There is a certain elegance and appeal of personal carbon quotas. Like democracy they are inherently equalizing. A challenge for carbon taxes is that they may allow the wealthy to buy their way our of change, when it is the most affluent who have the largest carbon footprints (a CCPA study is coming out next week on this topic). And […]
Read moreAt the recent PEF annual general meeting, we announced the winners of the 2008 PEF student essay contest. Thanks to Brenda Spotton Visano for coordinating this year’s contest. Graduate winner ($1,000 prize): “Healing a Crisis of Overaccumulation: How Canada’s Public Health Care System is Being Undermined through Accumulation by Disposession” by Heather Whiteside (Simon Fraser University) Honourable Mention : “Swedish […]
Read moreToday at the Canadian Economics Association meetings, the PEF officially awarded the first John Kenneth Galbraith Prize in Economics to co-winners Mel Watkins and Kari Polanyi Levitt. We had a packed room for the event, which featured opening remarks by Jamie Galbraith, and a historical retrospective of their works by Jim Stanford. Below is the text of Mel Watkins’ Lecture. […]
Read more… says Paul Krugman. And I’m in a session at the CEA confence on Keynes where the original quote just came up. Nothing new here to readers of this blog, but I like that Krugman is using his pulpit to deliver the message at a time when the Canadian government is on the verge of introducing legislation that would allow […]
Read moreCCPA submitted a brief to Vancouver City Council about the city’s EcoDensity Initiative, by myself and co-authors, Erick Villagomez, Penny Gurstein, David Eby and Elvin Wyly. We have been working on a bigger climate justice paper looking at affordable housing and EcoDensity, but a short window came up for written submissions on the revised and updated EcoDensity Charter, so we […]
Read moreToday’s release of first quarter GDP numbers shows a minus sign: Real gross domestic product (GDP) edged down 0.1% in the first quarter of 2008, its first quarterly decline since the second quarter of 2003. The economy, which had started to lose momentum in the second half of 2007 as exports declined, stalled in the first quarter due to widespread cutbacks in manufacturing, most notably […]
Read moreI have equivocated on carbon taxes vs cap-and-trade on this very blog. But more recently I’ve been leaning towards carbon tax – with the caveats that distribution be addressed and that carbon taxes be part of a suite of other policy measures. That is, carbon taxes are only part of the solution, so I am somewhere between the skeptics who […]
Read moreWe now have the official schedule for the CEA meetings. Please note that in addition to the sessions below, the PEF annual general meeting is on Saturday June 7 at noon. All paid-up members are welcome to attend. Also, the John Kenneth Galbraith Prize will be awarded on Sunday June 8, 10:30 am. The 2008 co-winners, Mel Watkins and Kari […]
Read moreThe Wellesley Institute blasts the federal Liberals on housing: Earlier today, the Liberal Urban Communities Caucus released a powerful report condemning the Conservative government of Stephen Harper, and calling for strong action. Eighteen years ago, almost to the day, the National Liberal Caucus Task Force on Housing released a powerful report that condemned the Conservative government of Brian Mulroney, and […]
Read moreIf you have visited this blog before you probably know that Erin Weir and I have it in for bogus arguments about alleged but unproven interprovincial trade barriers. Give us some examples, we say, but the rhetoric of trade barriers always seems to trump any actual evidence. And I’m not even talking about empirical evidence with a high degree of […]
Read moreIn his rabble.ca column, Duncan Cameron raises some concerns about carbon taxes: When Liberal leader, Stéphane Dion, floated the carbon tax idea in Toronto recently, Layton responded that such a tax would cause severe problems for poor and low income Canadians. May and Suzuki both support a carbon tax, and think its impact on the poor can be remedied through […]
Read moreGas prices are way up and look to continue that way looking forward. So what does this mean in terms of behavioural change? Todd Litman does a major review of all kinds of transportation elasticities. An excerpt: As it is usually measured, automobile travel is inelastic, meaning that a percentage price change causes a proportionally smaller change in vehicle mileage. […]
Read moreMy old classmate from Upper Canada College, Ed Rogers, was featured in a story in the Globe on the weekend. This gist is that Ed has been waiting a long time to assume the throne of the Rogers empire, but he does not a lock on the top job: Five years after taking the reins of the company’s cable division […]
Read more… if you are stinking rich. Quoth Associated Press: Cindy McCain, who two weeks ago said she would never make her tax returns public, revealed Friday that she had a total income of more than $6 million in 2006. The presidential campaign of her husband, Republican John McCain, released the top two summary pages of her 2006 tax return, eager […]
Read moreSometimes I wonder if I am going to miss Stephen Harper and Jim Flaherty when they are gone. It goes away pretty quickly, but I was reminded of their clever conservatism when I opened up the 2007 federal budget just now. Like the 2008 Budget, named “Responsible Leadership” the 2007 budget also had a name: ASPIRE to a Stronger, Safer, […]
