Opinions
Innovation key to Ontario's prosperity
Len Crispino & Matthew Mendelsohn
January 26, 2012
The 20th century was a good one for Ontario. Its prosperity was founded on a strong manufacturing base, its proximity to American markets, a rich natural environment and its position as the centre of Canadian economic and political power — power it was not afraid to wield in order to secure favourable federal policies. That era is over. The...
Employment Insurance for modern times
January 18, 2012
Last year turned out to be a disappointing year for employment growth in Canada. The year was also indicative of the broader structural changes that have been underway in our labour force for a long time. Unfortunately, the federal Employment Insurance system can't accommodate the "new normal" in our labour market. Premiers are meeting today in Victoria...
Federal health role is about more than money
January 10, 2012
Jim Flaherty’s surprise health announcement last month was clear, principled and financially generous: 6 per cent through 2016-17, and then to 2024 increases at nominal GDP growth, but never below 3 per cent, even if economic growth lags. This provides known long-term funding and is more than provinces could have reasonably expected from the...
Providing shelter for the unemployed
November 30, 2011
Canada’s employment insurance system is a vestige of Old Canada, antiquated debates about national unity and outdated understandings of the labour market. Modern Canada needs a system consistent with new regional realities and the new world of work. Modern Canada needs a system that promotes a shared sense of citizenship. Canada once featured...
What can fiscally constrained governments do to improve undergraduate education?
November 11, 2011
Anxiety about the quality of undergraduate education is much in the news. American studies like those described in the recent book, Academically Adrift, have suggested that, for many students, four years of university produces no measurable improvement in writing skills, critical thinking or complex reasoning. In Canada, class sizes keep increasing...
How To Reform Health Care
November 1, 2011
The story has become too familiar: health-care spending is skyrocketing and governments are struggling to find money to pay the bills. With current trends, health care would account for 80 per cent of Ontario’s budget in 2030. These “straight line of death” projections lead quickly to the conclusion that we either need new revenues...
Canada's unequal voters
Sujit Choudhry & Matthew Mendelsohn
November 1, 2011
Here’s a little-known fact: we don’t have real voter equality in Canada. And here’s another: last week, the federal government introduced the Fair Representation Act that will begin to correct this problem. Canadians in three provinces — Ontario, Alberta and British Columbia — live in ridings that are much larger than...
Only the Federal Government Can Beat Gridlock
October 28, 2011
Canada’s mayors want a national transit strategy. Prominent organizations, including the Canadian Chamber of Commerce, the Canadian Urban Transit Association and the Toronto Board of Trade are all agitating for one. NDP MP Olivia Chow has proposed a bill in the House of Commons to create one. And critically, there are signs that the federal government...
Canada’s Innovation Underperformance: Whose Policy Problem is It?
October 18, 2011
For three decades Canada has been supporting innovation primarily through one of the most generous tax incentive policies in the world, one that currently represents about C$ 4.7 billion in foregone federal tax revenue per year. The failure of this policy, however, is clear to anyone who has been paying attention to the many published reports. They...
Economy, Ontario: Have not province
September 20, 2011
Ontario’s recent descent into equalization-payment receiving, or “have-not” status is not due to the state of its revenues alone. It is due to other provinces’ revenues, as well. Ontario is a manufacturing powerhouse, operating largely in North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) economic space. It has suffered from both...
A good start toward rational health-care billing
August 16, 2011
Last Friday, Ontario’s Ministry of Health made a low-key announcement: “The province and the Ontario Medical Association have improved the final year of the four-year Physician Services Agreement by making changes that will deliver better health-care results for families, reduce the use of unnecessary medical procedures and allow for...
Boosting the Great Lakes International Economy
July 18, 2011
The regions on both sides of the Great Lakes international border need to team up to strengthen their highly integrated economies. That was the conclusion of over 250 public and private leaders from both the United States and Canada recently brought together by Brookings and the University of Toronto Mowat Centre in Detroit-Windsor. The tone was...
