TORONTO, June 26 /CNW/ – Like the perpetual little brother, Canadians have always lived in the shadow of our American neighbours. But it turns out that while America was out conquering the world, Canada has been quietly working away at building better lives. Now we’re the ones on top: Compared to the U.S., we work less, live longer, enjoy better health and have more sex – and believe it or not, we’re now wealthier.
No surprises here: Set up an equation. One one side, take the gross income of a typical Canadian household, and subtract from that taxes at all levels, federal, provincial, and local.
On the other side, take a typical American’s household, assuming he is employed, and subtract from income not only federal and state taxes, but also health care and education costs, including student loans.
Who is better off? I’ve not seen any studies, but the article above is evidence, at least, that Canadians are better off than Americans.
Piece of Mindful 
Canada’s lower population density, ten times lower than U.S., may have something to do with that. Land and natural resourced are less depleted, and commodity prices appear to be holding or trending higher which favors a large-area, low-density situation. Australia enjoys many similar benefits with comparable density and abundant resources to trade on the global market.
Their weaker environmental laws, however, allow multi-nationals pretty much free reign, which may hurt them down the road. The snapshot today looks pretty appealing. Many have made the move already and seem content.
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They are under attack, constant attack, by American corporations and their agents in government. They are still resilient, and there is some semblance of public opinion translating into public policy up there. As to
what happens in the future, the non-falisfiable hypothesis is not a useful argument. There is hope, even here, for better. Read Gar Alperovitz at Democracy Now last Friday for some hope blown up our collective ass.
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Canadians are about to get richer.
http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2012/07/15/energy-revolution-2-a-post-post-american-post/
Make sure you read the second paragraph.
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What the HELL is your point? Spit it out, man, back it up. Your links are tiresome.
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“By some estimates, the United States has more oil than Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Iran combined, and Canada may have even more than the United States. A GAO report released last May (pdf link can be found here) estimates that up to the equivalent of 3 trillion barrels of shale oil may lie in just one of the major potential US energy production sites. If half of this oil is recoverable, US reserves in this one deposit are roughly equal to the known reserves of the rest of the world combined.”
Canadians have better sex cause there’s lots of high paying energy jobs.
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Yes, I read it. I was simply perplexed that you could so easily and quickly reduce complex subject to a tangentially related link. Can things ever be made simple enough for you?
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Your stuff always needs translation.
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In to or out of swedish?
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Biggy Jo, Mark seems to have missed that Canadians give “conservative” Stephen Harper the credit: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-05-03/harper-s-conservatives-to-win-canadian-election-ctv-television-projects.html
Out with it now, Craig – are you saying that Canadians are wealthier than Americans because Harper is PM? I’d like to see your dots and how you connect them.
You must understand something here: It is not a short-term consequence of some election. It is not any given policy or the fact that they are exploiting tar sands. I don’t understand how all of that interconnects. Economies are very complicated animals, too much so for me.
It is this: Everything they do up there is counter to our wisdom down here. they should be swilling in debt and poverty, what with higher taxes and public spending on health care and education.
They are not. Quite the opposite. Why?
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Mark, here is what I said:
The “credit” is for whatever ‘exceptionalism’ that motivated Canadians to affirm their support for the direction of their country with their overwhelming vote of confidence for Harper’s conservative government.
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Canadians swing back and forth, and Harper will run his course just like the others. I tend to think that Canadians habcing more household income left after taxes versus mericans having less after taxes, health care and education costs has more effect.
Simple math. More money left equals more household wealth. Harper is shorting to bearing down the health care system. That’ll get him put to pasture, quickly.
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Mark, if Harper was going to be shown the pasture quickly, that would have been the last election where the opposition thought the same thing. They lost badly on your prediction.
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Craig – think a bit longer term. Canadian elections regularly swing back and forth, with the party in power usually losing power after scandal. Remember Mulroney? He almost singlehandedly destroyed the conservatives up there, leaving them with less than 25 seats. It’ll come around again, no doubt. It is interesting to note that Canadian elections actually affect Canadian government policies, unlike here.
All of that has nothing to do with the fact that Canadians are wealthier than Americans. I’m sure if harper has his way, they’ll do American-style health care, American-style education, and they’ll be as poor as us in short order.
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Several years ago, you gave us the impression that Cuba was a socialist paradise. Then, more recently, you extolled Venezuela as the greatest People’s Place on Earth. Now you are promoting Canada.
Before you know it, you will be back to the USA, then to Colorado, and then, eventually, to Montana. And I will be the first to welcome you back, Trotsky.
— MB (Still loving Wild West capitalism, still laughing all the way to the bank.)
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False on all counts.
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