Dollarama profit up despite rising input costs

The article I wanted to talk about today is called “Dollarama profit up despite rising input costs”, posted on CBC news on December 4, 2014. This article is making it clear that since the dollar is going down but raising wages for employees is going up that it is hard for Dollarama to function its business. The profits of the dollar store increase to 55 cents a share in the three months up to the end of the month October. Dollarama’s overall sales had boosted 12% to $588 million. The chain that started off in Montreal has added eleven new stores, making a total of 928 stores. It is quite obvious how convenient Dollarama is to the public, whether it is for a picking up a birthday card, Christmas decorations, or some gum.  The chain is reliant on imports, it is quite frail towards the low loonie, and this is because a low loonie makes bringing in the products more costly. It is said that the input costs are expected to go up more in the new year when new tariffs on foreign goods are applied. Some provinces have increased their minimum wage and it’s not looking so good for their company’s profits. Dollarama retailers are hoping that the Christmas season brings in a lot of customers. "You have to appreciate that the dollar store business is a labour-intensive business. " 

                                                                                                                         - CEO Larry Rossy.

The government function that is involved with this article is maintaining competition. This is because, Dollarama is going through some difficult times in the sense that they can not afford to raise their employees’ wages with the loonie being so low. Therefore, the chain of stores must proceed to think about new ways in which to bring in customers for the Christmas season. Dollarama is in competition with Buck or Two and the evil cousin Dollar Tree. Dollarama must think of new tactics to use in order to bring in more people otherwise they will have no choice but to lay off people or hope the Canadian dollar increases. If Dollarama prices increase, people are going to notice and they will put their money to the items sold somewhere else.

By: Remoni Fernanopulle 12A

News, CBC. "Dollarama Profit up despite Rising Input Costs." CBCnews. CBC/Radio Canada, 04 Dec. 2014. Web. 08 Dec. 2014.

Manitoba on all-day kindergarten

     The article that I chose to talk about is called "Manitoba won’t budge on all-day kindergarten despite internal push" written by Chinta Puxley of The Globe and Mail. The article was about an issue that the provincial government of Manitoba is currently dealing with: the call for all-day kindergarten.
     Full day kindergarten currently exists in 7 provinces and territories across Canada, and an Ontario study concludes that enabling full-day kindergarten improves readiness of children going into grade 1 and accelerates their development. Despite an Education Minister backed poll concluding that 61% of Manitobans surveyed were in favour of having this issue be a government priority, the government resists the call for it. The reason why is that it is a very costly initiative, and the province is already working on reducing the class sizes for grades 1-3. In Manitoba, there is some school divisions that offer full-day kindergarten, but it is not funded or assisted by the government. However though, the Education board of Manitoba will be working with a few school divisions to analyze the impact of full-day kindergarten. It is expected that at some point in the future, full-day kindergarten will be supported by the government, but at the time being it does not look to be any time soon.
     

research shows children in all-day kindergarten have
better language, social and communication skills

     The only government function that relates to this article (as far as I can tell) is Correcting for Externalities. Since kindergarten is part of our education, it fits under that section. Eventually, if this were to go through and be supported by our provincial government, the people would have to pay taxes to fund it, just as we already pay taxes to fund the education system overall. 
     Any changes in taxes will always be opposed to by the common folk, but if it's in the best interest of our children and our country's future, isn't it our duty to contribute? I think so.

Manitoba won’t budge on all-day kindergarten despite internal push

Olczyk, Iwona. A child painting. Photograph. n.d. Iwona_Olczyk. pixabay. 7 December 2014

Ottawa reveals details of $1.5-billion fund for science strategy

In a recent visit to IBM headquarters in Markham, Ontario Prime Minister Stephen Harper has announced a $1.5 billion funding program that will advance Canada's science research to a global scale. This is the first update to this field in 7 years. The program, Canada First Research Excellence Fund, will focus on bringing researchers to Canada and creating innovation in the private sector. In it, different universities and research institutions will bid for funding with proposals that will be judged based on scientific merit and alignment with government ideals. This fund will be used over seven years with $350 million offered in the first round of proposals.The 5 priority research areas stated by the strategy document are:

• environment and agriculture
• health and life sciences
• natural resources and energy
• information and communications technology
• advanced manufacturing

The major criticism against this program is that fact, that there was no mention of any ability of these federal scientists to communicate with the media, and the lack of mention of the budget cuts to these labs. 

In this article, we can see the government function of correcting for externalities being demonstrated. This government function includes providing incentives like subsidies or funding to create positive externalities. In creating this program, the government is giving more opportunities for scientists to stay in the country or give other scientists incentive to move and work here. If this program is successful, the scientific field in Canada will grow creating more jobs and helping the economy. One of the reasons that the government provides things like funding programs is to look at what helps the economy in the long run even if it might cost a bit in the short run. I believe that it's a smart idea to invest in new and young ideas that can make Canada an important country based on it's contributions to scientific research. 

