The best way Canada can deal with the U.S. tariffs and other problems.

[CdnFox]

On 3/14/2025 at 10:56 AM, impartialobserver said:

It makes sense to decouple from the US and therefore leave Canada less exposed to trade wars. My guess is that this will be a rocky journey with lots of ups and downs. 

Probably not as many as you would think. To be honest the business lost by Interventional trade barriers is more than the 25% tariff trump is threatening to impose. Every province is carved out its little fiefdom where it makes money and doesn't want the others playing ball. All it takes is the political will to smash that and force a more open internal market and frankly that would go a huge hunk of the way to offsetting any tariffs

Canada has gotten lazy, the united states is an easy to access market and we haven't had to be all that competitive in order to do well there because the things the Americans buy from us are things that they generally don't have like power and oil and strategic materials and nickel etc etc. But either don't have it, they don't have enough of it, or they don't have the kind of quality we do. So it was very simple

Now we need to get away from that. For example the creation of an energy corridor from one end of Canada to the other that encompass electricity oil natural gas and possibly gasoline products would consume a significant portion of our steel production for the next 5 to 10 years, would allow us to sell to each other instead of to America or independent considering our oil currently goes to the US then crosses the US and comes back up in Ontario and Quebec.

We need to make it easier to move from one province to another and still be ticketed for your trade like being a nurse or an electrician, we need to end government protection of certain industries and we need to stop selling our goods to the US and keep selling our goods to ourselves.

That would go a long way to making us a lot more independent of the united states. Developing additional trade relationships and increasing our ability to export things like oil and gas to other countries would be another big step. A lot of the other countries are realizing that you ask mark it isn't safe either and we'll be open to the discussion of trading goods and services.

There's almost no chance that the day will come when we will have no dealings with the united states. They are a massive market sitting literally on our doorstep.

But we can reduce that influence substantially, probably too less than half of its current state. This may turn out to be the wake-up call that promotes a lot of that

[SpankyMcFarland]

On 3/13/2025 at 9:27 PM, xul said:

Best way No.1: Don't bluff.

 

Ford wants to sell more electricity to the U.S. — Trump says it ‘doesn’t make sense’

Big words and bluffing doesn't make anyone strong. They only make the person a clown😜

 

He got their attention. Like sociopaths generally, Trump and his goons have a big problem seeing other countries as real, with national pride of their own. 

[Dougie93]

15 hours ago, xul said:

I wish Canada would act like Ivana, acknowledging the reality that the marriage is over and taking calculated measures to secure her future as a successful businesswoman.

it's really market forces which decide,

thus I wouldn't worry about that which is beyond your control,

rather you should simply calculate how you can prosper in relation to where the markets are going

[SpankyMcFarland]

Trump aside for a second, we shouldn’t be starting any crisis from here financially. Trudeau’s spending has put us in a much weaker position to hold out against our enemy in the White House. 

[TreeBeard]

44 minutes ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

Trump aside for a second, we shouldn’t be starting any crisis from here financially. Trudeau’s spending has put us in a much weaker position to hold out against our enemy in the White House. 

Debt to GDP is lowest of G7 countries.  You’re repeating rightwing talking points.  
 

If spending is truly the problem, then we’re better off than any other G7 nation.  

[eyeball]

1 hour ago, SpankyMcFarland said:

...hold out against our enemy...

It's a little astounding how people seem to think anyone is getting out of this to extent things return to some semblance of normalcy.

Our global civilization's as well as every countries best days are behind us and have been for years.

The real measure of financial or socioeconomic success going forward will simply be survival. Screwing someone before they screw you is the name of the game we're playing now.

[CdnFox]

16 minutes ago, eyeball said:

It's a little astounding how people seem to think anyone is getting out of this to extent things return to some semblance of normalcy.

Our global civilization's as well as every countries best days are behind us and have been for years.

The real measure of financial or socioeconomic success going forward will simply be survival. Screwing someone before they screw you is the name of the game we're playing now.

That's absolutely asinine and stupid. Unless mankind manages to kill itself off in the next few weeks there will be better times and there will be worse times. That's just the way it is.

 

[eyeball]

30 minutes ago, CdnFox said:

That's absolutely asinine and stupid.

Judicious and intelligent.

And I said civilization not mankind...mankind isn't going anywhere. We're just about the weediest most invasive species on the planet.

[suds]

1 hour ago, TreeBeard said:

Debt to GDP is lowest of G7 countries.  You’re repeating rightwing talking points.  
 

If spending is truly the problem, then we’re better off than any other G7 nation.  

Some Canadian politicians like to refer to net debt/gdp ratios where they include the Quebec and Canada pension funds as assets which combined are worth over $765 billion. Most other countries look at them as assets and liabilities (cancelling each other out) because they have to paid out at some future date. The IMF uses gross debt/gdp ratios that includes all liabilities that require future payment of interest or principal. Using IMF data (2024), Germany has the lowest gross debt/gdp of 62.1%, Canada 103.2%, U.K. 103.8%, France 115.3%, U.S. 124.1%, Italy 138.7%, and Japan 248%. We're holding our own (but not as good as we used to be) especially when compared to Denmark at 27.3%, Sweden 35.4%, and Norway 42.7%.

https://www.imf.org/external/datamapper/GGXWDG_NGDP@WEO/OEMDC/ADVEC/WEOWORLD

[xul]

3 hours ago, Dougie93 said:

it's really market forces which decide,

thus I wouldn't worry about that which is beyond your control,

rather you should simply calculate how you can prosper in relation to where the markets are going

Tariff itself is an attempt to distort the market force. When Trump put 25% on Canadian steel and aluminum, the market is gone. Canadian doesn't ask for this. Except being annexed by US, what could Canada do to prosper the relationship enough to make Trump cancels the tariff?

Besides, even if Canadian accepted the annexation, would US allow Canadian to keep their current way of living? Obviously not. Because if everything is kept as their current statues in Canada, like the steel and oil are still sold to US by the same prices, what is the point of the annexation to US? The annexation is just the cover words of colonization. This time the colonist is American and the aboriginal is Canadian.

Since Canadian would still suffer if they accepted the annexation, why shouldn't they resist US and bear the suffer for their freedom and independence?    

Edited March 17 by xul

[Dougie93]

Just now, xul said:

Since Canadian would still suffer if they accept the annexation, why shouldn't they resist US and bear the suffer for their freedom and independence?    

I'm not telling Canada what to do,

if Canadians are keen to charge over the top when the whistle blows for the Liberal Party of Canada,

let them,

see what happens to veterans of Canadians wars therein, by all means

[CdnFox]

1 hour ago, eyeball said:

Judicious and intelligent.

 

Based on your track record I can see why you confuse the two but no

Quote

 And I said civilization not mankind...mankind isn't going anywhere. We're just about the weediest most invasive species on the planet.

Civilization will continue a pace as it always has. There are some good times and bad times but it is absolutely childish to pretend that somehow the concept of civilization is in decline.

[eyeball]

50 minutes ago, CdnFox said:

There are some good times and bad times but it is absolutely childish to pretend that somehow the concept of civilization is in decline.

You're definitely the best evidence of it around here.

[CdnFox]

3 hours ago, eyeball said:

You're definitely the best evidence of it around here.