Tag: #elxn42

This week’s podcast is a Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives double-header. The CCPA has been an invaluable resource for alternative economic and political analysis for decades and I always enjoy highlighting their work. First up, I speak with Seth Klein, the director of the Centre’s British Columbia office, on how inequality and climate, two major issues to which Seth and the CCPA devote considersable effort, have fared in Canada’s election debate so far. Seth also talks about how the platforms of the parties stack up against the Leap Manifesto. The second half of the episode contains my conversation with Scott Sinclair, the CCPA’s chief trade researcher. Scott talks about the freshly-concluded Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, and what this enormous trade pact means for us and our democracy.

Tags #elxn42, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, Canadian election 2015, climate change, inequality, TPP, Trans-Pacific Partnership

Canada Government

The economic debate we got and the one we need

Post author By Michal Rozworski
Post date September 19, 2015
No Comments on The economic debate we got and the one we need

I feel more like a broken record: another piece for Ricochet on the economic debate in the 2015 election and the missing big picture. This after the Globe Debate on the economy.

The Conservatives have promised balanced budgets and have even enshrined them in law. The NDP is also promising balanced budgets, painting itself as “responsible” with government finances.

The Liberals are the only party to break out of the balanced budget consensus, admitting that for a few years they may run small deficits of about $10 billion, or 0.5 per cent of GDP.

The leaders will meet in Calgary to go head-to-head at an event sponsored by the Globe and Mail. But will they break out of the narrow constraints that have thus far defined the conversation on the economy?

Tags #elxn42, Canadian election 2015, deficit spending, Globe Debate, inequality, responsibility politics