Category Canadian economy
Taxation and Growth: A North American Cross-Border Comparison
My last comparison of U.S. states and Canadian provinces with respect to their federal transfer revenue shares got me thinking about the other revenue sources and whether any relationship could be found between economic growth and revenue composition. Income taxation is supposed to have incentive and distortion effects on saving, risk taking and labor supply […]
Fiscal Federalism: A Cross-Border Comparison
As a federal country, one of Canada’s hallmarks is a well-developed system of intergovernmental transfers. Indeed, we often remark that Canadian provinces are dependent on federal transfers for large chunks of their spending and there is some debate over whether Canada’s provinces should engage in more own-source revenue effort rather than plead for more transfers. […]
International Employment Update: U.S. Resilience and Australian Exceptionalism
I thought it was time for an updated look at employment creation in the advanced economies given that we are now at just over five years since the 2008-09 Great Recession that walloped world economies. I’ve taken the IMF World Economic Outlook Database employment numbers for the period 2007 to 2013 to get employment levels […]
Visioning the Surplus
The Federal government is poised to move into a period of fiscal surplus. According to the 2014 Federal Budget, the 2014-15 fiscal year will see a 2.9 billion dollar deficit (which could actually be a small surplus due to the 3 billion dollar contingency fund). After that, 2015-16 will see a 6.4 billion dollar surplus […]
Scotland, Quebec, and currency union
I don't have anything to add to this, except to express my relief that the Permanent Secretary to H M Treasury (UK) said what needed to be said, especially given the dreadful experience of the Eurozone currency union (which is not over yet in my opinion), and that Canadians should read it. (H/T David Smith).
The 2014 Federal Budget
With so much commentary out there on the 2014 Federal Budget, there is probably not much left to contribute but here are a couple of thoughts.
Is Ottawa Shortchanging Ontario? You Decide.
Well it is federal budget time once again and the inevitable political opera around transfer payments is in progress. This time, Ontario is feeling shortchanged and wants Ottawa to restore the 641 million dollar cut in transfer payments it is slated to receive for the 2014-15 fiscal year. Ontario Finance Minister Charles Sousa argues that […]
Tiff Macklem, retail competition, flexible IT vs NGDPLT
Tiff Macklem is senior deputy governor at the Bank of Canada. On Friday, Tiff gave a speech on "Flexible Inflation Targeting and 'Good' and 'Bad' Disinflation". The Bank of Canada is not like the Fed; Tiff's speech reflects the Bank of Canada view. The picture below reflects what I think Tiff might be saying:
“Is the falling exchange rate good news or bad news?”
I was on CBC radio yesterday morning for about 5 minutes, talking about the exchange rate. From this experience, and from previous similar experiences, this is what reporters want to ask: "Who gains, and who loses, from the fall in the exchange rate? For Canada as a whole, is the fall in the exchange rate […]
A Lower Dollar Won’t Reverse Manufacturing’s Decline
The decline in the value of the Canadian dollar relative to the US dollar is expected to provide a boost to the manufacturing sector. There is certainly no shortage of commentary on whether the fall in the dollar is the result of economic fundamentals or an engineered conspiracy designed to boost Conservative re-election prospects in […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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