Economic Wealth Canada vs. USA

Canada's output lag is also caused by two other things. For starters, even though the market is bigger than 40 million people and the population is growing, we still have a business environment that isn't as competitive or open as the U.S. This is because of the strong influence of duopolies and oligopolies, especially in the transportation and internet sectors.

Take a look at the most blatant example so far: when Canada's two biggest airlines basically split up their service areas, it was a lot like drug or gaming lords splitting up the money they made. It's not an accident that airfares have gone through the roof since then. Even though the country's population has doubled in forty years, our markets are still "too small" to allow for more competition, and stores and other oligopolistic firms are still able to take advantage of us. When you add in the fact that municipal and federal rules and regulations have made it more expensive to start almost anything, you have a recipe for long-term economic stagnation.

The last thing that explains why we aren't getting more done is that Canadian policy is what you might call "anarchic federalism

At its best, Canadian federalism is a cooperative system that lets policies and practices be tailored to the preferences of different regions. Economic policies are consulted on and coordinated to improve Canada's general economic performance. At its worst, Canadian federalism can be a spoiled group of narrow-minded states that work against each other and make it impossible to coordinate across the country. Canada's provinces and the central government have been fighting more and more over the last ten years. Even giving people and governments large amounts of federal cash doesn't seem to be enough to get things done. This is in addition to making it clear that the federal government prefers spending on consumption over investment.

Picture this as the work of Canadian federalism: Ottawa has a lot of power over immigration, and they've used it to bring in more people to deal with an aging population and a lack of workers, but they haven't given much thought to how this might affect health services and homes. The provinces are in charge of health and education services, but both are under a lot of stress because of a growing population and high demand.

Then there are the municipalities, which have a lot of power over land use and housing building but are moving very slowly, if at all. This is despite what seems to be a huge demand for housing. It looks like Canada's only economic strategy has been to grow its population, which is a way to promote extensive growth, while hoping that anything needed to improve productivity, which is a way to promote intensive growth, would just fall from the sky.

As a result, there are more people and a bigger market, but there is less competition, which means costs are higher and services are less convenient

We spend more on health care and education, but kids' test scores are going down and health care is being provided in the hallways. And finally, a group of Canadians who can't afford a home, even if they have good jobs that pay well. This is not good. It's not hard to see why economic growth is slowing down: the conditions that would have encouraged more business investment seem to have vanished in a muck of blame and disagreement.

Canada's real per capita GDP is going down and the gap between it and the U.S. is rising. This will have simple long-term effects: a lower standard of living and the best and brightest people leaving the country. Canada's real per capita GDP has grown by an average of 0.9% per year since 2010, while the U.S.'s has grown by an average of 1.5% per year.

If growth keeps up at that rate, Canada's real GDP per person will be 60% of the U.S.'s in 25 years. We are on track to become a country that is less wealthy and has a more unstable government that can't get things done. Do we really want this country for our kids?Patrick Luciani writes the most recent Hub book review. It's called GOAT: Who is the Greatest Economist of All Time and Why Does It Matter? written by Tyler Cowen in 2023 and looks at the cases of some of the biggest economists in history to see who can claim to be the best.

Who among experts is the GOAT, or the best of all time? The question is interesting and strange at the same time

One would think that the best would depend on your political views. Tyler Cowen, a famous economics professor, best-selling author, podcaster, and philosopher who also co-founded the very popular website Marginal Revolution, has written a 350-page book that tries to answer the question. You can get it online for free. The frequent traveler had his COVID shutdown book to keep him busy at home.

I was hooked as soon as I began to read. It was interesting to review not only important economic ideas but also the people who came up with them. There was new information on every page. Cowen did something that no one else could have done: he turned the history of economic thought into a thrilling book that brought to life the ideas of six economists who have changed the world we live in.

You can get past the problem of political bias by following Cowen's rules for a good review. The person who wants to win the GOAT prize must be unique, have made a big impact on history, carry important ideas, and know a lot about micro and macro theory and evidence. This last point is important: no candidate can be "too wrong" about the "substance of issues." You may be a great thinker, but if your ideas don't last, you're not on the list.