Talk:Canadian and American economies compared

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Is there anything to back up the notion that Canadian unemployment rates are recorded significantly differently than American ones? I have never seen anything concrete to back that up.


Median income is lower in Canada than in the United States.

Do you have evidence for this? I could not find any direct comparissons, but Statscan puts Canadian median income at CSD 55,016 in 2000. The US census puts their median income at USD 43,527 over a three year average from 2001-03. In terms of purchasing power these numbers would make Canada's median income higher. Comparing these two raw numbers is not ideal, do you have any better numbers? - SimonP 08:57, Jan 31, 2005 (UTC)
Yes, and I've seen several citations which mention that the US has a higher median income than Canada. [1] Look at median earnings in terms of purchasing parity, the US is quite a bit higher. The margin is much less than if you simply compare per capita income averages but clearly the US is higher.
I don't know why this article is using median income for Red Deer, Alberta to represent all of Canada and then goes ahead to use US Census Bureau data for the United States. If we want to be fair here, Statscan has median family income at http://www40.statcan.ca/l01/cst01/famil108a.htm which shows that in 2005 (and in 2005 dollars) the Canadian median income is 60,600. I'm not sure what the PPP conversion is which may bring it down by an amount. 18:49, 21 September 2007 (UTC)Breadloaf


"Aboriginal peoples in Canada, a comparatively smaller percentage of the population, have a far lower standard of living than the majority."

Maybe this should say "Most Aboriginals". I beleive that some of the *ahem* cheifs live rather well, even if they're only a small percentage of a small percentage of the population.

Talnova

I think the "on average" is implicit here. Why didn't you object to the generalization in the previous sentence? HistoryBA 23:45, 15 July 2005 (UTC)

Contents

[edit] Title of article

Shouldn't it be "economies" instead of "economics"?

Good point. On another issue, may I ask that you sign your contributions to the talk pages? HistoryBA 00:11, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
Sorry, I'm new Tony
So I just discovered a tab to move the page. Should we change the title from 'Canadian and American economics compared' to 'Canadian and American economies compared'? If yes, do we need to fix every link that pointed to the old article? Tony the newbie
Moving it is a good idea, and I have done so. I am not sure what I was thinking when I named this page, probably trying to too closely parallel Canadian and American economics compared. No we don't have to fix all the incoming links, but since "economics compared" really is a pretty awkward phrasing, it might be a good idea.- SimonP 02:38, 22 September 2005 (UTC)
I fixed all the incoming links in actual articles. Should we delete this article? As you said, the title is wrong. Tony Bruguier

[edit] POV in opening

I think that the following opening is highly problematic:

The comparison between the economies of Canada and the United States is generally far more of a concern to Canadians than to Americans. Canadians feel that they are under constant pressure to remain competitive with the United States. Otherwise, they fear that they will suffer brain drain, where highly skilled Canadians emigrate and/or corporations relocate to the United States. American citizens and corporations rarely emigrate.

Frankly, it's unsourced crap. "Far more of a concern to Canadians than to Americans" - cite? "Canadians feel that they are under constant pressure to remain competitive with the United States" - cite? "American citizens and corporations rarely emigrate" - cite? (I seem to recall a lot of American corporations "emigrating" to the Bahamas, at least in name, for tax purposes.) All of this is crap and should be reworded, cited or removed. Firebug 04:51, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] POV/General Questions

"American citizens and corporations rarely emigrate"

Probably should be changed, specifically the corporations part. As already pointed out they've been moved to tax free areas, and new areas with a cheaper work force.


"In its quest to appear to compete with the US, Canada starts at an immediate disadvantage."

Denotes Canada is just trying to look even, not be even.


"Differences between government intervention in the economies of the two countries is most closely examined in Canada, because some feel that policies that more closely emulate the US are preferable, while others disagree."

Source for first part? Last clause ("while others disagree") seems unnecessary.


"Canadian low-income earners are thus more burdened in this respect because a sales tax is regressive by nature."

G&S Tax Basic food is exempt.


