FROLITICKS

Satirical commentary on Canadian and American current political issues

Jan 26

Canadian Trucker Protest Over Mandatory Vaccination Between U.S. and Canada

by bcurry

This weekend, in something called the Freedom Convoy 2022, hundreds of semi-trucks will be arriving in Ottawa from cities across Canada in order to protest vaccine mandates.  However, plain and simple, their reaction to the Canadian government’s January 15th imposition of a vaccination requirement for truckers entering Canada appears to be just another protest tied into anti-vaxxers’ movements.  Indeed, the largest national organization representing Canadian truckers, the Canadian Trucking Alliance, has denounced the protest.  The Alliance has already stated that 85 percent of its members have been fully vaccinated, roughly the same as for the Canadian population at large.  It has strongly denounced any protests on public roadways, highways, and bridges and has urged all truckers to get inoculated.  However, the Alliance does not represent the majority of independent truckers who one would suggest are primarily involved in this protest, especially those in the West. 

On the other side of the border, the American administration has also imposed a mandatory vaccine requirement for truckers entering the U.S.  Indeed, it is interesting that Donald Trump Jr. this past Tuesday urged Americans on social media to follow the example of the Canadian trucker convoy’s fight against ‘tyranny’ and should carry out similar protests in the U.S.  Apparently, it is estimated that only half of American truckers have been vaccinated, not a dissimilar portion when compared to the general population in the U.S.  What concerns authorities is that the trucker convoy has become a lightning rod for far-right fringe, particularly those against public health measures and government restrictions in the fight against COVID. 

Despite claims that the vaccine mandates will negatively further exacerbate supply chain problems, in monitoring the volume of trucks crossing the border each day since January 15th, authorities have seen no measurable reduction in the number of trucks to date.  Last week, the Canadian Transport Minister noted that almost 100,000 trucks crossed the border — about the same as usual for this time of year.  Unfortunately, those opposed to vaccine mandates have attempted to frighten Canadians by claiming that there will be food and other materials shortages as a result of the government’s policies.  For the vast majority of Canadians, who support COVID vaccination and such mandates, the real issue is in the fight to control the pandemic’s current wave and reduce its terrible impact on a stressed-out health care system. 

Moreover, studies have shown that vaccine mandates work in increasing vaccination rates.  For example, recent research from Simon Fraser University economists indicated that the mere announcement of vaccine mandates last fall led to an average 66 percent surge in new, first-dose vaccinations in Canadian provinces.  From a constitutional perspective, whether a government can mandate vaccines depends on what exactly a new law says.  Canadians have rights to make decisions about vaccination but these rights are not absolute.  And having rights does not mean there will be no consequences for your decisions, including forms of penalization.  In the case of truckers, the government has done more than enough to promote voluntary vaccination.  Since the federal government imposed an immunization requirement last fall on workers in the air, rail and marine transportation sectors, it deliberately gave truckers more time to get vaccinated.  In consultation with the trucking and retail industries, the government waited for a “critical mass” of truckers to get their shots before making it mandatory.  In taking this approach and given the proven effectiveness of vaccine mandates, there is little doubt that the courts would find that such policies legally pass the taste test.

There is no doubt that Canadians and Americans owe much to these essential workers, but truckers need to vaccinate for their own health reasons and those of their families and friends, just like the rest of us.  While independent truckers in particular tend to reflect a ‘wild west’ mentality, they still have a responsibility to themselves and their communities to continue contributing to beating COVID-19 so that life can get back to normal and the economy can open.  They need to cut down on extreme pronouncements about attacking ‘tyrannical governments’ who supposedly are oppressing their people with public health measures.  Instead, they might gain more public support by avoiding such far-right fringe edicts.

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Jan 22

It’s Hard to be Optimistic About the Rest of 2022 — Here’s Why

by bcurry

Well, the New Year began much as the old year ended.  Across the board there are numerous reasons for North Americans not to be overly optimistic about the rest of the year.  Several key factors are leading us to this conclusion.

