Canada no longer leading the G7 in economic growth
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Really, quibbling about spelling? :roll:
Personally I would have went with something like this:
Worthwhile Canadian Initiative: The federal deficit is shrinking
I wonder if those idiots in Ottawa (et al) would realize more consciously the reality if they had to write/type out all the 0s after the $ and the significant digits instead of just adding suffixes like "million", "billion", and "trillion". I mean $25.8 billion does not nearly look as impressive as $25,800,000,000.
The figures for GDP have been rigged for a long time, as have statistics for real unemployment. Essentially the GDP is inundated with completely gratuitous economic activity associated with passing around script representing ownership or claims on ownership, and not real industrial activity. There are two economies now.. a parallel or shadow economy of banking, trade and investment.. and a real productive economy. Canada's real productive economy has been in decline for decades.. so don't trust the glowing figures of growth the government puts out. Only a small group of financiers and their henchmen are profiting from it. It acts as a parasite on the real economy, sucking its lifeblood.. the rest of us divvying up the crumbs they leave over.
What do ya mean? Thats just 258 followed by a whole bunch of nuthin' :lol:
Don't hold your breath! :lol:
Conservative spending cuts could tip Canada into recession
OTTAWA — The Conservative government could tip Canada into a recession if it reduces federal spending by up to $8 billion, says an analysis by the union representing government economists and social scientists.
Claude Poirier, president of the Canadian Association of Professional Employees, said that if the Conservatives press ahead with spending reductions of $8 billion by 2014-15, Canada’s gross domestic product will fall by more than $10 billion and draw an embattled economy into a recession.
“Either the government isn’t aware of the impact its expenditure reduction program will have and is prepared to risk plunging the country into recession, or the government has not gauged this impact properly and is tinkering with the Canadian economy to satisfy an ideological imperative,” said Poirier.
The results of the spending and operational spending review that will be announced in the upcoming budget have been kept under wraps under the guise of cabinet secrecy. With few details about the cuts, unions and other organizations have been struggling to estimate the job losses and their ripple effect on the Canadian economy.
Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page said the government has released so few details about the upcoming cuts that it is difficult to come up with much more than rough guess.
“It is unclear to me on how one can do a reasonable job estimating economic and fiscal impacts and public service employment impacts of the government’s austerity package when we have no details,” he said.
CAPE launched its study months ago to get a handle on the economic impact of the government’s spending cuts. It was conducted by economists using data from Statistics Canada, as well as data generated by an economic model used by federal departments and agencies.
The study concluded that any spending reduction will have an immediate impact on Canada’s economic growth and will be felt more strongly in some regions more than in others.
The study also examined the impact of $8-billion reduced spending on GDP by industry. The hardest hit sector is the finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing sector, which will lose about $1.2 billion. The retail sector in Ontario could lose more than $161 million, while B.C.’s financial industry could lose $133 million. In manufacturing, Ontario could lose $182 million, with losses of $131 million in Quebec.
Poirier blames the deficit on bad fiscal decision-making. He said the government is pitching the cuts as necessary to eliminate the deficit while glossing over the tax cuts that deprived the government of billions in revenues. Reducing the GST to five per cent cost $13.4 billion in foregone revenue, along with $1.5 billion in reduced corporate taxes.
Those decisions shifted the “burden of fighting the deficit” to Canadian taxpayers who will now be forced to live with fewer services, he said.
Conservative spending cuts could tip Canada into recession
OTTAWA — The Conservative government could tip Canada into a recession if it reduces federal spending by up to $8 billion, says an analysis by the union representing government economists and social scientists.
Claude Poirier, president of the Canadian Association of Professional Employees, said that if the Conservatives press ahead with spending reductions of $8 billion by 2014-15, Canada’s gross domestic product will fall by more than $10 billion and draw an embattled economy into a recession.
“Either the government isn’t aware of the impact its expenditure reduction program will have and is prepared to risk plunging the country into recession, or the government has not gauged this impact properly and is tinkering with the Canadian economy to satisfy an ideological imperative,” said Poirier.
The results of the spending and operational spending review that will be announced in the upcoming budget have been kept under wraps under the guise of cabinet secrecy. With few details about the cuts, unions and other organizations have been struggling to estimate the job losses and their ripple effect on the Canadian economy.
Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page said the government has released so few details about the upcoming cuts that it is difficult to come up with much more than rough guess.
