Comment 58980

By A Smith (anonymous) | Posted January 31, 2011 at 23:19:27 in reply to Comment 58801

Brandon >> Private funds won't develop there unless the area is cleaned up through public investment,

That's why City Hall should use cleaning up industrial sites as an opportunity to add more debt to the credit card. Seriously.

Brain Mulroney told Stephen Harper recently that he should be transformational rather than transactional. In other words, be either hot or cold. I am starting to see the merits in that outlook.

Under the eight years Mulroney was in office, real GDP averaged 2.24% a year. Under "prudent" Harper, GDP has averaged only 1.14%. The seventies, which Conservatives hate, because Trudeau wasted money on big government schemes, real GDP averaged 4.14% per year.

Even Mike Harris was transformational. He did it in the opposite way of Trudeau, by freezing spending, but the results were equally as positive for economic growth.

For the years 1985-1996, interest payments on government debt never fell below 9% of GDP. During this time period, GDP averaged 2.44% a year. In 2008, interest payments were only 4.06% of GDP.

If the Rheem site needs to be cleaned up, the city should just spend the money and get it done already. We used to fund massive wars with debt and our economy grew much faster than today.

Permalink | Context

Events Calendar

There are no upcoming events right now.
Why not post one?

Recent Articles

Article Archives

Blog Archives

Site Tools

Feeds