  • The Omicron variant of COVID-19 has created a fourth or fifth wave, depending on who you are talking to.  Although Omicron appears to have possibly peaked, it has once again severely strained our health care systems.  In addition, the unvaccinated continue to represent the largest number of hospitalizations, especially when it comes to patients in our ICUs.  Our health care providers continue to be under a great deal of strain, especially after two years of treating COVID patients.  There is now a tremendous backlog of elective surgeries and treatments.  In addition, although CDC studies show the effectiveness of booster vaccine shots in preventing severe COVID cases, far fewer adults have gotten booster shots to date.  When will we move from a pandemic to an endemic?
  • In most jurisdictions, kids are back for in-person learning in schools.  However, there are still a large number of children under the age of twelve who have not received their first dose of a COVID vaccine.  With the Omicron variant being twice as contagious as the Delta variant, many parents are concerned about the safety of schools and the potential effect of the disease on their children.  Indeed, statistics have shown that more children are being hospitalized due to Omicron.  Questions have been raised about whether in-person learning can continue in the near future.
  • Even with the economy starting to reopen, a number of economic issues have arisen.  Among these is the forecast of continuing hyperinflation over the coming months.  There continue to be supply chain problems, shortages of skilled labour and increasing fuel, food and housing prices.  With the current annual inflation rate running at around six percent, Canadians have not seen such a high inflation rate since 1991.  A survey of consumer expectations showed Canadian households also expect inflation to stay above 3 percent over the next couple of years, above the two percent average considered normally acceptable.  Central banks have little choice but to raise interest rates this year which will have a major effect on government and personal debt payments down the road.
  • Internationally, both the U.S. and Canada, as members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), will have to deal with on-going Russian threats suggesting a possible military incursion into eastern Ukraine.  Although the Ukraine is not a member of NATO, the allied countries strongly believe that there needs to be an immediate and firm reaction to any Russian incursion.  As a warning to Russian President Vladimir Putin, NATO countries are arming and training the Ukraine military and defence forces in preparation for such an event.
  • China’s economy is slowing, a worrying sign for the world.  China’s National Bureau of Statistics indicates that economic output from October through December of 2021 was only 4% higher than during the same period a year earlier.  This is a far cry from previous annual growth rates ranging between 6 and 9 percent in recent years.  The Omicron variant of the coronavirus is now starting to spread in China, leading to more restrictions around the country and raising fears of renewed disruption of supply chains.  Being a major supplier to the North American markets, any continuing slowdown in China’s economy will have a severe impact on U.S. and Canadian businesses and consumers.
  • COVID-19 government relief programs for the unemployed and businesses affected by government-imposed lockdowns and public health measures are being phased out.  This could result in many hardships for lower income individuals and small to medium-sized businesses.  The resulting loss of income due to the pandemic will have an impact on government revenues in the near future.  Many government support programs may have to be reviewed for termination or reduction under expected future austerity measures.

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Jan 19

In Canada, People Are Beginning to Demand More of Governments When Dealing With COVID Vaccine Hesitancy

by bcurry

Back in 2020 when the Canadian federal government announced that it had ordered millions of doses of COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer, almost three-quarters of Canadians indicated in a poll that they would take the vaccine.  Since then, of Canadians 12 and older, an incredible 90.57 percent are either partially or fully vaccinated.  After over a year of the availability of vaccines, this leaves less than 10 percent of the population unvaccinated, a very small percentage because of medical exemptions.  Of Canada’s roughly 3.7 million unvaccinated, the limited data includes a group that is disproportionately composed of people who are low income, recent immigrants and ethnic minorities (i.e. marginalized communities).  Canada remains in the midst of a once-in-a-century pandemic that has already killed 30,000 people.  Of course, there are the so-called anti-vaxxers, who appear to oppose COVID vaccines no matter what.

Two years into this pandemic, the majority of Canadians are increasingly becoming angry over those people who are hesitant about or against getting vaccinated.  With the Omicron variant, hospitals are once again being stressed to their limits and many elective surgeries and treatments are being postponed.  Since the majority of COVID-related hospitalizations are among the unvaccinated, people are starting to point their fingers at them.  Nowhere is this reaction so evident as in the province of Quebec, where new cases caused by Omicron have severely taxed the capacity of the health care system.  On a per capita basis, Quebec’s case load has far outweighed that of any other province.  Quebec has also seen the biggest protests by anti-vaxxers and those against lockdowns than in any other province.  In turn, the situation has now driven the Quebec government to introduce a contribution increase for the unvaccinated to support the bigger demand on the province’s health care system.  Quebec’s Health Minister Jean-Yves Duclos even suggested earlier this month that mandatory vaccinations may be on the horizon for everyone, similar to what Austria recently implemented.

Across Canada, in a turn of events, the frustrated vaccinated are now more overtly protesting against those who refuse to get vaccinated.  A January poll by Maru Public Opinion found that two-thirds of Canadians are now in favour of mandatory vaccines for everyone over the age of five.  Another 37 percent said it would be OK to refuse to “allow them access to any publicly funded hospital/medical services.”  Sixty-one percent of the respondents said it would be allright to make the unvaccinated pay “a monetary healthcare surcharge on their taxes of up to $150 per month.”  More surprisingly, more than one in four of the Canadians polled supported jail time for the unvaccinated, agreeing that it would be acceptable to make them serve up to five days of jail time.