Read moreSummer is coming and so is my favourite band, the Drive-By Truckers. A rare Vancouver appearance at a small venue, the Biltmore Caberet, walking distance from my house. Heck, last year I drove to Portland to see what turned out to be one of the best live shows of my life. I would make the case that DBT are currently […]
Read moreAt a meeting I was at the morning, Green Party deputy leader Adrienne Carr made a familiar refrain that a carbon tax is needed to help solve our transportation woes by making driving more expensive. I generally support a carbon tax, as long as the revenues are recycled in a manner that ensures that overall income inequality is not worsened […]
Read moreThe Fraser Institute says the debt monster is gonna getcha: The study, Canadian Government Debt 2008, shows that federal, provincial, and local governments have accumulated $791.2 billion in direct debt and more than $2.4 trillion in total government liabilities. Total liabilities include direct debt and programs that the government has committed to provide such as Old Age Security and Medicare […]
Read moreOK, not the “law of one price” you learned in undergrad trade theory. I’m talking about plain old prices at the cashier. It has long bugged me that the price listed on a sales tag is not the same as the money that comes out of our wallets to complete the transaction. Most of the time it is provincial and […]
Read moreIn policy terms I have been concerned about regressive impacts of a carbon tax, and was pleased to see that BC’s carbon tax is being partly recycled into refundable tax credits for low-income families. But the $10 per tonne carbon tax starting in July is rather small (2.4 cents per litre), and in spite of a tripling of the rate […]
Read moreWhen we think about renewable energy most of us imagine solar panels and wind mills. Few of us think about trees and crops. But these latter items are getting mainstreamed as new sources of energy – burning them for electricity generation and converting them into liquid fuels – with no small amount of controversy attached. The premise of bioenergy in […]
Read moreMargaret Wente, circa August 2005: The other day I stuck the nozzle in the tank of my dainty little SUV and paid for my first $50 fill. It was a shock, but I knew it was coming, and I know it’s going to get worse. … Theoretically, I know my car dependency is bad (and my SUV dependency is even […]
Read more … is homes. Check out this astonishing admission, as reported by CBC: St. Paul’s in downtown Vancouver, one out of every four beds is being used to treat the homeless, drug addicts and the mentally ill, said [Lorna Howes, the director of acute and community mental health for Vancouver with the Vancouver Coastal Health authority]. We are spending money on […]
Read moreLast December I testified before the Senate Special Committee on Aging, making the point that public health care need not fear an aging population. Today, I was invited back again to comment on their draft interim report and in particular the issue of how to address the fact that some provinces have a larger share of seniors than others, and […]
Read moreA salvo from our very own Nick Falvo in today’s Toronto Star: Outrageous but predictable violence Nick Falvo The murder trial of a group of Canadian Forces reservists accused of beating a homeless man to death has grabbed many a headline. But as disturbing as it has been for most of us to read about the trial, the incident could […]
Read moreI just got back from a week in New York City with my wife, in which, among other things, we went to see five Broadway shows (I know the best way to get cheap tickets now). It was during the intermission to Rent that it finally hit me that something must be done about a fundamental injustice in our society. […]
Read moreFinancial market speculation masquerading as investment is driving me crazy. The business press fails to understand the distinction between buying an asset the delivers a stream of income in the future (a dividend) and buying an asset because of anticipated higher resale price in the future (a capital gain). It is a fundamental difference, and while I have little objection […]
Read moreToday’s front page of the Globe and Mail business section calls out, Flaherty’s budget wiggle room shrinking.Which is indeed true, but what I find amusing is that I broke this story back in January. At the time, this was outside the consensus so many blew it off. But now that the mainstream has caught up, do I or any other […]
Read moreThe BC office of the CCPA released today a major study about life on welfare for the poorest of the poor. It tracked a cohort of welfare recipients for two years and tells the tales of how they have interacted with a nasty and mean-spirited welfare system, and also the challenges they face as people in getting and holding work […]
Read more A fascinating tidbit from today’s Statistics Canada release on human activity and the environment (climate change): In 2008, oilsands producers intend to invest $19.7 billion, up 23% after a 31% hike in 2007. This exceeds the total investment plans of $19.6 billion by all manufacturing industries [Chart 1.6 on page 25]. Oilsands investment has surpassed manufacturing because of its rapid […]
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