Let’s Worry About Skills, Not Outsourcing
– April 15, 2013
If you landed back in Canada this week from outer space, or even southern Florida, you’d be forgiven for thinking you’d hit a wormhole in time and that it was actually 1990. A debate is raging about whether business should outsource jobs if it makes the business more profitable. Wait, you might think, we settled this long ago. And except when it becomes campaign trail rhetoric in America, we understand that outsourcing is not a bad thing.
Obama’s Reactionary Jobs Plan
– February 21, 2013
Does it bother anyone else that the president of the United States seems to believe that our collective future entails assembling battery parts in a government-subsidized factory for $9 an hour? Is that really what Americans envision for their kids -- an assembly line? Because when you look past Barack Obama's mesmerizingly hollow rhetoric, what he's proposing is a return of jobs that progress and prosperity have left behind.
Hey, Mitt, Voters Aren't the Obstacle
– September 26, 2012
Voters are not the primary obstacle to reform. Forty-five-year-olds don't rise in revolt because somebody proposes raising the retirement age decades from now. One of the fastest growing federal liabilities is the Social Security disability system. Advocates for the disabled actually criticize the program for not doing more to get recipients back into jobs and off the dole.
The Trials of a Democratic Reformer
– September 13, 2012
Former Los Angeles Lakers Coach Phil Jackson once referred to Sacramento as a "cowtown," but Gloria Romero, a pro-labor Democrat who served as California's Senate majority leader from 2001 to 2008, takes exception to the belittling description. The capitol building in Sacramento, she says, has "the eighth most powerful economy in the world under that dome," and it operates not unlike other wealthy kleptocracies. "There's no other way to say it politely. It's owned."
Why not let Quebec manage its own EI?
– August 28, 2012
PQ Leader Pauline Marois says that if she becomes the next premier of Quebec she will demand that Ottawa transfer jurisdictions to Quebec, starting with employment insurance. In her mind, she wins either way. Ottawa’s agreement makes the “Quebec state” more powerful and readier for independence; Ottawa’s refusal proves that Quebec can never fulfill its legitimate aspirations within Canada.
How Big Government and Big Business Squeeze Entrepreneurs
– August 20, 2012
Wisconsin's Elmer Kilian wants the chance to earn an honest living. So do Nevada's Lissette Waugh, Florida's Silvio Membreno and countless other entrepreneurs who have the drive and ability to put themselves and others to work.
Ontario's Tories take on the Unions — and It's About Time
– June 29, 2012
Recently the Toronto Star has been entertaining its readers with a series of stories on how work gets done at the Toronto District School Board: $143 to install a pencil sharpener, $2,900 to install an electrical outlet, that kind of thing.
Obama Abandons (Private) Labor
– November 18, 2011
The decision by the Obama administration to "delay" building the Keystone XL pipeline is a watershed moment in American politics. The implication of a policy choice rarely gets more stark than this. Put simply: Why should any blue-collar worker who isn't hooked for life to a public budget vote for Barack Obama next year?
We Don’t Have to Surrender to Public-Sector Unions
– October 27, 2011
In the Great Depression, Franklin Roosevelt declared categorically that he would not give government workers the right to strike. “A strike of public employees manifests nothing less than an intention on their part to obstruct the operation of government until their demands are satisfied,” he said.
The Fall of the Midwest Economic Model
– August 22, 2011
President Obama has kicked off a three-day bus tour of Minnesota, Iowa and Illinois, where the corn is high and at least some factories are spewing smoke. He's holding town-hall meetings on the economy, putting the unemployed back to work and "growing wages for everyone." He won these Midwestern states handily in 2008, but he's not taking anything for granted these days. The Midwest is the region with the largest number of target states.
Private-Public Wage Disparities
– June 23, 2011
Years ago, I told my sister once people realized how much they were paying public servants such as her, there would be a full scale revolt. Factoring in the short work days, thrice annual long vacations, professional development days, retirement at age 55, and wildly generous pensions, no one of comparable education makes nearly as much on an hourly basis.
A Welfare State or a Start-Up Nation?
– June 17, 2011
Who you vote for in the next election will largely be determined by how you answer the following question: Should we encourage more productive use of resources or more social welfare?
Virtual Assistants - Location No Barrier!
– June 8, 2011
When Greg Cole decided he needed an extra assistant, he resolved to look for a Virtual Assistant. But this VA needed to be different from the two assistants he already had - specifically, they needed to be located in Australia to take advantage of the time difference.
What Canadians Want
– May 5, 2011
Canadian Conservative Party leader Stephen Harper's landslide victory in Monday's election, capturing the first center-right majority since 1988, is a tutorial in economics as much as politics. Aspiring Presidential candidates south of the 49th parallel, please take note.
Cameron's Multicultural Wake-Up Call
– February 21, 2011
Finally, Europe's mainstream party leaders seem to be realizing what others have long noticed: Multiculturalism has been the most pernicious and divisive policy pursued by Western governments since World War II.
Ministry of Silly Feminist Numbers
– January 26, 2011
"Statistics Canada’s latest contribution to the gender wars was eagerly seized upon by feminists as further evidence of women’s inequality. The agency recently summarized findings from the latest Women in Canada report that shows that women with university degrees earned 30% less than men."
Government 'Fixes' Only Worsen Problems
– January 5, 2011
"Songs that are "golden oldies" have much less pleasant counterparts in politics — namely, ideas and policies that have failed disastrously in the past but still keep coming back to be advocated and imposed by government."
Pension Riots Brewing in Canada?
– December 8, 2010
"Are you saving $14,180 a year for your pension? That is how much you would have needed to save – every year for the last 35 years – to pay yourself a pension equal to that of a federal public servant retiring today. That’s a lot of money and precisely why taxpayers are on the hook for an unfunded federal pension liability of $208 billion, according to a recent C.D. Howe Institute report."
Defying Trend, Canada Lures More Migrants
– November 24, 2010
"As waves of immigrants from the developing world remade Canada a decade ago, the famously friendly people of Manitoba could not contain their pique. What irked them was not the Babel of tongues, the billions spent on health care and social services, or the explosion of ethnic identities. The rub was the newcomers’ preference for “M.T.V.” — Montreal, Toronto or Vancouver — over the humble prairie province north of North Dakota, which coveted workers and population growth."
Cuba to Cut State Jobs in Tilt Toward Free Market
– September 17, 2010
"Cuba will lay off more than half a million state workers and try to create hundreds of thousands of private-sector jobs, a dramatic attempt by the hemisphere's only Communist country to shift its nearly bankrupt economy toward a more market-oriented system." |
