Sir_Osis_of_Liver

The Business Council of Alberta wants to fix the productivity problem through immigration instead of having businesses actually fixing their lack of reinvestment directly.

The causes of the low productivity of Canadian companies are well known and documented: they invest little, spend less on research and development than those in other rich countries, and have a low propensity to innovate. These behaviours tend to limit their productivity gains and, consequently, restrict the growth of the Canadian economy.

https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/april-2023/the-low-productivity-of-canadian-companies-threatens-our-living-standards/

MMP is difficult to explain to anyone uninterested in electoral reform, ie the majority of voters. Include things like party lists and members at large, and you can get some pretty significant drawbacks. There was also the more likely possibility of constitutional issues than with STV or ranked ballot, given the seat allocations outlined in the constitution.

Ranked or STV are easy to explain, ranked especially. Ridings and the ballots don’t even need to change. Instead of an X, put numbers in the circle. Easy-peasy to explain.

No. That’s a completely reductivist take. They gave it a shot, the NDP were MMP or bust, the CPC got the others to agree to a referendum that they knew would fail. At that point the project was dead.

No, not the committee, in the electorate.
You can get a small majority to support switching away from FPTP. Then the supporters split into MMP, Ranked, STV, and a number of hybrid systems. That’s the primary reason why it has repeatedly lost at the provincial level.

Anyone with experience in politics knows why the Liberals did what they did.

IF the Liberals had pushed through the legislation, the CPC and Bloc were both going to portray it a Liberal power grab, and that message would definitely get traction. The CPC had already said they’d revert back to FPTP, and the Bloc was making noises that they’d back them up.

That’s why the Liberals went out of their way to do what they did. What they didn’t expect was the NDP going all or nothing on MMP, a system that laypeople find difficult to understand, and certainly not one to be explained easily in a sound bite.

Internal Liberal polling, not the dog and pony online poll, found that most people didn’t care, but could easily be convinced it was a power grab. They were putting a lot of effort in something that had no upside, but a pile of potential downside.

They cut their losses, and aside from online forums, paid little price for it.

No, he didn’t. This is the fantasy narrative that election reformers tell themselves.
The reality is that these efforts always blow up because there is never a consensus on what to change it to, and the general public just doesn’t care.

And with the blowback they got for their efforts, they won’t touch it again for at least another 15-20 years. The CPC would never even consider it. The NDP are as far from power as ever being essentially dead east of Ontario, and spotty through the rest of the country.

So people can sulk if they want to, but it’s going to be status quo for the foreseeable future.

So just like now then. The Liberals are backed by the NDP and maintain power.

Germany has been dominated by two parties since the war under MMP. And proportional representation has done absolutely nothing to inhibit the right wing authoritarians coming into power in much of Eastern Europe, and making gains in Western Europe.

In Israel, Netanyahu’s Likud control government with the support of 24% of the electorate in the last election. He had to put together a dog’s breakfast of even more extreme parties to do it, but that’s always a possibility in that sort of system.

Comments from people who have never had real exposure to the political system are useful as tits on a fish.
Being an MP or MLA is an absolute grind. Even more so now with myriad anonymous threats being levied at not only you but your family. They have some reimbursements, but inevitably end up spending some of that pay on expenses.

And for the most part, they aren’t rich.

Here is the list from Manitoba MPs:

Niki Ashton NDP university lecturer
James Bezan CPC Rancher, crop adjuster
Ben Carr Lib Teacher, consultant
Raquel Dancho CPC –
Terry Duguid Lib Non-profit organizer
Ted Falk CPC Construction company owner
Leah Gazan NDP Lecturer
Kevin Lamoureaux Lib ATC assistant & Military
Branden Leslie CPC –
Larry Maguire CPC Farmer, Lobbyist
Dan Mazier CPC Pres Keystone Agricultural Producers
Marty Morantz CPC Lawyer
Dan Vandal Lib Middleweight Boxer, Social worker

Bezan (CPC), Falk (CPC), Maguire (CPC), Mazier (CPC) and Morantz (CPC) are pretty well off. The rest are doing okay, but hardly rich.
Dancho (CPC) and Leslie (CPC) went from school right into politics.

A former MP that I new pretty well was a teacher and served on a small city council, an unpaid position in those days, before getting into federal, and then provincial politics. He was the hardest working person I knew.

He got calls at all hours as a federal MP regarding garbage pickup and street plowing FFS. Some constituents were completely clueless as to what level of government does what. He’d listen and try to direct them to the right people, and the only thing he got in return was abuse.

Corporate taxes used to cover over 30% of government revenue, it’s 10% now. The top marginal income tax rate peaked in the 1960s at somewhere around 80% on income exceeding ~3M/year (today’s money). We’ve had 4 decades of tax cuts while the cost of delivering services has increased more or less with the inflation rate. Private equity funds now have favourable tax treatment, and stock buybacks, previously considered illegal stock manipulation is a common practice. And so on and so forth.

If you want what you had, you have to do what you did.

Just like assuming a perfectly spherical cow, or a frictionless surface, you can completely ignore the economics, the massive cost and schedule overages to make nuclear work.

Flamanville-3 in France started construction in 2007, was supposed to be operational in 2012 with a project budget of €3.3B. Construction is still ongoing, the in-service date is now sometime in 2024, and the budget has ballooned to €20B.

Olkiluoto-3 is a similar EPR. Construction started in 2005, was supposed to be in-service in 2010, but finally came online late last year. Costs bloated from €3 to €11B.

Hinkley Point C project is two EPRs. Construction started in 2017, it’s already running behind schedule, and the project costs have increased from £16B to somewhere approaching £30B. Start up has been pushed back to 2028 the last I’ve heard.

It’s no different in the US, where the V.C. Summer (2 x AP1000) reactor project was cancelled while under construction after projections put the completed project at somewhere around $23B, up from an estimate of $9B.

A similar set of AP1000s was built at Vogtle in Georgia. Unit 3 only recently came online, with unit 4 expected at the end of the year. Costs went from an initial estimate of $12B to somewhere over $30B.

Note that design, site selection, regulatory approvals, and tendering aren’t included in the above. Those add between 5-10 years to the above schedules.