Tag Archives: inequality

The PC Government in Ontario has introduced Bill 87 which would eliminate the rate-based borrowing to subsidize electricity prices and replace it with Government borrowing. Last week’s Provincial Budget estimates that the required borrowing to subsidize electricity prices for 2018/19 was $2.8 billion. It is likely to exceed $3 billion in 2019/20. Ontario is the only jurisdiction in North America where the Government would directly subsidize electricity prices. Today the...

The PC Government in Ontario has introduced Bill 87 which would eliminate the rate-based borrowing to subsidize electricity prices and replace it with Government borrowing. Last week’s Provincial Budget estimates that the required borrowing to subsidize electricity prices for 2018/19 was $2.8 billion. It is likely to exceed $3 billion in 2019/20. Ontario is the only jurisdiction in North America where the Government would directly subsidize electricity prices. Today the Government...

A version of this post appeared on Pieria in December 2013.  In my post “The desert of plenty”, I described a world in which goods and services are so cheap to produce that less and less capital is required for investment , and so easy to produce that less and less labour is required to produce them. Prices therefore go into freefall and there is a glut of both capital and labour. This is deflation. There are two kinds of deflation. There is the “bad” kind, where asset prices go...

I’ve written an opinion piece that appears in today’s Regina Leader-Post. The piece argues that the Saskatchewan government shouldn’t brag about the province’s low-tax climate (which it recently did). Rather, I argue that taxes serve important functions. The link to the opinion piece is here. Nick Falvo is a Calgary-based research consultant with a PhD in Public Policy. He has academic affiliation at both Carleton University and Case Western Reserve University, and is...

I’ve written an opinion piece that appears in today’s Regina Leader-Post. The piece argues that the Saskatchewan government shouldn’t brag about the province’s low-tax climate (which it recently did). Rather, I argue that taxes serve important functions. The link to the opinion piece is here. Enjoy and share:

Increasing asymmetry of income and wealth, which now goes by the name "inequality" as the buzzword, arises either from the function of perfect markets or from asymmetry of power. A perfect market is one in which there is no asymmetry, that is, the agents are homogenous.A perfect market could generate asymmetry through difference in ability that lead to differences in distribution owing based on merit and just deserts (as conventional economics assumes). However, perfect markets don't exist...

LinkedIn Why and How Capitalism Needs to Be Reformed (Part 1) Ray Dalio See also by Ray Dalio Productivity and Structural Reform-Why Countries Succeed & Fail, and What Should Be Done So Failing Countries Succeed

Need education outcomes explained in a more intuitive way? Better call Dave Guest post by Jeff Mosenkis of Innovations for Poverty Action A lovely tribute to Dave Evans, who’s been a boon to the field, and a prolific producer of public goods, from David McKenzie and his Development Impact Blog colleaguesI ran a quick search, and I’ve cited him about 50 times in my links It’s fitting that Dave’s final Dev Impact post is in one of his specialities, making research more understandable to...

More numbers sleight of hand. It should perhaps come as no surprise that, as capitalism has been called into question and socialism generated increasing interest during the past decade, capitalism’s defenders have resorted to a long historical view. Look, they say, how capitalist growth has decreased poverty and led to improvements in people’s lives around the globe. Just stick with it and all will eventually be well. That’s why, as Jason Hickel points out, the above infographic, based on...

I had been waiting for last month’s publication of the book “Confronting Inequality” before preparing my annual update on income inequality and redistribution in Canada. I am glad I did because the book presents new and exciting empirical findings that shed light on the age-old equity/growth debate (more on that below), but also introduced me to the Standardized World Income Inequality Database (SWIID). Data comparability and granularity has been a challenge for inequality researchers...