By Gregor W. Smith, Queen’s University

The Bank of Canada often describes inflation targeting as flexible. For example, the preamble to its October 2018 Monetary Policy Report says:

“Canada’s inflation-targeting framework is flexible. Typically, the Bank seeks to return inflation to target over a horizon of six to eight quarters. However, the most appropriate horizon for returning inflation to target will vary depending on the nature and persistence of the shocks buffeting the economy.” [3]

The flexibility thus involves a deferral in the planned return of the inflation rate to 2%, the mid-point of the target range. This deferral is applied because policy is being used to respond to some other goal. One can read more about this strategy in speeches by Bank of Canada officials or in the background documents at the last two renewals of the inflation target [1,2].Read More »

By Raphaelle Gauvin-Coulombe, Queen’s University

Fiscal policy in response to the Great Recession of 2008-09 varied widely across OECD countries. The United States, for example, took an expansionary fiscal stance, adopting an important stimulus package in February 2009 on the order $787 billion (CBO estimate). Canada’s response went in the same direction with its Economic Action Plan, a $30 billion stimulus package enacted in January 2009 (Department of Finance, Canada). Alternatively, on the other side of the Atlantic, policy-makers in the United Kingdom, Germany, and elsewhere either proposed, or implemented, austerity measures. The effectiveness of these different responses is still debated among economists and policy-makers today, and the political drivers of such heterogeneity are still imperfectly understood. Read More »

By Ian Keay, Professor, Queen’s University

After tearing up a long-standing trade agreement between the United States and Canada, a deeply divided, Republican controlled Congress dramatically raises US tariff rates on products predominantly imported from Canada. The federal government in Canada is faced with an acute policy dilemma – there are strong domestic interests pushing for rapid and dramatic retaliation, while other groups, including farmers and landowners, are not nearly so enthusiastic about the prospect of a trade war with our largest and fastest growing trade partner. To complicate matters further, Canada’s European allies are keen to promote the continued globalization of international markets by keeping trade barriers low. The Canadian government ultimately decides to respond to these conflicting forces by re-writing virtually every line in the domestic tariff schedule, explicitly adopting protectionism as a primary policy goal, and increasing average tariffs by more than 50%.

This series of events probably sounds very familiar to Canadians today, but this particular episode in Canada-US trade relations took place over 150 years ago, during the late 1860s and 1870s. John A. Macdonald’s Conservative government introduced the National Policy tariffs as a response to US protectionism just months after his party won the 1878 federal election. Economists and historians have long understood that this response marked a sharp U-turn in Canada-US relations. However, our understanding of this policy, and its consequences for Canadian growth and development, has been hindered by researchers’ reliance on incomplete evidence.Read More »

By Nikola Milutinovic, Queen’s University

Carbon taxes aren’t necessarily the job killer some provincial party leaders are making them out to be. Research by Ph.D. Candidate Akio Yamazaki of the University of Calgary should give Canadian politicians and pundits pause over the employment effects of carbon taxes. Yamazaki’s research suggests that British Columbia’s revenue-neutral carbon tax caused a net-gain in employment of 4.5% between 2007 and 2013. Governments can affect the labour market impact of carbon pricing by properly allocating their carbon tax revenues, according to Yamazaki.

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By Fanny McKellips, Queen’s University

It is a well-accepted fact that smoking and second-hand smoke have harmful effects on health.

For this reason, many measures are taken by governments to decrease smoking and exposure to second-hand smoke. Canadian provinces, for instance, have banned smoking in all public places and workplaces. In the United States, 25 states have banned smoking in public places. While this limits exposure of non-smoking adults to secondhand smoke, it may create a displacement of smoking from public places to homes. Could this mean that children and infants, who cannot make their own decision to be exposed to second-hand smoke, are negatively affected by smoking bans? This issue is not well understood as the literature surrounding smoking bans tends to focus on the health impact on adults. Read More »