Of course, all of the above would be extraordinary measures in any democracy and politically dangerous for most governments.  However, given the current frustration with the unvaccinated and the politicization of public health measures, the chasm between the two groups has grown ever so deep.  Desperation to end this pandemic and its health and economic impacts has taken over, despite rational arguments over the self-evident consequences on civil liberties of such seemingly extreme measures.  Interestingly, the above poll noted that 12 percent, including 3 percent who were vaccinated, continue to describe the unvaccinated as “heroes for free speech/choice.” The Canadian Civil Liberties Association (CCLA) has stated that the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees autonomy over our bodies and medical decision-making.  “Allowing the government to levy fines on those who do not agree with the government’s recommended medical treatment is a deeply troubling proposition,” the CCLA said.  “The government must provide clear and compelling evidence and demonstrate that there were no reasonable alternatives.”

When it comes to dealing with the unvaccinated, in some jurisdictions the pendulum has swung the other way.  As in Quebec, current public opinion may just encourage a government to introduce even more severe penalties or restrictions when it comes to the unvaccinated.  I’m afraid that the end result will not prove to be good for any of us!

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Jan 14

Trade Squabbles Between U.S. and Canada Will Always Exist

by bcurry

When Canada, the U.S. and Mexico signed the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, known as USMCA, which came into force on July 1, 2020, no one really believed that any trade squabbles between the three countries would disappear overnight.  However, as a major trading nation, Canada has every desire to keep such squabbles to a minimum.  After all, the U.S. is Canada’s biggest trading partner with over 75 percent of Canada’s merchandise exports going to the U.S.  The U.S. and Canada enjoy the world’s most lucrative and enduring trade relationship, with almost $1.6 billion in goods crossing the border each day.  Goods and services trade between the two countries totalled almost $675 billion during 2017, according to the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.

Despite our close economic relationship, disputes occurred under the former North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and continue to surface under the USMCA.  For example, the Canada–United States softwood lumber dispute is one of the most significant and enduring trade disputes in modern history.  The dispute has had its biggest effect on British Columbia, the major Canadian exporter of softwood lumber to the U.S.  In turn, it has increased the cost of softwood lumber in the U.S., influencing daily costs in housing construction.  More recently, the U.S. won a key ruling by the USMCA dispute-settlement panel that could allow more American dairy brands to break into the Canadian retail market, much to the chagrin of highly dairy provinces such as Quebec.  The next dispute on the horizon has Canada joining Mexico in formally disputing how the U.S. interprets rules governing the origin of vehicle parts under the USMCA agreement between the countries.  Ever since the auto pact under NAFTA, the three countries have established highly integrative parts and assembly capabilities when it comes to the manufacture of vehicles.  Now with the increased manufacturing of electric vehicles, the Biden administration has proposed that e-vehicles should be primarily assembled in the U.S., using American parts, in order to avoid any kind of tariffs at the American border.

In addition, all three countries are tied together in the energy sector on a truly continental basis.  Both Canada and Mexico have substantial oil and gas sectors, and help supply the thirsty U.S. markets.  None is so dependent as to ignore the other contributors.  Canada for some time now has been trying to increase the flow of Alberta oil via pipelines, such as the now defunct Keystone XL pipeline.  The Keystone XL pipeline project aimed to carry oil from the tar sands of Canada into the U.S. and has been a political football for years.  Led by pressure from American and Canadian environmentalists, both countries will continue to have issues surrounding the extraction and transport of fossil fuels, in particular via pipelines between the two countries.

However, trade wars simply are not effective.  Tariffs result in less capital spending and higher costs.  Any economics student knows that that is a recipe for net job losses across an economy, not net job additions.  For example, trade wars involving the introduction of tariffs result in more paperwork, less efficiency and higher costs as affected companies try to ‘game’ the system and attempt to get around the tariffs in any way possible.  The negative effects were clearly shown when Donald Trump introduced steel tariffs on Canadian steel.  A Canadian committee was quickly set up to make sure that other countries did not ‘dump’ steel into Canada in reaction to the U.S. steel tariffs.  Few new jobs were created in the U.S. steel industry, where the real issue is the problem of competition from modern and more efficient steel production overseas.  Again, Canada’s steel and aluminum industries are fairly integrated with American users and manufacturers, so that tariffs simply lead to market disruptions and increased end costs.