The Great Lakes can lead the world
June 17, 2011
The Great Recession ended two years ago this month, but many countries around the world are still reeling from its economic devastation. Moving forward, every country must fundamentally re-examine its economic growth model, and build a different kind of economy. For the United States and Canada, this means transitioning to a "next economy" that...
Overcharged for health care
June 15, 2011
One of the biggest challenges facing our health-care system is what to do about declining costs. No, that was not a typo. The actual cost of many services and procedures has been spiralling downward — yet the amount provincial governments spend on health care has been spiralling upward. How can this be? Let’s take a look at one...
Budget 2011 continues inequities in federal support for working Canadians
June 9, 2011
As promised, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has re-introduced the pre-election 2011 federal budget with “minor tweaks.” This is bad news for those who care about fairness in the EI system and federal support for working Canadians. The present approach is at odds with a modern, equitable Canada. Working Canadians with equivalent yearly incomes...
The best investment in the world
John Austin & Matthew Mendelsohn
June 6, 2011
Regions will be just as important as nation-states in ensuring the wellbeing of communities in the coming decades. The Great Lakes-St. Lawrence region - made up of the eight states and two provinces (Quebec and Ontario) that surround these great waters - has everything necessary to succeed in this new world. Regions are becoming more important because...
The sun is setting on Sunbelt hockey
May 24, 2011
The National Hockey League's 2005 Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) was supposed to have fixed all of this. A lockout cost the league its 2004-'05 season, but at the end of the day the owners and the players reached a deal that promised labour peace and financial stability. Labour peace they got, but financial stability? Not so much. The NHL finds...
Self-fulfilling prophets of health-care doom
May 15, 2011
During the election campaign, all federal party leaders agreed that spending more money on health care is good. They fell all over themselves proclaiming their party was most likely to continue increasing spending by 6 per cent a year. There was no real debate about how to improve or reform health care, just a political argument about who is best...
Finally, good news for Ontario
May 9, 2011
The federal election results are good news for Ontario. The province is in play for federal parties. We should use that power. Real damage has been done to Ontario’s economy over the past 20 years by Liberals who have taken the province for granted, Conservatives who had active contempt for the GTA and the NDP, which was not a serious...
When is $500 not $500?
May 9, 2011
When it is a tax credit introduced in a federal Budget. Most tax credits, including the ones just announced in the 2011 Budget, are designed as ‘non-refundable credits.’ This design means that recipients of these tax benefits do not receive any direct cash payment. Rather, they obtain their benefit in the form of an income tax reduction...
The Lessons From the Election
May 8, 2011
Il existe deux règles irréfutables dans la politique électorale canadienne: une vieille règle et une nouvelle. Et les libéraux n'ont compris ni l'une ni l'autre. L'ancienne règle, c'est que les partis doivent posséder une base régionale solide... quelque part. Les conservateurs ont une base...
Canada’s EI regional lottery
Vuk Radmilovic & Josh Hjartarson
April 19, 2011
Canada’s employment insurance program is a postal code lottery — your winnings (if any) largely depend on your address. In this respect, the program is unique internationally. A recent study done for the Mowat Centre Employment Insurance Task Force compares Canada with 17 OECD countries. It is only in Canada that your region plays an integral...
Double standard on energy
April 15, 2011
The federal government spends billions of dollars every year on the nation’s energy sector, except, that is, on the portions that happen to be in Ontario. It is in Canada’s interest that the federal approach to energy support the sector in all regions, including Ontario. Right now, the federal government’s energy strategy is heavily...
Ontario Budget: It Takes Two to Untangle
April 6, 2011
Ontario’s recent budget announcement contains a not-so-subtle hint at future government savings. The message: now is the time to reduce the costly and inefficient duplication of federal and provincial programs. A subsection of the March 29 budget, titled Reforming Public Service Delivery, signals that the province is finally ready to take a hard...
