Economy

Building North America

In 2007, Ottawa, Mexico City and Washington all announced new transportation infrastructure development programs. All were viewed as efforts to remedy the infrastructure gaps that had emerged over the past decade of intensified use and delayed maintenance. A new paper from the North America Transportation Competitiveness Research Council, with assistance from Arizona State University's North American Center for Transborder Studies, provides an introduction to the current situation, an overview of the three national programs and a brief critique. It seeks to address whether or not these new national efforts will create the foundation for freight transportation system that will maintain North American global competitiveness in the first decades of the 21st century.

http://natcrc.org/Research%20Council%20Working%20Paper%205%20March%202008.pdf

 

Where do Western Canadians Want Their Money to Go?

Health care, the environment and reducing poverty are the top three public policy priorities for western Canadians, reveals Canada West Foundation's third segment of the Looking West 2008 Survey, Strategic Investments: Western Canadian Attitudes About Government and the Economy. The paper reports that over 7 in 10 westerners feel that these areas are very high or high priorities. http://www.cwf.ca/V2/cnt/release_200805071000.php

 

Trade Liberalization and Productivity Dynamics: Evidence from Canada

Statistics Canada investigates the productivity effects of the Canada–United States Free Trade Agreement (FTA) on Canadian manufacturing, finding that Canadian tariff cuts increased exit rates among moderately productive non-exporting plants. This then led to the reallocation of market share toward highly productive plants. The paper also finds that all of the within-plant productivity gains resulting from the U.S. tariff cuts involved exporters and, especially, new entrants into the export market. http://www.statcan.ca/english/research/11F0027MIE/11F0027MIE2008051.htm

Domestic Affairs

IRPP Policy Options on the Liberal Party
The May edition of Policy Options, published by the Institute for Research on Public Policy, including an in-depth analysis of the Liberal party, featuring an article by Liberal Party Leader Stéphane Dion, as well as David Herle, former Liberal pollster and campaign chair under Paul Martin, and Geoff Norquay, longtime adviser to Conservative opposition leaders. The issue also contains an article by Environment Minister John Baird on climate change and coverage of the  US presidential election. http://www.irpp.org/po/index.htm

 

 

Demographics

Absolute Poverty in Canada Remains Low

Efforts to accurately measure and define poverty in Canada have been hindered by inconsistent and poor quality data, resulting in a confusing picture that is often further distorted by politicians and activists, says a new study from the Fraser Institute. The report's author, noted poverty researcher Professor Chris Sarlo of Nipissing University, clarifies the definition of poverty and, using this definition, argues that poverty -- whether measured by income or consumption -- has remained in the four to six per cent range since 1996.
http://www.fraserinstitute.org/commerce.web/newsrelease.aspx?nID=5333

Canadian incomes up 11.1 percent in 2006

Earnings of Canadian families rose 11.1% from 2005 to 2006 to an average of $58,300 after taxes, a new Statistics Canada study declares. For families in the 65 or older age category, after-tax income averaged of $42,400, up 2.9%, while younger working-aged families had a median of $62,000, a 1.8% gain. Based on census data, an estimated 633,000 families were below the Statistics Canada's after-tax low-income cutoff, which represented 7% of the total. That translates to about 760,000 children 18 and under living in low-income families, the report said. http://www.statcan.ca/Daily/English/080505/d080505a.htm

 

Science and Technology

Students Unveil Emission-Free Hydrogen Fuel-Cell Vehicle

A team of students from the University of Waterloo (UW) unveiled its innovative emission-free hydrogen fuel-cell vehicle as part of the final year of Challenge X, a multi-year North American competition to develop sustainable transportation solutions. A top contender in the Challenge X competition, UW is the only Canadian university chosen to compete in the competition between 17 teams in North America. During the design phase, UW's detailed vehicle design process won eight of ten award categories and earned the team first place overall. http://newsrelease.uwaterloo.ca/news.php?id=4963

 

Sonenberg Scores Mini-Nobel for Science

Dr. Nahum Sonenberg of McGill University will be among this year's winners of the Gairdner International Award, which recognizes the world's very best medical scientists. The Gairdner is often referred to as the "mini-Nobel", given that of the 288 individuals who have received the award since its inception in 1957, 70 have subsequently gone on to win a Nobel Prize.

http://www.mcgill.ca/reporter/40/16/sonenberg/

 

Spinal Cord Research Heads New Funding in London, Ontario

The University of Western Ontario and Lawson Health Research Institute have received more than $10.5 million in funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) this week to help patients recover from spinal cord injuries. Scientists at the university believe a lack of cell regeneration after spinal cord injuries can be attributed to the molecular makeup of scar tissue that inhibits nerve growth, and Dr. Arthur Brown, a scientist at Robarts Research Institute at Western, has begun to study a protein he has identified that may control regeneration in the injured spinal cord. http://communications.uwo.ca/com/

 

 

Education

Democracy Centre Calls for Equity in Standards of How Universities Should be Judged

A report entitled "Equitable Access to the Canadian University and Quality: Can We Have Both?, published by Queen’s University’s Centre for the Study of Democracy (CSD) notes that “in a healthy and genuine democracy equitable access to a higher education should be a political and philosophical given”.  Primary author and research co-ordinator of the CSD, Valerie Ashford, suggests that “meaningful efforts to enlist a greater population of diversely defined students, whether in terms of class or race or any other marginalization, should count as a criterion of excellence.” Ashford points out, for example, that The Higher Education Authority of Ireland has an explicit commitment to equity, and recommends that Canada adopt this policy. http://qnc.queensu.ca/story_loader.php?id=4821aeb000614

 

Healthcare

Ontario Plan for Building Hospitals Could be Pricey

A recent decision to let private sector employers oversee construction of hospitals could end up costing Canadian taxpayers, says the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. The study examines the province's claim that alternative financing and procurement deals with the private sector will save the public purse $341 million, concluding that this prediction is, at best, optomistic. http://www.policyalternatives.ca/News/2008/05/PressRelease1887/index.cfm?pa=BB736455

 

Frameworks for Integrated Care for the Elderly: a Systematic Review

In a study prepared for the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, Margaret MacAdam of the Canadian Policy Research Networks, examines the literature on comprehensive models of integrated or coordinated care. MacAdam found that some models of integrated health and social care can result in improved outcomes, client satisfaction and/or cost savings or cost-effectiveness, and identifies four frameworks with common interventions that achieve this goal. http://www.cprn.org/doc.cfm?doc=1890&l=en