For decades now, people have talked about the need for freer trade between our two countries.  Indeed, most business people would prefer to let the marketplace determine the value of trade, including cost effectiveness and competitive advantages.  Unfortunately, it appears that administrations in both countries prefer to have dispute resolution processes settle their ongoing trade squabbles, often resulting in long, disruptive and costly legal battles.

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Jan 10

Arguments Against Working for Jerks Are Nothing New

by bcurry

Recently, Emma Goldberg wrote an article in the New York Times entitled: “No More Working for Jerks.”  The problem is that the issue of managers who are jerks is really nothing new.  What the pandemic and technology have increasingly exposed is that jerks are more frequently being caught out in the open.  The exposure is often because people are working from home and management has come to rely on e-mails, zoom and other social media to communicate with employees.  Over several years now I have been researching what makes good managers, only to find unfortunately that there are clearly a number who fit the mould of being crazy bosses, bad bosses, jerks or just plain assholes.  Whichever descriptive terms you prefer to use, their attributes include everything from bullying, harassment, insensitivity, incivility, sexism, racism, ageism, narcissism, etc., etc.

Several books have been written about managers displaying such attributes.  Stanley Bing wrote “Crazy Bosses” in 2007.   That same year, Robert I. Sutton wrote what has become a business classic: “The No Asshole Rule — Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn’t.”  This book became a runaway bestseller, selling well over 800,000 copies and sparking translations into languages including Polish and Japanese.  In 2017, Sutton wrote a follow-up book entitled “Asshole Survival Guide: How to Deal With People Who Treat You Like Dirt.”  The book offers ways of spotting and coping with the various kinds of jerks we encounter at work and pulls no punches.

Emma Goldberg notes in her article that, for some, the past year has rebalanced the power seesaw between worker and boss.  She suggests that it might partly be because of the surge of people quitting, noting a record high 4.5 million Americans who voluntarily left their jobs in November.  With about 1 out of 7 employees now working from home (compared to pre-pandemic 1 out of 67 persons), there is a lot of discussion about return to office plans of corporations and the preferences of workers vis-à-vis work-life balance.  Goldberg believes that, whatever the change, more workers are now feeling empowered to call out their managers than ever before, particularly those who are real jerks.

The fact of the matter is that studies have shown that companies that adopt a no-jerks or no asshole policy simply perform better.  In many cases, the problem starts with how workers are promoted and trained in management skills.  In today’s high-tech economy, persons with good technical skills may not necessarily have good soft-skills needed to manage knowledge workers.  Over the last couple of decades, companies have not invested as much time and resources in developing leadership and management skills.  Given the greater competition for gifted knowledge workers, having the right management skills and personal attributes is more important than ever.  When jerks are in charge, their actions quickly become known within the industry, often through social media exposure.  Subsequently, such corporate culture becomes a major obstacle to attracting new talent or retaining existing talent.

Increasingly, employees are informed during their orientation of the company’s “no asshole rule”, and it’s often even written into training material.  Failure to comply with the rule can lead to corporate punishment, including being fired.  Obviously, the same rule should apply to midlevel and senior managers.  Unfortunately, given the power and influence of senior executives, enforcing the rule and penalizing them for violations is not always easy.  Where Boards of Directors exist, it would certainly appear to be part of their responsibility to ensure accountability among senior management.  Over many years, there has been a lot written about actual examples of bad bosses and their impact on the workplace and workers.  Given the lack of management training and overview in both the private and public sectors, one can only conclude that jerks will continue to surface within organizations in the future.  The real question becomes whether these organizations will be able to retain and recruit scarce talent in this highly competitive era?

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Jan 8

Lower Unemployment Rate, However There Are Other Important Factors To Consider

by bcurry

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that the unemployment rate declined to 3.9 percent in December 2021, compared to 4.2 percent in November.  According to Statistics Canada, the unemployment rate in Canada fell to a new pandemic-low of 5.9 percent in December 2021 from 6 percent in November.  Of course, this has governments in both countries touting their apparent economic policy success.  However, there are a number of important factors to consider especially given the impact of COVID-19 on the labour force participation, notably in certain sectors of the economy.  When these dynamics are factored in, there is not a whole lot of good news to shout about.

The first is the decline in the participation rate, that is to say those who are actually looking for work.  For example, in the U.S., the labour force participation rate was unchanged at 61.9 percent in December but remains 1.5 percentage points lower than in February 2020, largely because of the pandemic’s impact.  Many workers are choosing to stay out of the labour market due to health and safety concerns and business closures, more so today with the more contagious Omicron variant.  With fewer people actually seeking employment, this automatically helps to lower the unemployment rate.