Ontario's 3 simple questions
March 27, 2011
Many Canadians apparently don’t want this federal election. The risk is that voters tune out. This could yield tragic results for Ontarians because it may be the most important election for Ontario since the free trade election of 1988 — which fundamentally altered Ontario’s economic landscape. Ontario’s economy is again under...
A New Agenda for Non-Profits
Elizabeth Mulholland & Matthew Mendelsohn
March 14, 2011
Last week, the Government of Ontario announced measures to help put charities and non-profits on firmer financial footing. This includes allowing them more ways to generate revenues through entrepreneurship or "social enterprise." A Minister responsible for the sector is being created. A number of other provinces, like BC, are undertaking similar...
Bringing coherence to our fragmented EI system
January 24, 2011
Canada's Employment Insurance program is beset with many problems. While the program has evolved substantially since its introduction, its modern iteration has been distorted by partisan politics and ad hoc adjustments designed to put out small, often regional, fires. Most experts agree that the system is broken and needs an overhaul. If the EI system...
Fixing EI: Getting beyond regionalism
January 20, 2011
Debate over what's wrong with Canada's EI system often drips with regional animosities. The East is frequently painted as a bloated, slothful sponge for the resources of the hardworking provinces west of Quebec. It's time to get beyond that perception and down to the real business of EI reform. Although the EI system does represent a real transfer...
Take the politics out of Employment Insurance
January 19, 2011
In the midst of the recession last year, the federal government decided to ignore the spirit of its own legislation (enacted only a year before) and froze the premiums that workers and employers pay to fund the Employment Insurance (EI) program. This was the right call. Increasing EI premiums -- as was legislatively required -- would have hurt the...
The price of Canada's fraying safety net
January 19, 2011
Many Canadians like to feel smug about the deficiencies of the American health-care system. Yet we shouldn't feel so smug. There are large parts of Canada's own social safety net that millions of Canadians slip through every day. Our federal government delivers many social benefits through the Employment Insurance system. These include sickness, compassionate-care,...
Yesterday's EI is failing today's Canada
January 17, 2011
Employment Insurance in Canada is broken. The Ontario government has said this for two decades. Many groups across the country have joined in this chorus, urging the federal government to fix the program. But attempts at serious reform, such as Lloyd Axworthy's Social Security Review in 1994, always come up against the same old story in Canada: regional...
The Real Evidence on a National Securities Regulator
December 16, 2010
In assessing the merits of a national securities regulator, it is important to be guided by rigorous analysis, not selective citation. In his report, “The National Securities Commission Proposal: Challenging Conventional Wisdom,” Pierre Lortie appears to prefer the latter. Lortie seeks to discredit federal initiatives, aimed at creating...
Fix the Transfer System
December 3, 2010
Canadians know that health care is a ticking time bomb. The fiscal and demographic pressure on the Canadian health-care system is one of the reasons why many provinces are posting large deficits. It's a problem that must be addressed sooner rather than later. As a result, provincial governments are becoming increasingly worried that the federal government...
Thinking Like an Ontarian
November 15, 2010
Next week, academics and representatives from government, business and civil society are gathering from across Canada to discuss Ontario, its politics and its relationship with the rest of the country. This is unusual. Ontario, despite being home to nearly 40% of Canada's population, barely registers as a topic of conversation among Canada's opinion...
Big Brother No More
October 13, 2010
In 2006, all governments were staking out their positions on the renegotiation of the equalization formula. Most provinces wanted the program expanded, but Ontario had publicly stated that federal programs, like equalization, that drained money from Ontario to support other provinces were unsustainable for the Ontario economy. In an attempt to come...
An Exaggerated Demise
October 12, 2010
Let us, for a moment, pity poor Ontario. The litany of affronts, indignities and embarrassments over the last two decades is long and inglorious: free trade agreements foisted upon it, careening business cycles and a roller-coaster dollar, wrenching and radical changes in government, ever-increasing taxes and an end to cheap power, never-ending sporting...
