Canada's prosperity age - over?

[myata]

An interesting international read about one of the top Canada food execs getting a million-dollar raise among an acute food and inflation crisis in generations.

Soooo funny how Singh complains about other, private company execs while seeing nothing wrong with own obscene pay and benefits in the Canada political system paid, note the difference please OUT OF THE PUBLIC'S POCKET. But OK, these are just words made by an agile tongue and carried by airwaves - and they'll carry anything who cares, right?

Something is quite clear though: the country is exiting the period of relative broad prosperity based on ineffective exploitation of natural resources. With steeply rising immigration, entrenched and outdated political system, business culture based on isolation from competition, grossly overpriced goods and services, what would the future hold? Anybody can see a good news here? Will, and could the preferred (and the only one known) trick of one time handouts make a difference?

[Michael Hardner]

17 minutes ago, Contrarian said:

•  concerns such as: rising immigration, an outdated political system

Concerns... population and demand growth, and a stable political infrastructure..

The concern I have is that a sizeable chunk of the public thinks that our economy can and should look like it did in 1960.

[Zeitgeist]

6 hours ago, myata said:

An interesting international read about one of the top Canada food execs getting a million-dollar raise among an acute food and inflation crisis in generations.

Soooo funny how Singh complains about other, private company execs while seeing nothing wrong with own obscene pay and benefits in the Canada political system paid, note the difference please OUT OF THE PUBLIC'S POCKET. But OK, these are just words made by an agile tongue and carried by airwaves - and they'll carry anything who cares, right?

Something is quite clear though: the country is exiting the period of relative broad prosperity based on ineffective exploitation of natural resources. With steeply rising immigration, entrenched and outdated political system, business culture based on isolation from competition, grossly overpriced goods and services, what would the future hold? Anybody can see a good news here? Will, and could the preferred (and the only one known) trick of one time handouts make a difference?

Inflationary special interest program spending, over-regulation of the energy sector, carbon taxes, the subsidy of war overseas, and the reliance on cheap labour are radically driving up the cost of living. All the Liberals do to fix it is spend even more money on “targeted programs” that create winners and losers and drive up inflation and debt even further.  

[Guest]

29 minutes ago, Contrarian said:

It is coming: 

• With technological advancements leading to changes in the job market + Deep Learning Technology increasingly taking on roles, it may be necessary for the government to provide some form of financial support, such as Universal Basic Income, to prevent social unrest. While some may disagree with the idea of UBI, me too on most days, it is a reality that is coming, and those who are able to make the most of it may benefit in the long run if they think of original ideas. 

I think the key to a UBI is in the details.  How will it relate to current welfare and other benefits programs?  How will you get people to do the **** jobs if a UBI payment approaches their salary?

I can't see any way to avoid it, to be honest.  The trick will be to get it right.

Edited April 9, 2023 by bcsapper

[CdnFox]

10 minutes ago, bcsapper said:

I think the key to a UBI is in the details.  How will it relate to current welfare and other benefits programs?  How will you get people to do the **** jobs if a UBI payment approaches their salary?

I can't see any way to avoid it, to be honest.  The trick will be to get it right.

I think cerb was a dry run and i think that the vast majority would say it was not an experiment that went well for the UBI supporters.

People are happy to give when their own needs are met. Right now - things aren't going so well in that department. And at some point things will tend to nosedive more. Justin is still dumping tonnes of unearned dollars into the economy and that's creating inflation pressures the bank has to fight with interest rates.

I think if anything it'll go the other way and people will be less likely to want to give up their cash for someone else to "live free". I mean, we cam't even get people worked up over the fentanyl deaths any more. Too many people don't have enough for themselves to give freebies to others. 

[Aristides]

5 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Concerns... population and demand growth, and a stable political infrastructure..

The concern I have is that a sizeable chunk of the public thinks that our economy can and should look like it did in 1960.

True but we have a lot of things we didn't have in 1960, like national universal health care.

[ExFlyer]

5 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Concerns... population and demand growth, and a stable political infrastructure..

The concern I have is that a sizeable chunk of the public thinks that our economy can and should look like it did in 1960.

And not the 2 decades after, the 70's and 80's.

[myata]

Maybe and probably I don't know everything. Possibly there's much going on in the country that I don't see. But, let's look: a foundation of broad base prosperity where a large fraction of population is involved in regular, well paying jobs with multiple benefits including importantly: pensions, doesn't exist anymore, went out of existence anybody noticed when? (and we have not a small bunch of paid by public statisticians massaging data in all ways, where have they been looking?

Instead, we have pockets of varying size of reasonable prosperity and a complicated web of government run handouts to create visibility of some, quasi prosperity. No, seriously:

- Public service: not stable. Will collapse in the next coming public budget crisis

- Information and high tech: not a significant segment, a fraction is part time and/or outsourced overseas

- Manufacturing: not significant, reduced to an absolute minimum

- Forestry and mining: OK but very volatile and it's not going to improve

- Fishing: collapsing

- Anything else? what did I miss?

Is anyone curios what direction is it heading to? Instead of broad prosperity, a standard of poverty or survival only living in some form, the populace voting for a promise of a juicier handout while political class disconnected itself into the stratosphere? Spell with me: M- e- x- .... (Northern, granted).

