Archive for the ‘Policy Context’ Category
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Free-market ‘rationalism’ turned Canada from champ to chump
Sunday, February 26th, 2012
February 26, 2012
From Korea to Finland, China to the Netherlands, Brazil to Germany, countries which actively direct and manage growth seem to perform better in productivity, innovation, and global trade. These countries have fostered investment and innovation with focused sector strategies; deliberately favourable capital market, exchange rate, and trade policies; and sophisticated efforts to manage income distribution so that productivity growth visibly translates into higher living standards
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, poverty, rights, standard of living
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Pain Without Gain
Sunday, February 26th, 2012
Feb. 19, 2012
The confidence fairy has failed to show up: none of the countries slashing spending have seen the predicted private-sector surge. Instead, the depressing effects of fiscal austerity have been reinforced by falling private spending… Why? Because spending cuts have deeply depressed their economies, undermining their tax bases to such an extent that the ratio of debt to G.D.P., the standard indicator of fiscal progress, is getting worse rather than better.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living, tax
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Get Ontario to work
Thursday, February 23rd, 2012
Feb. 22, 2012
Drummond got it wrong. Indeed, while MPPs are literally debating his proposed cuts right now, they should be considering a different type of cut: to Ontario’s long list of barriers to job creation and economic growth… Drummond dismisses any hope of robust growth, claiming that the province can’t beat 2% annually in the coming years… It’s true that Ontario wastes billions, but cuts alone won’t save it… Ontario needs a systematic attack on job-killing labour laws, time-consuming approval processes, and overly strict regulations.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living, tax
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Caterpillar fiasco highlights failure of economic and social policy
Tuesday, February 14th, 2012
Feb 13 2012
The factory operated profitably and productively for decades. Then suddenly its workers and the whole community were confronted by an uninvited visitor — who barged in, demanded money, and then left, leaving a shuttered plant and immeasurable social despair in its wake… Caterpillar had no sooner digested its new subsidiary, than it began shifting production to Indiana (where new right-to-work laws effectively ban unions) and Mexico… moving jobs out of Canada won’t stop Caterpillar from raking in billions in revenue here… Yet nothing was demanded from Caterpillar in return for this largesse
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, rights, standard of living, tax
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Why we’re seeing the ugly new face of capitalism
Tuesday, February 14th, 2012
Feb. 14, 2012
The implicit deal is that lower taxes create more investment and competitive cost structures create more demand. Both supposedly create more (good-paying) jobs. Lower taxes, check. Lower payroll costs, check. More good-paying jobs here at home: Insert sound of crickets chirping… in Canada, federal taxes on profits had fallen to 16.6 per cent by fiscal 2010-11 after briefly dipping to 13.2 per cent in 2008, a level not seen since the Great Depression… Unlike the 1930s, corporate profits in Canada have rebounded since the 2008-9 crisis, nearing the previous high water mark… Despite growth, there is no shortage of profitable firms telling workers they can keep their jobs only if they agree to get less.
Tags: economy, featured, globalization, ideology, standard of living, tax
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Buy North American and save ourselves
Monday, February 13th, 2012
Feb. 13, 2012
Few Americans know that the two key markets for their exports and source of energy imports are Canada and Mexico. Our trade with each other enhances our collective competitiveness because many of those goods are jointly produced with parts from all three countries. Thus, the best way to multiply our exports and accelerate growth would be to create a seamless market…
Tags: economy, globalization, standard of living
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Ottawa outsources the attack on the middle class
Monday, February 6th, 2012
Jan.6, 2012
… it is time for an end to the scattershot, no-strings-attached tax breaks being tossed from Stephen Harper’s government to large multinationals that are using it to drive down the standard of living in this country. Friday’s closing of the Electro-Motive Diesel plant is simply the most egregious example of taxpayers’ funds being used to try to bust unions or ship jobs out of the country… Under the Investment Canada Act, such takeovers are supposed to demonstrate a “net benefit” to Canada, but, in fact, are acting as an anvil on wages, living standards and the prosperity of communities in central Canada.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living
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Caterpillar closing part of a coordinated attack on unions
Sunday, February 5th, 2012
Feb 03 2012
Since it locked out 460 Canadian workers in January, the giant U.S. firm had made little secret of its intent to move their jobs to Muncie, Indiana. All it was waiting for, apparently, was a signal that the state government there was serious about crippling trade unions. The London plant closing is not an isolated event. It is part of a coordinated attack across North America on unions and wages… But the attack on wages is also being aided and abetted by governments. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s government is blatantly anti-union. Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty’s government is simply useless.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living
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Made in the World
Sunday, February 5th, 2012
Jan. 28, 2012
‘Let’s send some software generation overseas.’ This is not the outsourcing we’re doing today… 96 percent of our potential new customers today live outside of America.” That’s the rest of the world. And if companies like Dell want to sell to them… it needs to design and manufacture some parts of its products in their countries… But America can thrive in this world… either imagining products, designing products, marketing products, orchestrating the supply chain for products, manufacturing high-end products and retailing products. If we get our share, we’ll do fine.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living
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‘China Syndrome’ rears head in coming U.S. election
Friday, February 3rd, 2012
Feb. 02, 2012
The truth is we are no longer living in “one nation under God” – we are living in one world under God. Globalization is working – the world over all is getting richer. But a lot of the costs of that transition are being borne by specific groups of workers in the developed West… The irony today is that the real internationalists are no longer the bleeding-heart liberals, they are the cutthroat titans of capital… Smart policy, however, can make a big difference… Americans might want to study how Germany has turned the China Syndrome to the benefit of both its chief executives and its blue-collar workers.
Tags: economy, globalization, standard of living
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