Category Immigration
Why is it so hard to know the relationship between immigration and economic performance?
Here is the number of new permanent residents to Canada, as a percentage of the existing population, over time: "New permanent residents" is not a perfect measure of immigration – it excludes temporary foreign workers, who have become much more important in recent years, and also ignores emigration, that is, the non-trivial number of newcomers […]
The carbon costs of immigration
Canada is, as far as countries go, relatively cold and sparsely populated. Our houses are large by global standards, and we drive a fair amount. We are rich enough to consume a lot of stuff. These factors, together with the oil sands, mean that we have one of the world's highest levels of CO2 emissions on […]
Do (local) housing demand curves slope up?
Take this post with a truckload of salt. This is a second in my series in which "Lost Macro Farmboy tries to get his head around Urban Economics". Think of it as sceptical pushback. I might easily be wrong, but those who know a lot more Urban Economics than I do should be able to […]
Who chooses to become Canadian?
Immigrants to Canada can, after living here for four years as a permanent resident, opt to become naturalized Canadian citizens. Most immigrants opt for naturalization – but some cling to their original citizenship, even after living in this country for thirty, forty, fifty or more years. The graph below shows the proportion of immigrants choosing to become […]
Importing people is not like importing apples
Remember all the old Canadian nationalists? The ones who said that the (Canada-US) Free Trade Agreement would destroy Canadian culture? The ones we economists defeated back in the 1988 election? I'm beginning to wish we hadn't defeated them quite so thoroughly. They were wrong. But they sorta, kinda, did have a point. Social/economic institutions are […]
Under-investment in Public Clubs
I don't know if I'm re-inventing the wheel. I don't normally do this sort of micro, or any micro. Talking about "Public Club Investment goods" will sound oxymoronic to an economist. But the investment goods I'm talking about are a bit of both. They look like club goods from one angle, and look like public […]
Vortigern’s immigration policy
Economists aren't exactly noted for their expertise in Cultural Studies (I think that's what I'm doing here), but I'm going to give it a go. The fact that the Arthurian legend still resonates 1,500 years later tells us something about people, their hopes and fears. According to legend, Arthur was the British resistance leader who […]
A modest proposal for renewed imperialism
I hear that a lot of people want to migrate to…Finland. I'm pretty sure it's not because they like Finland's climate, or scenery. I don't think it's got anything to do with the physical geography of Finland. I think that they want to move to Finland because they like Finland's political, legal, and social institutions, […]
Countries as clubs: open borders and debt/GDP ratios
Don't think of a country as an area of land. Think of a country as a club, to which a group of people belong. Nomadic tribes were not attached to any particular area of land. Settled agriculture on scarce land is a recent and contingent fact. Clubs provide club goods to their members. Club goods […]
Open borders vs forced emigration
Let's start simple. There are two physically identical islands, Alpha and Beta. There are two agents, A and B. Initially, A lives on Alpha, and B lives on Beta. Under "Open Borders", each agent has the right to move to either island, if he wishes to. Under "Forced Emigration", each agent has the obligation to […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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