What just happened here? Extensive exploitation of resources is in a way similar to a financial pyramid: each new level of prosperity requires more exploitation and there will be a limit. There's a difference between creating and building a balanced and innovative economy with the help of the extraction funds and managing handouts to create visibilities and illusions. Detached and exalted political system has no incentives to do the former and so we're stuck with the status quo, forever as it looks, eh?

 

 

Edited April 9, 2023 by myata

[myata]

2 hours ago, Contrarian said:

such as Universal Basic Income, to prevent social unrest

That is, permanent stratification of the population into the castes of permanently poor and the exalted ones? Like in pretty much any, take randomly off the shelf, dark apocalypse utopia? Left wing philosopher's dream come true.

[Zeitgeist]

I think governments have to free up land through zoning de-regulation.  Service unused industrial and commercial land with electricity and water.  Provide a cheap lease and allow people to put tiny homes and manufactured/modular portable homes on the land.  Musk has a great $10000 home.  At a lease of around $6000 a year we would see the smart re-use of brownfield sites and create millions of affordable housing options overnight.  The governments are in bed with developers and won’t do it.  It’s lazy, spitefully neglectful, and stupid, but unsurprising.

These kinds of ideas are more incentivizing than UBI and other welfare programs, though I’m sure we’ll have some kind of UBI eventually.  Take away the incentive to work and take away entrepreneurship in a free marketplace of ideas and natural supply and demand and you destroy your society.  

Edited April 9, 2023 by Zeitgeist

[myata]

6 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

and should look like it did in 1960.

For the political caste sure it's true. Except it was a tad more modest back then. So why is it a huge problem for the lowly ones?

[I am Groot]

8 hours ago, Michael Hardner said:

Concerns... population and demand growth, and a stable political infrastructure..

The concern I have is that a sizeable chunk of the public thinks that our economy can and should look like it did in 1960.

When things were good, you mean?

The less government interference and involvement in the economy the healthier that economy is. Unfortunately, Canadian governments at all levels have been pushing their control, regulations and requirements like tentacles into every nook and cranny of private life. It's not just Trudeau, though he has been more enthusiastic about government growth than any of those who preceded him.

Doug Ford's government is spending more money per person than Kathleen Wynne or Dalton McGuinty did  - or Bob Rae, for that matter. Why? 

And government itself, as it has bloated, has not exactly gotten more efficient and effective. Quite the contrary. In the case of the federal government the senior people I know are exhausted and on the verge of burnout. Micromanaging every single aspect of every single thing the public service does in order to cover their asses from any accusation of wrongdoing or error has become the core of their institutional culture. And that mentality flows into the need to micromanage industry and the economy.

And so it takes years and years to get anything done in Canada. Why? Because no one in the bureacracy who has to say yes dares to say yes without 'consulting stakeholders' and filing away copious amounts of documents and voluminous reports saying that decision is the right one, and getting 'buy in' from other departments and agencies, and then fobbing the final decision off on political appointees or the politicians.

And so business is drowning in the paperwork needed to satisfy the government, entrepreneurship is strangled at birth, and trying something new is frowned upon.

[CdnFox]

3 hours ago, Aristides said:

True but we have a lot of things we didn't have in 1960, like national universal health care.

We actually had universal health care in the 60's.  Every province had it.

What happened in the 70's wasn't the addition of universal health care but rather universal health care funding. The provinces agreed to reduce their taxes and the feds would up theirs and pay 50 percent of the costs of health care. The idea being it would make it easier for poorer provinces to afford it (which was a LITTLE silly - that's what the equalization program is supposed to do).

Of course - since then they dropped that considerably, and under trudeau it's about half of that - 25 percent of the costs. They kept the tax money tho

[Michael Hardner]

2 hours ago, I am Groot said:

1. When things were good, you mean?

2. The less government interference and involvement in the economy the healthier that economy is. Unfortunately, Canadian governments at all levels have been pushing their control, regulations and requirements like tentacles into every nook and cranny of private life. It's not just Trudeau, though he has been more enthusiastic about government growth than any of those who preceded him.

3. Doug Ford's government is spending more money per person than Kathleen Wynne or Dalton McGuinty did  - or Bob Rae, for that matter. Why? 

4. And government itself, as it has bloated, has not exactly gotten more efficient and effective. Quite the contrary. In the case of the federal government the senior people I know are exhausted and on the verge of burnout. Micromanaging every single aspect of every single thing the public service does in order to cover their asses from any accusation of wrongdoing or error has become the core of their institutional culture. And that mentality flows into the need to micromanage industry and the economy.

5. And so it takes years and years to get anything done in Canada. Why? Because no one in the bureacracy who has to say yes dares to say yes without 'consulting stakeholders' and filing away copious amounts of documents and voluminous reports saying that decision is the right one, and getting 'buy in' from other departments and agencies, and then fobbing the final decision off on political appointees or the politicians.

6. And so business is drowning in the paperwork needed to satisfy the government, entrepreneurship is strangled at birth, and trying something new is frowned upon.

1. Yes, exactly.
2. Generally this is true.  I can't disagree.
3. To get elected ?
4. 5. I do think that government has legions of people who are under utilized, and few decision makers who can approve things.
6. Yes, but the foreign market is also a big factor here, don't forget.