Category International
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 […]
Foreign Remittances, Immigration and Economic Development
In Europe, immigrants from developing countries come in to work and then often send back money to families. There are also alot of foreign workers in the higher income countries in Asia and the Middle East. According to a World Bank Report, the developing world is expected to receive $414 billion in migrant remittances in […]
Fleet, GDP and 1914
This year will mark the 100th anniversary of the start of World War I and my attention this week was drawn to a copy of J. Griffin and Company’s The Naval Annual 1913. It is a sweeping 520-page review of the state of the world’s navies with details on individual ships. The naval arms race […]
Migration and Population Size
There was a recent piece in the New York Times on Italy’s economic situation and how its high unemployment rate and stagnant economy appears to have led to a return of Italian emigration. This story struck a personal chord given my own parents came to Canada during the post World War Two wave of immigration. […]
Gross Saving: A Comparison
I’m teaching public finance this term and just finished a discussion of the economic effects of income taxation on saving using a simple two period model of inter-temporal consumption. I rounded out the discussion with a comparison of personal savings rates between Canada and the United States and how their savings rates have converged since […]
Opposition to two FTAs: Canada/US 1987 vs Canada/EU 2013
I don't understand this. In 1987 Canada negotiated a Free Trade Agreement with the US. In 2013 Canada negotiates a Free Trade Agreement with the EU. The US and the EU are both very big advanced economies. Wikipedia confirms my memory of 1987: "The debate in Canada over whether to implement the negotiated agreement was […]
Teaching tariffs vs taxes in a small open economy
I taught my first year students the effects of an import tariff in a small open economy. I used the standard diagram (from Mankiw, Kneebone and McKenzie). It looks like this:
Debt, Default and Leadership
Well I honestly thought the US debt ceiling crisis would be resolved by today given the past examples of American political theater when it comes to fiscal issues. As I write this morning, it seems that the US is heading towards defaulting on some of its debt interest payments. It appears to me that the […]
Trade, Growth and … Brazil
In a recent address on global growth and Canadian export prospects to the Economic Club of Canada, the Bank of Canada’s Tiff Macklem noted that Canada’s share of world trade has been in decline for over a decade and that the loss of global trade share has been the second highest of the G-20. Given […]
Teaching comparative advantage: barter vs money (bleg)
When we teach comparative advantage in Intro Econ we assume barter exchange. We swap Canadian apples for US bananas. But the students, quite naturally, are thinking of monetary exchange. What happens if Canadian apples and bananas cost more dollars [to produce] than US apples and bananas? That's possible, isn't it? Wouldn't that mean [US prices […]
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative 
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