Roundup: The GDP data and the “collapsing” economy

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Yesterday was the day that Statistics Canada released the quarterly GDP figures, and they were middling. The economy is sluggish, but 1.0% annualized growth in the quarter is growth, and it bears repeating that we have avoided a recession after the inflationary spike, so this is the “soft landing” that the Bank of Canada was aiming for. And because growth is sluggish, there is plenty of talk that the Bank will likely make another 50 basis point cut in December rather than 25.

The Conservatives rushed to make hay of these numbers, particularly the fact that per capita GDP fell by 0.4% over the quarter, which was the sixth quarterly decline. (Yes, there was revised data that pushed up growth and made the quarterly decline less pronounced for the past two years). And why has there been a decline in per capita GDP? Because at the end of the lockdowns, we ramped up immigration to combat labour shortages, and all of those new workers pushed up our growth enough to avoid a recession, and because the denominator has been increased faster than the numerator, it’s a pretty solid indication that the growth could very well be much stronger once we get it back on track. To that end, the Conservatives’ press release compared our non-annualised figures to the American annualised numbers to make ours look worse (they later issued a correction), and put out misleading tweets that blame Trudeau and not the 2014 collapse in oil prices for the so-called “economic vandalism” that they believe that simple line graphs show.

https://twitter.com/maxfawcett/status/1862538994221031782

And then there was the absolute mendacity in Question Period. Michael Chong said that the estimated effect of Trump tariffs was less than what Trudeau has done (which is both false and stupid), and Corey Torchor, unbelievably, claimed that the StatsCan data showed that the economy was “collapsing,” and I wish I was making that up. In no way did any of that data indicate that there was anything resembling “collapse.” Sluggish, yes. Collapsing? How? Either the Conservatives are just outright lying with statistics, or they have no clue how to read GDP data (or maybe both). And the funny thing is that all of this concern about declining per capita GDP is a pretty de facto way of saying that they are cheering for an actual recession, which we would have had if we hadn’t juiced immigration the way we did. I wish this wasn’t so stupid, and I wish we had more journalists calling this out, but we don’t because “I was told there would be no math.”

This is incredibly mendacious framing.GDP per capita largely declined because of the influx of immigration, which staved off an actual recession. Saying that Trump tariffs would do less damage than the current government is both stupid and wrong.

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2024-11-29T21:15:09.167Z

Tochor claims that StatsCan reported that our economy is “collapsing.”Bullshit. Complete and utter bullshit. He doesn’t know how to read GDP data and is going to just lie. #QP

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2024-11-29T16:37:05.538Z

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian drone attacks hit residential buildings in Kyiv and Odesa, injuring eight. Ukrainian forces are facing a desertion crisis because of overstretched forces, psychological scarring, and the management of the war. Ukraine’s army chief is pledging more troops on the eastern front after visiting there. Here is a look at Ukrainians dismantling a thermal power plant before the Russians can advance on it.

https://twitter.com/ukraine_world/status/1862448598702596345

Good reads:

  • Justin Trudeau started the day in PEI with a school food programme announcement.
  • When asked about the $250 rebate cheques, Trudeau was non-committal about expanding it to satisfy the NDP’s demands.
  • Trudeau then picked up Dominic LeBlanc and some senior officials in Ottawa and headed to Mar-a-Lago for dinner with Trump and his team.
  • Chrystia Freeland says that the federal government will commit $758 million so that Toronto can replace some of its aging subway fleet.
  • Ahmed Hussen announced another $50 million in humanitarian assistance for Gaza.
  • Private refugee sponsorship is being paused until 2026 in order to deal with a backlog of applications.
  • The federal government is signing the first moder treaty with the Manitoba Métis Federation (while internal Métis politics are interesting).
  • The Fiscal Monitor shows a federal deficit of $13 billion between April and September (but those numbers change bigtime at year-end).
  • The RCMP say they are ready to re-deploy a quarter of their Eastern workforce to deal with priority areas, possibly including the border.
  • The RCMP Civilian Review and Complaints Commission says that there needs to be a better complaint mechanism in Nunavut, where they can’t access it in Inuktitut.
  • A hitman in Quebec has offered a bounty of $100,000 on the reporter covering his trial because he didn’t like the coverage.
  • LGBTQ+ people in Africa are looking to Canada for help as anti-gay laws are expanding in several countries on the continent.
  • If the motion to restore Supply Days goes ahead next week, the Conservatives say they plan to use Jagmeet Singh’s words to craft a non-confidence motion.
  • The Conservatives and NDP are accusing each other of harassing and intimidating behaviour—and voting in the House while intoxicated, and I just can’t even.
  • Justin Ling declares that it’s time to replace Mélanie Joly as foreign minister.
  • Matt Gurney posits that Canada is unprepared for America’s changing global power dynamic, because we didn’t properly understand the power dynamic to begin with.

Odds and ends:

For National Magazine, I look at yesterday’s Supreme Court of Canada decision giving the go-ahead to a multi-Crown lawsuit against pharmaceutical companies.

Need a copy of my book “The Unbroken Machine,” or “Royal Progress,” which I contributed to? Want to give a copy as a gift? Dundurn Press is having a 25% off site wide sale!

— Dale Smith (@journodale.bsky.social) 2024-11-18T23:53:05.945Z

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