The Ontario I grew up in was governed by what was called the “Big Blue Machine”, the nickname for the Progressive Conservative Party that governed the province for 42 years from 1943-1985. Premiers Drew, Frost, Robarts, and Davis provided forward-thinking and competent government that made few major mistakes. The PCs stayed in power largely because […]
Ontario Used To Be Well Governed, But Has Lost Its Mojo Read More »
Housing affordability has been the major issue impacting average Canadians ever since the Covid pandemic has declined in importance. For around two decades, if not longer, the housing policies of Ontario and BC have been oriented towards promoting the densification of cities and major urban areas. This became even more important with the introduction of
Why Isn’t Densification Making Housing Cheaper? Read More »
Newspapers in Canada have been covering the “housing crisis”, with many stories about the high cost of buying or renting a home since the pandemic. Landlords are a frequent target of these stories, particularly over issues like renovictions, high rents, and renting houses to foreign students by placing beds nearly any place one can fit
You May Be A Landlord Or Real Estate Speculator, And Not Even Know It! Read More »
When I go on X, or Twitter, or Ex-Twitter or X-Twitter, my feed is often full of ideological people pushing the idea that Land Value Taxes (LVTs) are the solution to many of the problems of modern life, and the housing crisis in particular. I don’t agree, and I find these people naïve. The idea
That’s Not Fair! What Should Governments Subsidize? Read More »
Recently (late June 2024), Statistics Canada released the projections for Canada’s population for the next 49 years, all the way to 2073. There were headlines in The Toronto Star and other newspapers on these projections, and in particular on the revelation that Canada’s population in 2073 is likely to be approximately 63 million people –
Will Canada Really Have 63 Million People In 2073? Do We Have A Choice? Read More »
We live in an era where everybody is adamant about their rights, particularly their human rights as citizens. Nobody wants to be a second-class citizen, and it is one of the major areas of progress in the last hundred years that we have a Charter of Rights in Canada – and long before that had
Canadian Citizenship Should Not Be Without Obligations Read More »
Most of us have heard the term “It’s the economy, stupid!”. It actually comes from a handmade sign that Bill Clinton’s campaign strategist James Carville had in his office in 1992 US election. The majority of federal elections in Western democracies are mostly about the economy in some way. Interestingly, Carville had three points on
Are Biden And Trudeau Responsible For Inflation And High Prices? Read More »
Blues legend Robert Johnson wrote and recorded the song “Crossroads” (Cross Road Blues) – the song he is most famous for and which many people likely know from the rock band Cream recording it in the 60s. There is also a legend around this song – that Johnson sold his soul to the devil at
Crossroads Blues: Canada’s Economy Never Seems To Get On The Right Path Read More »
I grew up in Don Mills in the 1960s and 1970s, and frankly I feel lucky to have gone to school in those years, and not today. The education I got through the North York School Board was pretty good for the times. In my high school, they had some really great teachers and a
Are Canadian Courts Becoming Far More Powerful Than We Expected – Or Wanted? Read More »
DEI, wokeness, critical race theory, systemic racism, intersectionality and cultural appropriation. Ten or twenty years ago, most of these terms were unknown, and some only existed inside academia or very limited circles of left-wing intellectuals. Identity politics has since come to the fore. Before the millenium, just about the only term that was in common
Yascha Mounk’s Book On “Wokeness” Is Eye-Opening Read More »
