the housing crisis has been created by banking practices that have directed excessive amounts of credit into the property market, and especially residential mortgages. As a result, buyers can bid prices up to ever-higher levels, resulting in a market where people must pay more for the same type of housing. Hence financialization can be defined as an inflationary tendency in the housing market that is induced jointly by banks’ desire to expand mortgage lending and buyers’ confidence that the value of their properties will rise.

...

However, the image of a bubble bursting and prices returning to a more rational “equilibrium” level does not seem to apply to the housing market. Because housing is a necessity, people are willing to pay high prices for it. Bidding wars can therefore persist even when relative supply grows, so long as credit markets enable them.

Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab proudly announced earlier this month that the federal government had exceeded last year’s “ambitious” immigration target for francophones outside of Quebec. What she didn’t say, however, is that this strategy of passing over better-qualified applicants who don’t speak French will likely harm Canada’s economic growth.

It’s one in a series of policies that has upended Canada’s successful economic immigration program by watering it down to meet other objectives.

Francophones are now the highest priority group of skilled workers, with their numbers surpassing those with Canadian work experience, or expertise in health care, education or trades.

The cut-off scores for francophone immigrants, based on factors such as age, education and work experience, are substantially lower than those for other skilled workers offered permanent residence. The lowest cut-off score for French speakers last year was 379; it was 462 for health care workers and 515 for applicants with Canadian experience. According to research from C.D. Howe’s Christopher Worswick and other economists, lower-scoring workers are more likely to struggle economically and make less money. Bringing them in over more highly skilled workers hurts productivity and reduces tax revenue.

...

The government’s rationale, according to last year’s policy paper from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, is the “urgent need” to address the decline of francophone and Acadian communities. The government aims to restore their demographic weight to 1971 levels, when it was 6.1 per cent of the population outside Quebec, from 3.5 per cent in 2021.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/article-canada-has-gutted-its-economic-migration-program/

Canada’s tax and benefit system is making life harder for low-income seniors who continue working to pay the bills, according to a new report from the Montreal Economic Institute. The think tank is recommending the federal government overhaul how the Guaranteed Income Supplement, a benefit for this group of individuals, is clawed back.

...

Eligible seniors can receive a little more than $13,000 a year from GIS. Once they work and earn more than $5,000, the federal government begins clawing that benefit back. For every additional dollar earned, GIS payments are reduced by 50 cents, before income tax and payroll deductions are applied.

...

The clawback issue was recently flagged by another think tank. A November 2025 report from the C.D. Howe Institute found that Canadians with a modest pension income that includes CPP, as well as OAS and GIS, face some of the highest effective tax rates, often exceeding 75 per cent.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/investing/personal-finance/retirement/article-canadas-tax-system-puts-low-income-working-seniors-at-a-disadvantage/

Alberta broke housing construction records in 2025 and led the country in housing starts per capita — a massive upswing in homebuilding that comes after a period of similarly massive population growth.

...

Some of Alberta’s advantage comes down to geography. Cities in Alberta tend to be a bit more spread out, said Moffatt, which means you can build outward more easily (though that can come with its own challenges, such as the need to build new water infrastructure to service far-flung suburban neighbourhoods).

In Alberta, developers also don’t need to contend with provincial sales tax, he said, which makes it cheaper to build. 

And, generally, development policy is also friendlier at a municipal level in Alberta, said Moffatt.

...

Some federal policies and programs have also helped move the needle — both in Alberta and elsewhere — such as the federal government’s removal of GST on purpose-built rental housing, and a CMHC program that offers discounted mortgage insurance on certain multi-residential projects. 

Ontario Housing starts:

• 2022: 91,885
• 2023: 85,770
• 2024: 72,118
• 2025: 62,561

cross-posted from: https://ibbit.at/post/156444

Romel Castillo, a family physician originally from Cuba, learned much more than words when he joined a fledgling program to brush up on his medical English.

He learned the unspoken language of practising medicine in Canada, where concepts such as patient privacy, cultural competency and shared decision-making can be different than in an immigrant doctor’s homeland.

From The Globe and Mail via this RSS feed

cross-posted from: https://sh.itjust.works/post/53463841

Before the cameras were installed four years ago, roughly 17 per cent of motorists followed the posted speed limits. ... In the last year before the cameras were banned, compliance reached 87 per cent.

Within a week of the cameras’ removal, that fell to 62 per cent, and three weeks later, it had dropped to 50 per cent.

...

Carlucci says it’s time for drivers to reflect and consider one simple question.

“Why are you speeding in a school zone?”

Debt writeoffs by the federal government climbed above the $5-billion mark during the last fiscal year, according to figures reviewed by The Globe and Mail, adding to a debate over Ottawa’s practice of keeping the identities of those who benefit from such debt relief secret.

...

The upward trend in writeoffs inspired Conservative MP Adam Chambers to introduce a private member’s bill, C-230, that would require Ottawa to publicly disclose all corporate writeoffs worth $1-million or more.

...

“This is a great legislative initiative,” said Liberal MP Ryan Turnbull, the parliamentary secretary to François-Philippe Champagne, the Minister of Finance and National Revenue, during the debate on the bill.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-ottawas-debt-writeoffs-climb-above-5-billion-mark/

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.today/post/45322079

Carney’s own department, the Privy Council Office, has been one of the worst performers in the access to information system. In the span of about two years, the office was peppered with an extraordinary 87 legal orders to release documents after initially refusing to provide them to requesters. That’s up from zero orders in the previous three years. Little surprise, then, that bureaucrats have been quietly recommending curbs on the information commissioner’s ability to issue such orders.

I couldn't find an archive link that works. I tried signing in and archiving myself but it still asks for an e-mail.

If you enter a throwaway e-mail it'll let you in without having to confirm.

A massive mud plain cutting north-east made it clear where the water had gone. It had travelled almost 10km overland into a bigger lake. Amazingly, no one had been hurt in this gigantic – was it a mudslide? A flood? Nobody was sure what to call it.

With each passing decade since the mid-1980s, Canadians have been spending less and less time with their friends. Just 19 per cent said they hung out with friends on an average day in 2022, down from 48 per cent in 1986, according to Statistics Canada.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/social-trends/article-canadians-spending-less-time-friends-inventive-stay-close/