AIMS POLICY STUDIES
Public policy studies are the stock-in-trade of the Institute. Our studies are academically-rigorous examinations of important policy questions in Atlantic Canada, covering our wide range of research interests and receiving many awards for their scholarship and impact. All research papers meet academic standards for peer review and advance the public policy discussion in the region. Find below an archive of our policy studies.
Platform for Nova Scotia
This Spring, the Atlantic Institute for Market Studies (AIMS) surveyed dozens of leading minds in Nova Scotia about the province’s future. Respondents discussed their concerns about Nova Scotia, including low growth, decaying public institutions, and demographic stagnation. To reverse decline, this group proposed many original and helpful insights for public policy reform. Among the thought leaders approached for the platform project were economic development experts, former elected representatives of all three major political parties, entrepreneurs and industry representatives, academics, students and doctors. Also among the group were former Members of Parliament, members of the Order of Canada, and several PhDs ...
Reinventing the Building of Schools
The Real Legacy of Public-Private-Partnership (P3) Schools in Nova Scotia Reinventing the Building of Schools revisits the history of public-private partnerships for school construction. Though the province's experience with P3's since the mid-1990s has been widely described as a failure, the paper contends that the record is far more favourable. While there are numerous "hard lessons" to take from Nova Scotia's P3 policies, it is in the public interest to revisit the model for future projects. Author Paul Bennett, Founding Director of Schoolhouse Consulting, contends that "public criticisms of the P3 school deals have been overstated and amplified by politically-driven ...
Post-Secondary Tuition and Low-Income Access
© UNB. Post-Secondary Tuition and Low-Income Access discusses New Brunswick's Tuition Access Bursary program, which covers college and university tuition for the children of families earning under $60,000 per year. Author Patrick Webber's paper reviews numerous studies, surveys and reports from domestic and international sources, which speak to the relationship of tuition levels and participation rates. The data show that tuition is not a principal barrier to higher participation among those from low-income backgrounds. Specific to Canada, Mr. Webber's findings show that low-income participation has been lowest in Newfoundland and Labrador and Quebec, the provinces with the lowest tuition rates ...
The Size and Cost of the Public Sector in Western Canada
The Size and Cost of the Public Sector in Western Canada authored by Rodney A. Clifton, Jackson Doughart, and Marco Navarro-Génie, examines the provincial and municipal public sectors in Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan. For 2015, the authors draw data from Statistics Canada and examine the share of the overall workforce in the public sector, the number of public sector employees per 1,000 residents, and the share of the total compensation awarded to public sector workers. This paper is co-published by AIMS and the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. It is based on AIMS's recent paper, The Size and ...
13th Annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey
The 13th Annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey: 2017 is published in collaboration with the Demographia group in Illinois, USA and the Frontier Centre for Public Policy in Winnipeg. Authors Wendell Cox and Hugh Pavletich explain that many "best city" surveys do not include housing affordability in their calculations. This oversight is particularly relevant to the middle class, for which fluctuations in housing prices are significant. The index employs third-quarter data from 2016 to establish the affordability of middle-income housing in the large urban centres of nine countries: Australia, Canada, China, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, the United States, and ...
