RE: Immigration a key to maintaining Saskatchewan's Boom — November 7, 2011

We have the manpower in our country to fill the labour shortages and to replace aging Baby Boomers.  Our Aboriginal reserves in most instances have well over 80% unemployed simply because in most of the reserve areas there are few, if any other employers. Our government has failed to bite the bullet and should have long before this indicated that each family would be provided a reasonable sized home in the city or larger towns nearest to the reserves. Social assistance and training of employable family members would fill the shortages to replace aging Baby Boomers as referred to in this email from the Frontier Centre.  The family members in return would have to give up their current rights to live on the reserves.

The unemployment problems existing on most of the reserves would then be resolved and the aboriginals could integrate into our society for the benefit of all involved – as have our past immigrants to our country have done and continue to do when they come to Canada.

Stephen Marlowe
Edmonton, Alberta

RE: Culturally-Driven Violence Against Women: A growing problem in Canada’s immigrant communities — July 20, 2010

Thank you for your very timely essay about culture-driven abuse of women. You expressed very clearly the problems facing anyone who wants to promote the laws in Canada to protect all citizens. I am an older woman who sees some of our progress towards equal rights for all, being eroded because of political correctness .  I hope many Canadians who read your article will know the terrible consequences of ignoring this problem.... I am a retired teacher and was surprised by the school's playground policy . Thank you again. - Elaine Peterson, Vancouver

RE: Culturally-Driven Violence Against Women: A growing problem in Canada’s immigrant communities — July 19, 2010

Thank you for your excellent column in the Toronto Star, July 15.
What you're saying needs to be said, and it doesn't appear that anyone else has the intelligent grasp of it that you have.
I like how you said that even among the most well-meaning advocates for female equality tends to preclude discussions of cultural values and traditions, because I know a woman just like that, extremely well-informed and intelligent, but not beneath stepping far, far back when culture is thrown into the mix.
Thanks again for your thorough and truthful article.
Please keep up your advocacy and your teaching of us, the public, of this very real and deadly clash of cultures/ideology. - E-mail from Toronto

RE: Poverty Policies Tend to Impoverish — September 15, 2007
Perhaps letter writer Andrew Bonner should have taken more than just a quick glance around the world when discussing the successes and failures of laissez-faire economics. Ironically, the letter writer lives in London, England, which is proving to be one of the great success stories of laissez-faire economics in the past quarter century. Through reduced regulation and an increased focus on attracting foreign investment, this centre has reversed its general decline and is now, arguably, the most important financial centre in the world and certainly in Europe. Yet another success story is a short plane trip away in Ireland, where economic growth rates have been among the highest in Europe for years, due in large part to low taxation and low government spending policies. Meanwhile, on the continent, in the so-called high-tax countries of France, Italy and Germany, economic growth has been stagnant, resulting in high unemployment and social discourse. Even Sweden, which is often cited by proponents of social welfare policies, has felt the rising pressures on its fiscal policies. In light of this, the people of Sweden recently elected a more fiscally conservative government, as did the French and Germans. It is incorrect to blindly state that the best way to alleviate poverty is the inefficient and wasteful social welfare systems currently in place in Canada and Manitoba. - Letter to editor, Winnipeg Free Press, Craig White, Winnipeg

RE: Poverty Policies Tend to Impoverish — September 13, 2007
If Holle prefers to live in a society in which the people's elected representatives can't intervene in the economy for the common good, he need not push it on us all. He could just move to Guatemala. - Letter to editor, Winnipeg Free Press, Andrew Bonner, London England

RE: The Minimum Wage - Forbidding People to Work — February 8, 2005

One of your best articles yet, and one of the most convincing on the minimum wage issue, and ending with a possible solution. - Email from Winnipeg

Media Release - Public Administration Wage Growth
In light of these theoretical explanations for excessive wage growth for government workers, the empirical reality of anomalously rapid government wage growth deserves careful scrutiny. While we should remain open to the possibility of benign explanations, the phenomenon should be examined carefully by governments to determine the role of union influence and rent seeking.

Canada's Contract Killer
Administration of Canadian tax laws make being self-employed very difficult, and in many instances probably impossible. Much of it comes down to the way the self-employed are treated by the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA), which often wrongly labels the self-employed as employees.

Media Release - Removing Occupational Barriers to Entry for Immigrants to Canada
This volume explores various policy options that could facilitate liberalization of the regulated professions, so that foreign-trained workers are no longer prevented from practising their occupations. Canada’s provincial and federal governments must cooperate now to ensure that foreign-trained workers are no longer “admitted but excluded.

When People Control Their State Pension
Mexico finds itself in a dilemma similar to Canada's. Its state pension plan's unfunded liability equals 80 per cent of the country's Gross Domestic Product. The Canada Pension Plan is just as shaky. Unfortunately, our leaders are dealing with the CPP's own $600 billion unfunded liability in an uncreative way. They are doubling payroll taxes while keeping control of the money firmly within the hands of a small, anonymous group of Ottawa civil servants who will invest the money on behalf of millions of Canadians.

CPP's False Alternatives
Over time, it became clear that leaving the CPP fund in the public sector was a mistake. The money would have captured a far higher rate of return if it had been invested almost anywhere else. In fact, if private markets had handled the money Canadian retirees could have enjoyed pensions that are close to double the present level.

Managed Competition – The Phoenix Experience
Over a period of time, the City of Phoenix was successful in developing a process of public-private competitive bidding that achieved a high level of credibility. In a ten-year period between 1978 and 1988, the competitive process saved the city in excess of $25 million. Initially the city lost one-half of the solid waste program to private firms, but by 1988, the city had won back all contracts and returned to 100% city provided residential solid waste collection services.

Media Release - Suicide Among Young Women of South Asian Origin
Young South Asian women living in Canada have been identified as a demographic group marked by increased conflict with their parents due to cultural disagreements. Although increased conflict during adolescence is a relevant concern across Canada, issues affecting young South Asian women in particular need to be explored, as there is limited research regarding problems among them.

Qantas and Air Canada: A tale of two airlines
This is demonstrated in a key item of Air Canada’s industrial negotiations. Much of the battle is over management's desire to reduce the expensive pension scheme weighing heavily on Air Canada’s costs. Unions won’t budge. It’s really a fight by an aging workforce (understandably) desperate to secure retirement incomes. The fight shows the entrenched Air Canada staff attitude of viewing the airline as already defunct. They're not fighting for an airline with a future, but instead are fighting over how it dies.

Awakening to Tragedy Among Young Female South Asians
What plagues the South Asian community has significance for the wider Canadian population. Immigrants with origin in the Indian sub-continent make up the second-largest non-European ethnic group in Canada. They are 3% of the total majority born outside of Canada. By 2017 it is estimated that this population could more than double from roughly 1.3 million in 2006 to between 3.2 million and 4.1 million.