Economic and political issues in NS

[q12]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

I haven't seen much evidence of (economic) momentum under the NDP reign. I have seen increased taxation and business unfriendly policies (such as the first contract legislation).

Where is the momentum in the following graph? The Canadian economy seems to be improving but the Nova Scotia economy has been stagnant since 2008.

(source: http://www.gov.ns.ca/finance/statist...ws.asp?id=8536 )

And to add to that Dexter lied to Nova Scotians about raising the HST, people will not forget that.

I got a song for the NDP:

• Video Link

[ILoveHalifax]

Originally Posted by RyeJay

Thank you for replying, fenwick. Small business taxation has gone down under the NDP. How high do you believe taxation has gone up? After the hundreds of millions of dollars in forgivable loans the NDP has provided Irving for shipyard upgrades, I don't think it's fair to say the NDP are unfriendly toward business. I am willing to discuss the criticisms of the NDP, but my initial intention was to discover what people liked about the Liberals (or the Progressive Conservatives).

What are your thoughts?

Oh that is so easy, Stephen McNeil isn't Darrell Dexter. That in itself is enough to vote Liberal.

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by ILoveHalifax

Oh that is so easy, Stephen McNeil isn't Darrell Dexter. That in itself is enough to vote Liberal.

I don't appreciate your comment. I remain hopeful that someone will be non-sarcastic, and actually tell me what they like about Liberal policy.

[q12]

The NDP are also doing a great job of growing Nova Scotia's population. Everybody loves high taxes and no jobs, especially outside of Halifax.



http://www5.statcan.gc.ca/cansim/a26...ataTable&csid=

[RyeJay]

Originally Posted by q12

The NDP are also doing a great job of growing Nova Scotia's population. Everybody loves high taxes and no jobs, especially outside of Halifax.

So by this graph, the Progressive Conservatives currently in power in New Brunswick are perhaps solely responsible for their population decline? I'm going to give you an opportunity to engage me in non-sarcasm.

You subjectively label Nova Scotia's taxes (all varieties of taxes?...) as "high," when some economists would frame the current tax rates as closer to fairness. Enough with the debt and freeloading; we need to pay our entitlements: or not have them at all. I don't think sarcasm is warranted for a have-not province that hasn't seen an enormous amount of wealth throughout its history, relatively speaking.

We could adopt New Brunswick's lower tax rates for corporations -- but then we would run the risk of being short-changed for our social programs. New Brunswick has healthcare problems; it has school funding problems; it has pension problems; it has unemployment problems; it has infrastructure problems.

With such low taxes in NB, where are all of these amazing, high-paid jobs that right-wingers believe magically spring out of the ground as tax rates shrink?

Do you believe that Nova Scotia has some secret super powerful industries hidden somewhere that are creating just so much in tax revenues that Nova Scotians may pay as little in taxes as Albertans?

Most of the attacks on the NDP (such as your graph correlation) have been shallow, essentially picking at the party for not being perfect and not bringing perfection to Nova Scotia in the four years they had.

Please, acknowledge that the NDP hasn't been the hardcore left-wing socialist monster the Liberals and the Progressive Conservatives tried to mislead the public into believing. Much of the criticism toward the NDP has been from the left: especially with the issues of the NDP subsidising Irving and lowering small business tax rates.

The NDP have been better liberals than the Liberals. The NDP only want tax rates to be high enough to pay for the programs the province needs to continue growing -- programs, such as subsidies for private companies. The NDP are not anti-business.

(Is Canada anti-Maritimer because of our tax rates? The Maritimes get subsidised by the feds, generously.)

Nova Scotia is fortunate not to have New Brunswick's deficits. Compared to Nova Scotia's past Liberal and Progressive Conservative Governments, at least the NDP have come closer to balancing the books and achieving an improvement of the province's credit rating.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Let's hope this situation is resolved soon. It's sad that The Cat couldn't have been kept running for a few more years, regardless of the subsidy required, to help maintain the tourism link (and related income) for the south shore and valley until a better deal could be ironed out.