"For instance, the British Times Higher Education Supplement ranked 7 US universities in the top 10 of the world, 11 in the top 20, and 16 in the top 30. Indeed, excepting only Oxford and Cambridge, each of the world's top 9 universities were in the United States. Zero Canadian universities were in the top 20, and only one Canadian university (McGill) made the top 30. Five government-funded American universities (and eleven private universities) were included in the top 30.

In another international study by the Institute of Higher Education of Shanghai Jiao Tong University, the difference was even more striking. It ranked 8 US universities in the top 10 of the world, 17 in the top 20, and 22 in the top 30. Again only with the exceptions of Oxford and Cambridge, the top 13 universities in the world were all in the United States. As in the British study, no Canadian universities made the top 20 and only one made the top 30 (this time it was the University of Toronto). Eight government-funded American universities (and fourteen private ones) were in the top 30."

Has no correlation to economics.


"Contrary to popular belief, the U.S. Government spends far more on health care than does Canada."

Source?


"Canadians are forced to choose between small inefficient airlines that would be competitive, or monopolistic airlines that will generate its own inefficiency."

Opinion.


"Another example of this trade off is the book industry which has recently switched models. Until the 1990s Canada had many small and fairly inefficient book stores. Then Chapters entered the market and quickly created a near monopoly, eliminating the inefficiencies of smaller stores but potentially leading to a monopolistically set price and limited choice of books. This monopolizaton was aided by government policy in Canada that requires bookstores in Canada be Canadian owned."

Source?


"If Jim Carrey had remained in the Canadian entertainment industry, he would have made far less money and would not be world famous."

Opinion


Prices section needs to be updated with the rise in the Canadian dollar as well as higher gasoline prices in the United States.


"Canada has a higher unemployment rate than the United States. Canadian unemployment hovers around 7 to 8%(although is currently 6.4%) while the U.S. tends to be around 5%"

Source?

MiDra

[edit] Banking

The banking section seems disproportionatly long, especially in comparison to other sections (I have a hard time believing that banking deserves a longer section than, say, taxation). Is there any way to cut it down without losing something important? MiDra 17:35, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I added a lot of the banking material, but I also knew I was making it too long. Feel free to cut whatever you think are the least important or interesting parts. No offense will be taken. Deet 19:37, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
Cool. I started taking out a few lines, but I'm hesitant to massively renovate sections, I'm not exactly the greatest banking afficionado. MiDra 20:05, 9 December 2006 (UTC)
I actually think it is one of the best sections. I would instead say that subjects such as tax policy and productivity are much too short, and should be expanded by someone knowledgable. - SimonP 20:13, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

I think the banking section is a little American biased. "In real terms Canadian banks are much smaller". Considering that RBC would rank as the fifth largest bank by assets in the United states. I also think it needs some citations.--65.94.109.49 06:53, 2 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Structure

Are the topics listed drawn from a particular source regarding economic comparisons? I just wonder about which topics should, should not be included here and whether it should be standardized for all of these types of articles. Effectively, this could be viewed as original research Canking 22:40, 2 June 2007 (UTC)

Probably no one person picked the topics. With regards to you original research question, if an external example existed for every topic then we wouldn't need Wikipedia, would we? The original research concern applies only if we started some complex math calculations in this article to prove a new thesis regarding superiority of the economy of Nunavut relative to Florida, or something like that. Deet 18:38, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Idiotic article made less idiotic

You can thank me on my user talkpage.--Rotten 02:34, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

WP:CIV - SimonP 02:45, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:CAD50 Front.png

Image:CAD50 Front.png is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in this Wikipedia article constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

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BetacommandBot 18:12, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Removed "vandalism"

this was added to the article:

It is not reasonable to use data for countries which are taken at different times - there is a four year spread of data. It leads to a grossly misleading analysis.

whilst it's true it should have been raised on a talk page. i know nowhere near enough to be able to remedy this, though - so hence i've noted it here. cheers! Onesecondglance (talk) 12:49, 4 June 2008 (UTC)