The Census: A Compromise and the Seeds of Long-Term Change
August 5, 2010
As the provincial premiers gather for the Council of the Federation meeting in Winnipeg, there is undoubtedly some discussion of the census long form controversy, even if it is not on the formal agenda. Both short and long-term issues are at play and there are important, but quite different, considerations in the two time frames. In the very short...
Ideology, Autonomy and the Census
August 5, 2010
After Tony Clement announced that the census long-form would now be voluntary, the Conservative government’s decision was quickly denounced as being value-driven. The ensuing firestorm of contention over whether the census long-form should be voluntary or mandatory strikes at the heart of that which is truly at stake: how to balance the whims...
Securities Reform: Will Region Trump Reason?
July 21, 2010
George Orwell famously quipped that the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent people. With respect to securities regulation in Canada, there are two obvious observations: The current patchwork of 13 regulators in the highly sophisticated securities sector does not serve the national interest and is an obstacle to the smooth functioning...
Marchés Financiers: Vive Toronto!
July 21, 2010
La mosaïque canadienne actuelle dans le secteur hautement sophistiqué des valeurs mobilières est composée de 13 organismes de réglementation distincts. Elle sert mal les intérêts du pays et est un obstacle au bon fonctionnement de l'union économique canadienne. L'existence de tous ces organismes...
Re-Inventing Regional Economic Development
Neil Bradford & David A. Wolfe
July 6, 2010
For most of Canadian history, southern Ontario has been the nation’s economic powerhouse with many strengths across sectors, cities, and communities. However, recent years have brought complex and large-scale challenges to the region. Continental free trade, the global financial crisis, and a volatile exchange rate now demand creative adaptation...
Getting the Feds Out of Immigrant Settlement Services
July 5, 2010
The Greater Toronto Area is amongst the most diverse places on earth. Approximately 30% of people living in Ontario were not born in Canada and fully 50% of those in the Toronto area are foreign-born. Because of this good fortune, Ontario has often just assumed that people from around the world will keep coming here – and settling, integrating...
Municipal Voting Rights for Non-Canadian Citizens
July 5, 2010
Imagine a Canadian city with a population of 380,135 people. That would make it the same size as Halifax, and larger than half the provincial capital cities of Canada. What if none of its residents could vote in civic elections to choose their municipal mayor or council or school board? Outrageous? Impossible, you say? Well...it happens every time...
Why We Need to Raise the Retirement Age
Martin Hering & Thomas Klassen
April 14, 2010
Canadians can expect to live longer and healthier lives than ever before. Believe it or not, there is a downside. The recent economic crisis highlighted the troubles facing pension plans worldwide. Both private and public pension plans are facing shortfalls not only because of plummeting returns on investments and depressed stock markets, but also...
Why Canada Needs a New Approach to Child Care
April 7, 2010
Canada has one of the worst early childhood education and care systems among advanced industrialized countries. It spends significantly less than most countries, not only compared to countries like Sweden and France, but also less than the United States and the United Kingdom – countries not known for large public investment in social programs....
Who's Afraid of Rep-by-Pop?
April 6, 2010
Last month, the federal government honoured its campaign commitment to address the under-representation in the House of Commons of Canadians living in Ontario, British Columbia and Alberta. By introducing legislation to add new seats for provinces with rapidly growing populations, Canada will come closer to living up to its constitutional commitment...
Are National Standards Necessary?
February 24, 2010
There is a tension between federalism and the welfare state. Federalism, which preserves diversity by allowing provinces to pursue alternative policies, may compromise the achievement of the shared social citizenship fostered in a federation when the welfare state offers comparable programs and benefits accessible to all citizens. The fear is...
