Ontario is no longer the place to prosper | GTAMotorcycle.com

Ontario is no longer the place to prosper

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Delboy

Well-known member
My sister (lives in Toronto but is moving to Winterpeg) just sent me this.

https://www.fraserinstitute.org/sites/default/files/ontario-no-longer-a-place-to-prosper.pdf

It does come from the Fraser Institute but I found how much Ontario is now lagging the rest of the provinces to be incredible. Ontario used to rock, seems like its just going down the drain.

What really struck me was emigration. Ontario has had a net loss in population since 2002.

I grew up in Willowdale and keep in touch with about 10 friends from High School. Most of them now live out west. Not one still lives in Ontario.
 
Lots of good points but totally glazed/skipped the role the federal government had in all this (after-all it is a neocon "think" tank). One aspect to all this, Ontario has a 20th century economy (manufacturing) and in the early 2000s had a growing 21st century economy (high tech).

-Killing R&D tax credits drove these roles out of the Ontario (country). Yes they are still there, but they tighten the rules up so much that very few get them.
-Petrodollar made it harder to compete.
-In general 19th century economic thinking, big focus on what comes out of the ground, small focus on the human resource.
-Supply side economics.
-GST cut, it in the end makes manufacturing in Canada more expensive (after you do all the math, not the dogma...).

The thing with taxes, they modify behaviour. When you tax stupid you lose, cutting taxes for no reason is taxing stupid. I give the blame 70% Ontario Liberals, 30% Federal Conservatives.

BTW, most of the countries we compete with have higher corporate taxes, higher electricity rates, higher non-value added costs....

All those people that moved west are about to have an adjustment...
 
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Economies have ups and downs. I'm sure a great number of people who found their fortunes "out West" are struggling now that oil is $29/bbl.
 
Blackfin said:
Economies have ups and downs. I'm sure a great number of people who found their fortunes "out West" are struggling now that oil is $29/bbl.
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History repeats itself and those who do not learn from history, are doomed to repeat it...

In the latter parts of the 20th century we took it on the nose as our 19th century natural resource based economy went down the tubes (as resource prices collapsed). Both the PCs and then the Liberals took big steps to get that economy more balanced and bring on that 21st century economy we were experiencing as we moved into the 21st century (at least starting to).

Then Harper came along and drove the country back to the 19th century, all about what comes out of the ground. Now resource prices have collapsed and our economy... We cannot talk about the fate of Ontario without his 30% (my estimate) part of the problem.

Hopefully the next few PMs whoever they may be get us back on the right track. Then we in Ontario can deal with the current goofs come election time. Hopefully we have an option that is not entirely based on Supply Side Economics, 19th Century Thinking, and Bigotry--if so I will take the current goofs (lesser of the two evils).
 
It wasn't Harper. It was the provincial liberal government. They drove cost of living up so much and increased our debt to unsustainable levels. A lot of companies came out and said we don't want to do business in Ontario because of the cost of hydro. It's too high.

There is no accountability. They cut off the auditor general's legs. They are nothing but a stamp now.
 
Anything out of the Fraser Institute is to be taken with a grain of salt, and a fuzzy eyeball. This is the same organization that, while taking money from Phillip Morris and Rothmans (and with a tobacco company CEO on their board), released a report stating that there was no scientific evidence that cigarettes cause cancer. And that was in the late 90's, not the 60's.

They often seem to forget facts, ignore scientific evidence, and exhibit great bias.
 
While that may be true ... it's common knowledge about the screw ups of the provincial government and the amount of job losses we have had in the last 15 years. I remember back in 97 Ontario was a great place to have a job.

PrivatePilot said:
Anything out of the Fraser Institute is to be taken with a grain of salt, and a fuzzy eyeball. This is the same organization that, while taking money from Phillip Morris and Rothmans (and with a tobacco company CEO on their board), released a report stating that there was no scientific evidence that cigarettes cause cancer. And that was in the late 90's, not the 60's.