In both countries, the jobless rates particularly show a disparity among certain groupings.  For example, in the U.S., the jobless rates for teenagers (10.9 percent), Blacks (7.1 percent), Asians (3.8 percent), and Hispanics (4.9 percent) showed little or no change over the month of December.  In many cases, this is a reflection of the fact that certain minority groups and youth tend to work in low paying jobs in the leisure and hospitality sectors, many in small businesses that were closed or restricted due to lockdowns.  Employment in food services and drinking places has been particularly affected over the course of the pandemic.

In December, millions of persons reported that they had been unable to work because their employer was closed or lost business due to the pandemic — that is: they did not work at all, were prevented from looking for work, or worked fewer hours at some point in the four weeks preceding the survey, often due to the pandemic.  To be counted as unemployed, by definition, individuals must be either actively looking for work or on temporary layoff.

Another factor has been the difficulty in finding full-time work for economic reasons and the pandemic.  Instead workers have been forced often to rely on part-time employment.  These individuals, who would have preferred full-time employment, were working part-time because their hours had been reduced or they were unable to find full-time jobs.  Some have had to rely on government assistance in order to survive over the last year and a half.  Unfortunately, some of these assistance programs have gradually been terminated in some jurisdictions, forcing many people to rely on food banks, friends and family for assistance.

What is most intriguing is the fact that despite a large number of jobs going unfilled, it appears that many employers are actually facing a labour shortage.  As their businesses reopen, this has forced employers to offer better wages and working conditions in order to attract previous or new workers.  According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 4.7 percent.  It will also be interesting to see how employers will deal with the more immediate problem of loosing workers due to the Omicron variant.  This of course is a major concern in the health care sector, but should hopefully be a temporary problem.  This situation shouldn’t have any major impact on the overall unemployment rate, but could influence labour participation rates should the affected workers permanently withdraw their services from the labour market (e.g. retirement).

All in all, one can see that the lower unemployment rates don’t necessarily reflect detrimental aspects of the current labour market situation, especially as they pertain to certain sectors and certain members of the labour force.

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Jan 3

Start Of 2022 Not All That Different From Start of 2021

by bcurry

Well, the start of a New Year has arrived, but it doesn’t feel all that much different from the start of last year.  We are now into another wave of the COVID pandemic, much like we were last year with Delta on the horizon.  Many celebratory and sporting events were either cancelled or reduced with restrictions in place; airline travel has been seriously affected by new cases of the more highly infectious Omicron variant; cruise ships are returning to ports as a result of cases on board; and businesses have had to keep their people working from home wherever possible.  The biggest difference between the two years is the fact that we now have millions of people vaccinated against the coronavirus.  We also have better medical treatments for those who do become infected.  However, hospitals and the health care system are once again being strained by the sudden influx of new cases globally and locally.  COVID continues to affect supply chains around the world, causing serious shortages in many goods and foods.

Unfortunately, the politicization of health measures, including masking and social distancing, is still out there.  However, the big difference is that now the vaccination policies of governments and businesses have come increasingly under attack by the anti-vaxxers.  Even local public health providers have come under attack, many unfortunately being personally threatened and harassed by protesting groups and individuals.  Yes, pandemic fatigue has grown after over two years of combating this virus.  As a result, some states have actually removed certain related health measures and refused to endorse mandated vaccinations within essential services.  Like before, the U.S. appears to be seriously split down the middle, often between Republican and Democratic state legislators and governors.  In some cases, the politicians have taken over from public health officials and are calling the shots, despite record new COVID-related cases and the increasing strain on health care resources within their jurisdictions.  This split is less of a concern in Canada where provincial and territorial governments have relied heavily on public health officials for their expert advice when it comes to setting policies and distributing resources, claiming they are closely following the science involved.

The introduction of new COVID variants and the lack of progress in vaccinating populations in lesser developed countries have ensured that the pandemic remains a global concern.  Let’s be clear, until countries like the U.S. and Canada do more to help out countries in Africa, Asia and Central and South America, the war against COVID will continue for some time.  We need to get over our internal divisions and quickly work together to get this virus under control domestically, while simultaneously working with international organizations and other industrialized countries to speed up assistance to Third World countries.  While the beginning of 2021 offered hope with the amazing advent of new vaccines to protect us from this disease, that same hope needs to be passed along to people in other countries.  Only then can we really hope that 2022 will be a happier and healthier year than 2021 was.

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