“It is unclear to me on how one can do a reasonable job estimating economic and fiscal impacts and public service employment impacts of the government’s austerity package when we have no details,” he said.
CAPE launched its study months ago to get a handle on the economic impact of the government’s spending cuts. It was conducted by economists using data from Statistics Canada, as well as data generated by an economic model used by federal departments and agencies.
The study concluded that any spending reduction will have an immediate impact on Canada’s economic growth and will be felt more strongly in some regions more than in others.
The study also examined the impact of $8-billion reduced spending on GDP by industry. The hardest hit sector is the finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing sector, which will lose about $1.2 billion. The retail sector in Ontario could lose more than $161 million, while B.C.’s financial industry could lose $133 million. In manufacturing, Ontario could lose $182 million, with losses of $131 million in Quebec.
Poirier blames the deficit on bad fiscal decision-making. He said the government is pitching the cuts as necessary to eliminate the deficit while glossing over the tax cuts that deprived the government of billions in revenues. Reducing the GST to five per cent cost $13.4 billion in foregone revenue, along with $1.5 billion in reduced corporate taxes.
Those decisions shifted the “burden of fighting the deficit” to Canadian taxpayers who will now be forced to live with fewer services, he said.
Conservative spending cuts could tip Canada into recession
The Liberal spending cuts led to a recession too, and I still supported them. Are you suggesting that unsustainable growth is preferable to sustainability?
Now I will agree at least in principle that tax reductions were not too bright an idea either, and for that the Conservatives are to blame. That does not change the fact that we need to reduce spending nonetheless.
How is borrow-and-spend any more sustainable?
There are ways of cutting spending while avoiding a deflationary spiral:
1. lower the bank rate,
2. in the event that you've lowered the Bank of Canada rate right down to zero and are still experiencing deflation, print as much money as is necessary to counter the deflation (and no more, of course),
3. eliminate minimum-wage legislation and other impediments to employment.
I never said it was black and white like that.
Somehow, people on this board like to believe you're either a tax and spend leftist or hack n' slash tightie rightie.
I don't disagree with spending, unless it's wasteful spending on services that people don't want or need. And I don't disagree with cuts unless they put us into recession (which is what this article suggests).
But I'm saying it's easy enough to counteract the effects of the recession. Remember, in a recession prices will likely fall, so lowering minimum wage could help, and absolute worst case scenarion in the event of an free-fall deflationary spiral, the government could print money in moderation.
Mild recession is no more harmful than moderate debt or moderate inflation or moderately high bank rates. It's even better than exorbitant debt and inflation.
Recession is no more ideal than let's say debt and inflation. But we can also ask ourselves why we need to get into debt and inflation and high interest rates in the first place.
Often it's like a seesaw. If we lower interest rates, print money and borrow, we can fight recession at a cost. By cutting spending and raising taxes we can fight inflation, debt and high interest rates at a cost. It's a trade-off. However, sometimes the government does have other tools at its disposal to try within reason to avoid all these ills, though usually there will be a price to pay in terms of high taxes which I'm not necessarily against either.
Right, and I don't disagree with cutting the right amount for the right things and changing tax rates to the right amount for the right things either.
I just think we can do it in such a way that continues GDP growth to pull us out of deficit. I have no problem with it being an incremental growth to ensure sustainability. There may even be the opportunity to create economic growth drastically in the short term without any fiscal kick-back or loss of environmental stewardship as well.
I disagree with the government even trying to "grow" the economy. It ought to focus on sustainability, and if the economy grows, bonus.
Generally speaking, I won't blame a government for slow growth any more than I'll credit it for rapid growth, since often that growth is the result of policies passed decades ago only now starting to come to fruition, along with the state of the global economy and luck.
I'd rather credit or criticise the government for things more within its short-term control, such as keeping inflation down, paying off the debt, and keeping the Bank rate down. I also expect long-term planning from the government, such as investing generously in universal compulsory education (funding for education on our reserves is atrocious!), promoting free labour-movement agreements, promoting common educational standards for various trades and professions across jurisdictional boundaries, lowering the minimum-wage, and other measures to remove obstacles to employment. But again, usually the benefits aren't felt for decades, only for some other government decades later to take the credit. But honestly, what kind of long-term investment are the Conservatives doing? There is free trade agreements harper's working on, and I applaud him for that, but then he undermines it with his prison and military industries.