Goodbye to "National Unity" -- It's Time for a New National Policy
Robert Wolfe & Roderick Macdonald
February 22, 2010
When the global economic crisis hit last fall, Canadian politicians were consumed with debates about separatists under the bed. Now when the world is tottering towards the edge of the climate change cliff, the Canadian response is to worry about the costs to Alberta of shifts in policy, or about how Hydro Québec might get too big for its britches....
Speaking Truth to Academics: The Wisdom of the Practitioners
February 21, 2010
Governments are paying increasing attention to the inter-generational transfer of knowledge within the public service and to the threat posed by what has been termed “institutional amnesia” or “organizational Alzheimer’s.” The large number of impending retirements from the public service and the consequent loss of organizational...
Non-citizen Voting in Toronto: A Case of Too Little, Too Soon?
February 20, 2010
Should non-citizens be given the right to vote in municipal elections? A good many people, including the Mayor of Toronto, think they should. There are strong arguments for expanding the municipal franchise to include non-citizen permanent residents, drawing as they do on deep democratic traditions. It is hard to deny the logic of “no taxation...
The Three Ghosts of Poverty
January 11, 2010
The Three Ghosts of Christmas Past are a familiar holiday image, and they ask us to think about what kind of lives we’d like to live and what we owe our fellow citizens. But there are also three ghosts that haunt millions of Canadians every day. These ghosts of poverty stalk far too many households that provide support to sick and aging parents,...
The Insurmountable Problem of Cities
November 18, 2009
It is no secret that cities are becoming increasingly important as sources of innovation and wealth in our society. This is particularly true in Canada, where six large city-regions are expected to account for 80% of our country’s future economic and population growth. Does this mean that the governments of our urban centres will eventually grow...
Pour un Ontario fort
November 10, 2009
Le Québec a longtemps souhaité que le fédéralisme devienne plus souple et que le principe même du fédéralisme soit davantage respecté, c'est-à-dire que tous les gouvernements respectent les juridictions constitutionnelles de chacun. Bien que l'autonomie du Québec se soit immensément...
Why Just Focus on Quebec-Windsor When Talking About High Speed Rail?
October 30, 2009
It’s rare that an opportunity presents itself to simultaneously tackle some of our country’s biggest challenges: pollution and climate change, slow economic growth, the need for more private-sector-driven innovation and the requirement to deliver people quickly and efficiently to and from home, work and play. But that opportunity is here....
Will the Federal Government Listen to Ontario, BC and Alberta -- and Visible Minorities?
September 22, 2009
In Canada, the worth of one's vote depends on where one lives. The situation is especially unfair for Canada’s visible minority population, who are seeing their voting power diluted, even as their population expands. Section 3 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms gives all adult Canadian citizens the right to vote, but wide variations in...
A Bold Proposal to Renew Confidence in our Retirement Income System
September 22, 2009
Last winter, governments and central banks rediscovered John Maynard Keynes and saved us from a depression like that of the 1930s. Even so, restoring employment will be slow. And the great financial meltdown of 2008 has left other troubles. Among the worst is shattered confidence in retirement incomes. But correcting it is complicated by the imminent...
Why is Our Immigration System Delivering Short-Term, Ad Hoc Responses?
September 17, 2009
Immigration to Canada is fundamental to the nation's social and economic well-being. Immigration can fill jobs, promote trade and innovation, generate investment and grow our population. It is particularly important in Ontario, where nearly half of the immigrants to Canada settle. But the system is in trouble. Upon arrival, too many immigrants have...
@MATTMENDEL
Analysis and Opinion
Innovation key to Ontario's prosperity
Len Crispino & Matthew Mendelsohn
The 20th century was a good one for Ontario. Its prosperity was founded on a strong manufacturing base,... Read More
Employment Insurance for modern times
Mary Davis
Last year turned out to be a disappointing year for employment growth in Canada. The year was also indicative... Read More
Federal health role is about more than money
Will Falk
Jim Flaherty’s surprise health announcement last month was clear, principled and financially generous:... Read More
