Finance committee  Thank you, sir, and committee members. I am very grateful for the invitation to participate in this discussion. I see that the government announced last week that the target is going to be extended for five years. I'm not sure how we'll fit into that decision process, but I thin

Finance committee  Thank you, sir. In terms of the job numbers, this month's numbers were very worrisome. Whether that's a one-month blip—there is a bit of month-to-month movement in these things—or the sign of something worse is not yet clear. But we have never in recent history had a jobs numbe

Finance committee  If I were to follow an inflation-targeting system, which I indicated I think is not adequate, I would suggest the target should be higher in light of some of the economic evidence from the last couple of years about the problem of the zero-bound, where interest rates can't go bel

Finance committee  I think Mario's response has brought out a key problem in the way that the Bank of Canada looks at unemployment today. They certainly are aware of unemployment. They care about unemployment, and the level of unemployment influences their actions, as I think all of us have agreed.

Finance committee  Firstly, Mr. Marston, in regard to your earlier points, we really do have a serious problem. While monetary and fiscal policy in Canada was tremendously important at the outbreak of the crisis at the end of 2008 and the beginning of 2009, we have stalled since roughly the spring

Finance committee  Thank you. I think monetary policy has absolutely exacerbated the inequality in our society, because it has explicitly targeted inflation control. One effect of that is to enhance the real value of wealth—that's how Chris put it—at the expense of targeting full employment, tryin

Finance committee  First of all, there's been a very wide range of risks to the real purchasing power of Canadians' savings, and I would suggest volatility in the inflation rate is near the bottom of the list compared to what's happened in financial markets, the value of assets, and so on. But my

International Trade committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for the opportunity to meet with your committee by video conference from Toronto. I see that it's blue sky behind me. Rest assured that it's not blue sky in real life. That's a backdrop to make Toronto look pleasant, whi

International Trade committee  That's a very important question, which cuts to the centre of why Canada's trade performance has been so disappointing in recent years, even though we have accelerated considerably our extraction and export of our raw resources. First of all, in terms of the Canadian Manufacture

International Trade committee  Yes, certainly. That's kind of an example of the sorts of policy tools that are available and that should be applied to all our global champion industries, whether they are auto, aerospace, biotech, pharmaceuticals, or any other high-value sectors where we can succeed in global

International Trade committee  I did look at the section of the joint study that very briefly summarized findings of the CGE modelling done on both sides, some in Japan, and some in Canada. Then they developed a range of estimates, like other CGE models of a trade agreement, based on the assumption of full emp

International Trade committee  Yes. It is kind of standard practice now for governments that are negotiating free trade to commission an economic study, as was done in the Canada-Japan case, based on the use of what's called computable general equilibrium models, or CGE, which is the acronym in economics. I

International Trade committee  Oh, I'm sorry.

International Trade committee  You know what they say: an economist always has two arms, because we always say “on the one hand” and “on the other hand”.

International Trade committee  When you say “Canada's auto industry” in a global setting like that, you're referring to other global companies that are actually not based in Canada. It would be the decision of companies that manufacture in Canada, like General Motors, Ford, Chrysler, Toyota, Honda—the five glo