More Loonie Talk

You know, I still find it bizarre that Canada is the only country in the world where you'll find media reports filled with doom and gloom and predictions of widespread disaster because our currency is going up. I'm picturing an obsequious little nebbishy Walter Mitty telling his boss "Oh, it's OK, sir, you don't have to pay me what I'm worth, I promise I won't go work for the nice man across the street. Yes I know it's costing me more to drive to work and feed my family and heat my home, but I'm comfortable in this little rut right here. Thank you, sir."

See, the other news that happened the same day as our dollar reached parity with the U.S. dollar was that the U.S. dollar sunk to the lowest point in history against the Euro, €1.00 = $1.40 USD. (Mac OS X power tip of the day: Option+Shift-2 will make a Euro symbol. Sweet.) This means that while Americans can buy less of our oil and nickel and lumber, Europeans can buy a lot more of it, and they can also afford to bring it over there. Tying your economy so much to one neighbour because it's easier than developing a shipping industry is proving to be a little shortsighted.

And I'm glad we're not doing anything or even making noises towards artificially creating a lower dollar. If our government did that I would personally consider that they robbed me and 30 million other Canadians of the value of our own money just so some lumber company wouldn't be inconvenienced.

Speaking of the government, if Stephen Harper keeps on paying down the debt and making sensible tax cuts - the value of the interest we would have paid given back in tax cuts is so utterly sensible it makes me weep - I may not burn him in effigy if he's elected again. Still won't vote for him though, don't worry. Jack Layton did make a good point about infrastructure, though. We don't exactly need to wait for one of our own bridges to collapse before thinking it might be a good idea to do some engineering reviews of our cities a little more often.

If Ireland can silently raise itself up so that its standard of living has surpassed that of the United Kingdom without the benefit of natural resources, we shouldn't have any trouble growing either because of or in spite of the US's weakening economy.

Labels: Economics