The costs to the local economy have been severe, and likely the costs to reestablish this service will be greater than if it had just been kept going all this time.

http://thechronicleherald.ca/novasco...ferry-property

Not a legacy I'd want to be carrying with me coming into an election.

[teddifax]

Emails were sent out on the update on the Halifax Shipyards proposed work, a link is here http://us5.campaign-archive1.com/?u=...&id=4ee0cfc939

[someone123]

ANS had an interesting article about Conference Board of Canada projections for GDP growth in Halifax and in Nova Scotia as a whole.

GDP growth in Halifax is only expected to be 1.7% this year, but that is actually 6th highest in Canada. It goes to show that we are in a generally weak economic period. I think this has caused ideal conditions for migration to places like Alberta or Saskatchewan, since they are doing so well and since other places are doing so poorly.

Another interesting point in the article is that the economy outside of Halifax is expected to grow by only 0.4% this year, but they are expecting 3.3% growth in 2014, which is actually than the 2.9% projected for Halifax in 2014. Nothing is certain but I wonder if the current situation is more of a temporary rough patch for rural NS rather than a permanent sign of things to come.

It feels like there is a lot of positive economic news in NS that is for a couple of years in the future, so it will be interesting to see if those projections come true. It's the same in Halifax where we have supposed sure deals like the shipbuilding contract that will not get into full swing for a while. The shipbuilding contract was awarded in 2011 but it is really only now that the positive economic impact is starting.

[someone123]

There was an article in ANS tonight about BP and NS offshore exploration. Apparently they are expecting to find billions of barrels of oil deposits in the areas they purchased exploration rights for (major oil-producing countries have reserves of around 100-300 billion barrels of oil). The exploration itself will cost about $1B.

This is kind of interesting because Sable Island and Deep Panuke are natural gas projects, not oil projects. It would be better for the province to have both commodities.

[Wishblade]

Originally Posted by someone123

There was an article in ANS tonight about BP and NS offshore exploration. Apparently they are expecting to find billions of barrels of oil deposits in the areas they purchased exploration rights for (major oil-producing countries have reserves of around 100-300 billion barrels of oil). The exploration itself will cost about $1B.

This is kind of interesting because Sable Island and Deep Panuke are natural gas projects, not oil projects. It would be better for the province to have both commodities.

Shell is hoping to find oil in the Shelburne Basin as well. I'm really keeping my fingers crossed that they do as it could mean big things for the company I work for, and HUGE things for this province.

[someone123]

ANS reported tonight that the Conference Board of Canada is expecting NS GDP growth to be 2.8% (2nd in Canada) in 2014 and 2.5% (3rd place) in 2015.

[mcmcclassic]

My source at the Atlantic Provinces Economic Council predicted 2.0% growth in 2014. No guess at 2015..

The only problem with predictions is that they can become inaccurate extremely quickly when external events occur (ex. Blackberry closing).

[SignalHillHiker]

I thought you guys might be interested in this:

Originally Posted by BigRedSpecial

It's hilariously ironic that I'm posting this after Chris Chafe was brought up but I was in a meeting today and figured I'd share some news on future oil exploration. Keep in mind this is in a constant state of change, but this is the outlook as it looks today. In addition to developments I've mentioned previously (Husky GBS, Chevron bringing the West Mira here, Stena IceMax), this is new news:

-Statoil has contracted the West Hercules (sister rig to the West Aquarius and West Mira) to do their exploration work in the Flemish Pass

-"European companies" (I have no idea who, sounds pretty preliminary) are supposedly buying up licenses to conduct exploration in the three basins Nalcor reported off of Labrador last year (likely quite a ways out, but promising nonetheless)

-Not in this province, but will produce a ton of activity here: the exploration by Shell in NS will be a lot larger in scale than initially thought; now the plan is from two to seven wells. After that, BP will begin drilling... I have no idea where; this was the first any of us have heard of it.

Unfortunately that's all the details I have; as I've said before, I'm pretty low on the totem pole, but figured I'd share what little I do know.

