ie Qui Bono - Who Profits .. then what kind of ‘Journalist or ‘Punter are you ?
Fuck The Polls .. they’re Part of The Problem - Not A Solution ..
Chretien had no choice in the austerity budgets. Ultimately it is the bond markets that dictate what you can do, and Canada ran out of credit. The alternative was default and Canada becoming much more like Argentina, but without the nice weather and good food,
As for the early 2000s tax cuts, that was to keep high skilled and high income Canadians from leaving the country for the US. In that era Canadian companies were literally leaving everyday and brain drain was the biggest demographic problem.