Author Archives: wciecon
A comment on comments
While we are happy to have people read our posts and to discuss the points raised therein, we would ask people to remember that personal attacks and abusive comments will not be tolerated. There's been a recent uptick in such occurrences, and I'd like to nip this in the bud. That is all.
Wikipedia is dominated by men. So what?
About 15 percent of contributors to Wikipedia are women. Sometimes this shows. The entry for employment equity as of March 5, 2011, ran as follows: Employment equity refers to Canadian policies that require or encourage preferential treatment in employment practices for certain designated groups: women, people with disabilities, Aboriginal peoples, and visible minorities.[1] Employment equity goes beyond mere non-discrimination […]
The sources of the federal deficit revisited
There were a couple of puzzling things in my recent post on the sources of the federal defict, and I think I've solved the puzzle. I made a mistake.
We learn, and then we forget
Every time the census is released, hopes are raised for the future of bilingualism in Canada. Although relatively few older Canadians can speak both official languages, bilingualism rates are higher for young Canadians. Here's a picture, based on 2006 Census data, showing the percentage of non-Francophones in each age group who are bilingual, that is, […]
The conflicting claims theory of inflation, and unemployment
The conflicting claims theory of inflation goes like this. Suppose we start in equilibrium with 10 people in an economy each earning 10% of total income. Then all of a sudden each decides he deserves 11% of total income, and raises his price accordingly. The total claims add up to 110% of total income. In […]
Toilet cleaning, department chairing, and the ratchet effect
One of my all-time favourite paper titles is Marc Bilodeau and Al Slivinski's "Toilet cleaning and department chairing: volunteering a public service." Like any great title, it conveys the gist of the authors' argument in just a few words. Chairing a university department is a public service. Like toilet cleaning, it is something that has […]
How the federal government went from persistent surpluses to persistent deficits
Update: See this follow-up post, which corrects some mistakes made below. I've added comments pointing out which parts needed revision. In the early years of the millenium, the federal government ran what appeared to be an indestructible series of budgetary surpluses. No matter how many tax cuts were implemented, it ended each year with a […]
The political economy of rising tuition
Some facts about university finances in Canada: 1. Undergraduate tuition has doubled in real terms in the last twenty years; tuition in professional programs has risen much more rapidly. 2. University enrolments are growing, as the participation rate – the percentage of people in a given age group attending university – continues to rise. 3. Each […]
Why New Keynesian macroeconomists are against labour unions
Like all New Keynesians, I believe two things that are apparently contradictory: 1. We each get paid too much; 2. Because of 1, we all get paid too little. It only makes sense if you understand fallacies of composition. What is true of each part isn't necessarily true of the whole.
Have universities reached the tipping point?
In 1983, a t-shirt cost about $10 or $20, an album $10 or $15, and undergraduate tuition at University of Waterloo cost $1313.74 annually for architecture, its most expensive undergraduate program. In 2011, a first year architecture student at University of Waterloo pays $7,697 in fees each year (and architecture is far from being University of Waterloo's most expensive program). […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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