Contributed by Robert Lyman © 2024. Robert Lyman’s bio can be read here.
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Like an ocean liner approaching icebergs, the Canadian economy is in dangerous waters as it enters 2024.
https://blog.friendsofscience.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/01/SS-CANADA-IN-DANGER-FINAL.pdf
Real gross domestic product (GDP) per person is barely growing and the OECD has projected Canada’s long-term growth (i.e. to 2060 and beyond) in GDP per capita as the worst (the worst!) among the developed countries. Capital invested in the economy per worker has been falling, as are productivity and living standards.
https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/what-is-behind-canadas-growth-crisis.pdf
The situation is made worse by the Trudeau government’s fiscal, economic and environmental policies. The oil and gas industry, long the powerhouse of the resource sector, has cut its reinvestment of income in half and instead allocates more funds to buying back shares and increasing dividends. The manufacturing sectors are being hollowed out by ever-higher electricity prices in some provinces and by ever-more-stringent regulatory reviews that delay or impede new resource and infrastructure projects. The Trudeau government has proudly embraced the goal of reducing Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2050, completely ignoring the enormous costs of and technological barriers to that goal, and the fact that attaining it would have little impact on global emissions driven by economic development trends in Asia.
As we enter 2024, we should ponder the long list of new environment-related measures that the federal government plans to undertake this year. The rate of the carbon tax (and its evil twin, the Output Based Pricing System imposed on industry) is scheduled to rise on April 1st to $80 per tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent. Environment and Climate Change Canada plans several more regulatory changes that will adversely affect business, homeowners and consumers. The federal government probably will pass legislation to protect “nature and biodiversity” that will further harm investment and development and require financial institutions to impose onerous “net-zero” planning and reporting requirements on the firms to which they lend.
No doubt there will be other bad news events arising from the “net-zero” mandates given to publicly owned electric utilities and provincial agencies that regulate electricity and natural gas utilities.
Well-funded environmental organizations may use their influence to promote ending the use of natural gas; subsidizing electric vehicles, heat pumps and wind and solar energy; impeding the certification of all hydrocarbons-related infrastructure; and supporting lawsuits that will convert anti-economy policies into legislative requirements. They are pursuing the anti-plastics agenda with almost religious intensity. The Canadian ship of state is in danger, and there are no safe harbours in sight.
What to do?
Sadly –you’r right!!!!!!!!