They often seem to forget facts, ignore scientific evidence, and exhibit great bias.
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LiNK666 said:
While that may be true ... it's common knowledge about the screw ups of the provincial government and the amount of job losses we have had in the last 15 years. I remember back in 97 Ontario was a great place to have a job.
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I'm not 100% debating the underlying facts, just reminding everyone to not jump to conclusions based on one study alone. There's a million extenuating factors why **** collapsed here post 2008. Provincial government policies were certainly contributory, but not solely responsible. There is very much a bigger picture to keep in mind.
 
PrivatePilot said:
I'm not 100% debating the underlying facts, just reminding everyone to not jump to conclusions based on one study alone. There's a million extenuating factors why **** collapsed here post 2008. Provincial government policies were certainly contributory, but not solely responsible. There is very much a bigger picture to keep in mind.
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Don't you mean a billion reasons...lol
 
Out of province emigration is a problem. There seems to be a huge brain drain and those people are not being replaced with workers of an equivalent skill set.

I work for a company that took 200 million from the Wynne government to set up an office here in Toronto. 95% of the staff are from Vancouver, Montreal or the US.
 
LiNK666 said:
It wasn't Harper. It was the provincial liberal government. They drove cost of living up so much and increased our debt to unsustainable levels. A lot of companies came out and said we don't want to do business in Ontario because of the cost of hydro. It's too high.

There is no accountability. They cut off the auditor general's legs. They are nothing but a stamp now.
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The provincial government takes the credit for giving us Family day but the day's pay comes from the employer. It's about a half a percent of their wage burden that they no longer get anything for. Overheads don't get the day off. Every little bit hurts.
 
nobbie48 said:
The provincial government takes the credit for giving us Family day but the day's pay comes from the employer. It's about a half a percent of their wage burden that they no longer get anything for. Overheads don't get the day off. Every little bit hurts.
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Some of us who fall into the provincial versus federal regulatory loophole are forced to take the day off, but don't get paid for it.

/stands up
 
nobbie48 said:
The provincial government takes the credit for giving us Family day but the day's pay comes from the employer. It's about a half a percent of their wage burden that they no longer get anything for. Overheads don't get the day off. Every little bit hurts.
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Just a niggling point, if running business in the black wages are not an ongoing burden. Yes paid off days are of course. Sorry to be so pedantic.
 
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As a current business owner in Ontario (technology) and with a large amount of history in the manufacturing sector (North America & International), I would be very hard pressed to set up any manufacturing company in Ontario. In fact even in the technology side of things we kid ourselves about our home grown workforce. Most of us think that our engineers & other technology workers are superior than those in Latin America, Europe & Asia. Bull doodle! In my case my Canadian Engineers are from Asia and South Asia.

Our current situation in Ontario is not all that attractive and now we are going to add on a new Ontario pension plan, even higher hydro rates and a new cap & trade tax. What a great place to invest!

But at least we now can get wine, beer & even cider at a grocery store so that we can forget how screwed up Ontario has become over the last several years.
 
I have mixed views on the Ontario pension plan – although a lot of people are crying about it, many of those same people are the ones who haven't saved two pennies their entire lives. In the end, these are the people that are going to end up being a financial burden on society when they are past their working years and can no longer afford to support themselves.

And we we all know who pays for financial burdens on society, don't we? The taxpayers.

I started by retirement savings and RRSP's at around 18 years old, but I know a lot of people that are in their 30's and 40's who still have squat set aside, no equity in anything, and are living pay cheque to pay cheque sometimes not because of an inadequate income, but living beyond their means or a complete lack of financial sensibility. Forcing these types of people to put some money aside for their retirement in addition to the rather anemic CPP isn't exactly a bad thing IMHO.
 
Ontario still is a fantastic place to live and prosper, maybe not to the Millennials expectations of "I deserve everything now" but looking in most places around the world still is one of the best.
 
Agreed, great place to live but not to invest. If people/business do not want to invest in Ontario, it will not stay a great place to live. If there is not anybody making any money, there is no tax base and there can not be a continuation of government/public services. Over simplification but it's a "Greek" thing!

ZX600 said:
Ontario still is a fantastic place to live and prosper, maybe not to the Millennials expectations of "I deserve everything now" but looking in most places around the world still is one of the best.
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PrivatePilot said:
And we we all know who pays for financial burdens on society, don't we? The taxpayers.
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The taxpayers in their late 50s+60s will be paying into this and get nothing in return.
 
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