Taking the Road Less Taxing
In this paper, author Ken Boessenkool argues an increase in total cash payments to welfare families appears to satisfy the objective of reducing child poverty but the approach is shortsighted. Instead, provinces should heed the theory and evidence showing that poverty reduction over all but the shortest of time horizons is better achieved by easing the transition from welfare to work.
Canada’s political leaders leave voters little choice
In his bi-monthly column, AIMS President Brian Lee Crowley ponders just what Canadians are looking for in their political leadership. Publication: CHH, June 7, 2000, SJT, June 12, 2000.
Rip Van Regulator: CBC president helps write CRTC obituary
“As the CRTC sinks slowly into irrelevancy, it will whine about protecting Canadian culture and the need for regions to be "reflected" to themselves and to the rest of us. (Is Toronto a region? We should be told.) “But it's too late. Pathetic pleas won't work because the CRTC is in no better position to survive than were those thousands of monks who, before Gutenberg, copied all books by hand. The regulatory tide is on its way out for the control-culture freaks of the CRTC.”
Atlantic Canada’s bind
In its editorial pages, The Globe and Mail has endorsed the analysis of Atlantic Canada's economic problems contained in the Institute's first book, Looking the Gift Horse in the Mouth. Moreover, it has recommended that the region's four premiers draw inspiration from it in their quest to end the region's dependence on transfers from Ottawa. Gift Horse was the first Institute publication to win the prestigious Sir Antony Fisher Memorial Prize for excellence in think tank publications.
Devrions-nous pratiquer l’aquaculture?
Deux instituts, AIMS et CAI, invitent les chefs de fil dans le domaine de l'aquaculture à discuter de l'avenir de l'industrie sur la côte Est
Should we be farming the seas?
AIMS and CAI invite world's leading authorities on aquaculture to PEI to discuss industry's future on east coast
Not quite ready to kick the habit
No one can be opposed to more co-operation among the Atlantic provinces, so the recent announcement by the four premiers of the creation of a Council of Atlantic Premiers is welcome news. In this column in The Globe and Mail, however, AIMS President Brian Lee Crowley writes that while the premiers may have created a good vehicle, they are still trying to go in the wrong direction with it. The answer to the region's problems does not lie in yet more federal money, which is what they spent most of their time asking for. Been there, done that - and it doesn't work.
Silent partner in Voisey’s Bay
If the rich Voisey's Bay mineral deposit were in Alberta or Ontario, Inco would be developing it today. Hundreds, if not thousands, of well-paid jobs would be created, generating lots of economic activity and new government revenue. Yet in Newfoundland, with its declining population, and high debt, taxes and unemployment, Voisey's Bay languishes. Why? Because of the silent third party to the talks, hovering like Banquo's ghost over the negotiations between Brian Tobin's government and Inco.
Buddy, can you spare a vote?
In a new interview in Canadian Business magazine, AIMS' former Senior Policy Analyst, Fred McMahon gives some insight into the content of his next book, Retreat From Growth: Atlantic Canada and the Negative-Sum Economy. The book, a companion volume to the Institute's successful Road to Growth: How Lagging Economies Become Prosperous, will be released by AIMS this summer.
Do school boards add value to education?
Do we really need school boards? That's the question AIMS President Brian Lee Crowley asks in the wake of the Nova Scotia government's attempt to cut education spending. Experience elsewhere suggests that they can be eliminated, while improving school performance, accountability and local autonomy. And it saves money to boot! Publication: CHH, May 10, 2000.