One thing I do know, is I sincerely hope the Hercules and Mira have a better run here then the Aquarius has so far; the thing has been an absolute pile. Pretty sad when the brand new, state of the art rig has more issues than the ancient HGR and GGB.

[someone123]

The Conference Board of Canada is predicting 2.8% GDP growth and 0.8% employment growth (+4000 jobs) for NS in 2014, which is pretty good.

[resetcbu1]

Originally Posted by someone123

The Conference Board of Canada is predicting 2.8% GDP growth and 0.8% employment growth (+4000 jobs) for NS in 2014, which is pretty good.

I wonder how much of that is HRM.... I would imagine that it would be quite a bit.... if the rest of the province loses 5000 jobs but as a whole NS gained 4000 that'd be rather impressive. mind you these figures are not from any source just out of my head but the idea is real that HRM is showing exceptional growth.

[beyeas]

The recent release of the Report of the Nova Scotia Commission on Building our New Economy, commonly known as The Ivany Report, has stimulated essential debate about how Nova Scotia can and must adapt to the “New Economy”.

A critical point that stands out among the many messages contained within the report is the fact that the province must undergo an attitude shift from a perennial have-not province to a global player in areas where we have key assets. To be a leader in the global economy, we must first believe as a people that we ARE global leaders.

NS Health Research Among World’s Best

Health research is one such area where Nova Scotia competes with the best in the world. However, the report fails to mention health research, and more specifically fails to mention the vital role that health research within the hospitals plays in economic development.

http://smartcityblog.greaterhalifax....-research.html

[fenwick16]

Originally Posted by beyeas

http://smartcityblog.greaterhalifax....-research.html

Halifax seems to have entered a rather stagnant spell over the past couple of years, at least in terms of employment growth. Hopefully it can keep pushing forward and use its strengths to get back to strong economic growth.

It is nice to read a positive article ( to Dr. Beyea). Hopefully Halifax can retain more of its talented people and even attract talent from other parts of the world to shred its have-not label.

[Drybrain]

Some nice economic news coming our way: Halifax (and, more impressively, given the dodgy economic situation outside of HRM) Nova Scotia generally posted some of the highest gains in household net worth in Canada in the past 24 months.

Couple that an unemployment rate that's consistently been in the 5-6 range for the past year, and I think that that speaks to the relative strength of the city's economy--even on a national scale, which most of us seem to think we stack up poorly against.

[fenwick16]

It is good to see some positive economic news. It seems like there has been quite a bit of bad news the last couple of years such as declining Nova Scotia population and employment.

(source: http://thechronicleherald.ca/busines...14-apec-report)

Nova Scotia exports up 50 per cent in first half of 2014: APEC report
KELLY SHIERS BUSINESS REPORTER
Published August 7, 2014 - 8:15am

Nova Scotia’s economy has been buoyed by gains in export sectors, despite factors such as weakening employment and retail spending and a slowdown in home construction being felt across the entire region, says a report released Wednesday.

“In general, it’s a pretty soft economy across the region, including in Nova Scotia,” said Fred Bergman, senior analyst with the Atlantic Provinces Economic Council.

“Nova Scotia benefited from strong growth in natural gas exports. … Part of it was from Deep Panuke being on stream this year and also the Sable Project producing at a higher level.”

In its economic update for the region, the think-tank said total exports in Nova Scotia increased 50 per cent from January to May.
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[fenwick16]

I check the Statistics Canada website a few times a month and I have noticed that the Halifax employment levels have been stagnant the past couple of years - http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tabl...fss03a-eng.htm. I wonder if part of this could be a reduction in public sector job growth (provincial and federal) to control government deficits? (there have also been private sector job losses)

If the employment growth stagnation is due to a stagnation in provincial/federal government job growth then there is hope that the private sector will eventually start creating a significant number of private sector jobs with the offshore oil exploration and shipbuilding contract, for example. Certainly private sector job growth is preferable to public sector job growth since private sector job growth means additional provincial tax revenue whereas public sector job growth is normally associated with increased provincial/federal expenditures and deficits.