I do think it is both logical and unavoidable that if we were to try to develop incentives to keep our companies whole here in Canada, that incentive would need to grow every year. It would be without limit, in effect, and it would prevent us from actually capitalizing on the growth in the world economy. I do think that wouldn't be a very good use of our resources. Rather, I would see much more benefit to leaning with the wind as opposed to against it. That is to help companies to make these kinds of transformations faster and more easily so that they do assure their Canadian footprint and indeed grow it.
If we look to lessons in the United States, there are companies that have disappeared. For example, in the state of Massachusetts, which used to be a very big shoe manufacturing area of the United States, there are hardly any left now in terms of shoes. But one that is still there is New Balance, which is an athletic shoe, and they were the ones who were most aggressively global. They were the ones who built their own factory in China. So 60% of the pieces now come from China, a big container every day, but they've kept the final assembly and the finish. And of course the really expensive jobs, such as the design, the engineering, the marketing, the accountancy, etc.--all the good jobs--are still there, and in fact they are a bigger operation today than they were back when they were actually manufacturing the shoes in totality there.
So this model is a model for growth, but it is also a model for transformation. There will inevitably be people, as there have been over the past 50 years...and during the 100 years before that, people moved from the farm into manufacturing, and now they need to gradually move into higher-end manufacturing or design, or the other services that go with this, that are marketable globally. If we can aid that transition, it would be a better place for us to put our resources and, in particular, help those who are caught on the short end. So if, for example, a textile firm is unable to transform itself and then some of those workers become unemployed, where we can put the resources to lean with the wind is to help them with that transition into new gainful employment, not to try to somehow keep the company existing, because it will become increasingly unsustainable over time.