International
Affairs
Afghanistan: Looking
Forward
The situation in
Afghanistan is grave but far from hopeless,
asserts Ronald Neumann in a Centre for
International Policy Studies policy brief. Although stabilization is a long
term task, short term action is needed to reverse perceptions of Taliban
progress, he says. Read
Economy
The Downturn … And
After
In a recent commentary, Atlantic Institute for Market Studies
President Brian Lee Crowley explains that
Canada is poised to come out of this
downturn economically stronger than the
U.S. Moreover,
Crowley argues that the problems we face in
thinking about the post-recession world are not primarily economic problems;
they are cultural and political problems. Read
Canada’s Improved Business Investment
Performance
Canadian businesses have tended to
equip employees with less capital investment than their G7 counterparts have
over the past 15 years, according to the C.D. Howe Institute. In a promising
sign for 2009 and 2010, however, Canada’s investment performance should
improve relative to many other countries, particularly the
United
States. The paper claims that to make
further progress, Canadians should focus on maintaining and, where possible,
enhancing their fiscal, tax and regulatory advantages in the years ahead.
Read
Investment
Monitor
A recent paper from the
Asia Pacific Foundation of Canada
summarizes publicly reported new investments in Asia by
Canadian companies, and in Canada by
Asian companies. Read
Public
Policy
Health Insurance and Bankruptcy
Rates in Canada and the
United
States
In a recent update to a previous
study, Himmelstein et al (2009) concluded that in 2007, uninsured medical
expenses or loss of income due to illness “caused” nearly two-thirds
(62.1%) of all non-business bankruptcies in the U.S. Yet the most recent data
shows that the non-business bankruptcy rate in Canada is statistically the same
as it is in the United States, contends a study from the Fraser Institute. Read
Faster, Younger, Richer? The Reality
of Immigration’s Impact on Canada’s Future
While immigration has been a key
driver of Canadian population and workforce growth, it cannot, on its own,
offset demographic trends that threaten future living standards, says a recently
released study from the C.D. Howe
Institute. Despite some popular commentary to the contrary, offsetting or
even mitigating the trends towards an aging Canadian society through increased
immigration alone would require unrealistic increases in total immigration
levels, the authors argue. Read
Community Houses in
Ottawa: Making Connections that
Matter
Since the 1960s, townhouse units
donated by Ottawa's Community Housing Corporation
have acted as mini-community centres in 15 stressed neighbourhoods in the
Nation's Capital, writes Anne Makhoul of the Caledon Institute of Social Policy.
Acting as learning gateways and safe spaces where children, youth and adults can
congregate, Community Houses are facing an uncertain financial future. Read
Canada’s Declining Social Safety Net: The
Case for EI Reform
Employment Insurance (EI) benefits
in Canada are well below the OECD average,
says a new study released today by the Canadian Centre for Policy
Alternatives. Author Lars Osberg finds that in terms of access, benefit
duration, and income replacement levels, EI in
Canada falls far below most other OECD
countries and below the levels of Canadian unemployment insurance in past
recessions. Read
Prairie Agriculture at the
Crossroads
Myths exist about the
strategic position of food, the importance of the family farm to the
preservation of rural Canada, and the need to
defend Canadian farming in the face of European and American subsidization.
These myths get in the way of creative farm policy, claims the Canada West Foundation‘s Greg Mason. He
seeks to dispel these myths, with the aim of ensuring the competitiveness of the
Canadian agricultural sector. Read
Public
Opinion
Obama-Mania Alive and Well in
Canada
Almost 3
in 4 Canadians rate President Obama’s job thus far as being excellent or good,
according to a Harris Decima poll. Nationally, 31% said President Obama
is doing an excellent job, while 42% said he is doing a good job. 16% said Mr.
Obama is doing a fair job, while just 4% thought he was doing a poor job. President Obama
is universally popular across Canada, with no less than 67% in any region saying
he’s done an excellent or good job thus far. Read