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-reveals-details-of-15-billion-fund-for-science-strategy/article21957502/

US personal income up 0.2% in Oct; spending up 0.2%

This article talks about the the  flexibility in the US economy. After being flat in the month of September, consumer spending increased by 0.2% in the month of October according to the Commerce Department. Two-thirds of the US economic activity is made up by consumer spending. Low gasoline prices and the ascending labor market are supporting consumer spending. The government stated that the economy grew at a 3.9% annual pace in the third quarter. Salary increased 0.2% in October after a similar gain in the previous month. With identical income growth and consumer spending, the saving rate was kept at a constant 5.0% The Balance pace of consumer spending and weak gasoline price, kept the inflation under wrap.In the pass 12 months throughout October, the personal consumption expenditures (PCE) price index hiked 1.4% after advancing by the same margin in September. Prices increased 0.2% after gaining 0.1% in September, not including food and energy. The PCE price index increased 1.6% in the 12 months through October. Both price range continue to run below the US central bank's 2% inflation target.

The government function involved with this article is stabilizing the economy. This article deals with controlling inflation and economic growth. It talks about the consumer spending and how it contributes to the economic growth. By supporting consumer spending, rising labor market and lower prices, helps the economy form slow growth China, as well as recession in Japan.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/102219588

House Leaders Rush to Defend E-Cigarettes From Possible FDA Bans

The Senate Democrats harassed electronic cigarette companies throughout 2014 and tried very hard to push out new rules and restrictions against the new multibillion-dollar industry. In the article, they talk about the new rules that they want to get held up for these large manufacturing corporations that make these electronic cigarettes. They want to change the rules where manufacturers now have to win a "premarket" approval before their products can be sold to the public or else they'd be pulled out. This test approval applies for all electronic cigarettes released after February 2007, which means that basically all products on the market have to be approved since everything basically came out after then. The FDA predicts that electronic cigarette companies will spend about 5,016 hours per application they want to send with an estimate cost of about $300,000. This would lead to smaller companies going own the drain and leaving the market due to the expenses just to submit an application.

I think the government function that this article is involved in is maintaining competition and correcting externalities because first off, by creating this new law that companies have to submit applications and get approved before releasing the product gets smaller ompanies to back out because of the extra expenses and leave the bigger companies to the job which aloows the limited amount of companies to possibly sell at a more affordable and competitive price for the consumers. Also i think it corrects the externalities because by eliminating smaller competition that provides flavourful e-juices, which catches children's eyes to try it out too, the bigger companies are just left with their more neutral products with the tobacco taste instead. On the other hand, byadding in more restrictions, this causes people go more towards the black market and buy from there which rises up negative externalities to the whole picture.

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/12/03/house-leaders-rush-to-defend-e-cigarettes-from-possible-fda-bans

clean energy provided more jobs than oil sands

So the article I chose for today is titles clean energy provides more jobs than oil sands. Basically what this article is talking about is how renewable energy has experiences big growth in Canada in last five years, in fact it has grown so much that there is more employment in the sector outstrips rather than in the oil sands. This article also talks about how it is estimates that in the past five years we have invested $24 billion dollars mainly because of all the renewable initiatives in the power sector by Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec. Because of all these new investments that have been made in the clean energy sector employment have gone up by 37 percent to 23,700 people compared to the 22,340 people employed in the oil sands.  

So the type of government that this article would be demonstrating would be stabilizing the economy. Why is demonstrates this is because it is talking about how new jobs are being created and helping to reduce unemployment. This article talks about how it increases new jobs with also increasing clean energy.

  

http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/clean-energy-provides-more-jobs-than-oilsands-report-says-1.2857520

Loblaw Under Investigation by Competition Bureau for 'Pricing Strategies' with Suppliers

This article is talking about Loblaws and their pricing strategies, and how they might be going against the Competition Act. The Competition Bureau is now investigating giant Loblaw Companies and some of its suppliers. The bureau is looking into this because it could have an effect on competition on the market. Loblaw recently bought Shoppers Drug mart and when this happened, the competition bureau approved the deal but also put restrictions on it.The reason for the restrictions was to help regulate prices, the bureau felt that if they didn't have any restrictions on the prices it would lead to higher prices paid by retailers and higher prices for consumers. Now of course, Loblaw feels like there isn't anything wrong and that they do not have inconsistent prices with a competitive market. Even though Loblaw believes nothing is wrong, they are still cooperating with the bureau and giving them everything they need for this investigation. With all of this happening the bureau has said there has been no wrongdoing and that they are looking for information on pricing strategies and programs with Loblaw and its suppliers, and all of this is relevant to their investigation.


The government function that is involved with this article is maintaining competition. This is the government function because this whole article deals with the competition act and competition on the market, as well as pricing strategies. The Competition Bureau is investigating this because they are worried about how Loblaw is setting their prices and how they are working with their suppliers. If there are no restrictions on prices between Loblaw and their suppliers then the pricing for products could get out of hand as well as bring down competition in the market. Consumers are only willing to pay certain prices and if a product is too expensive then people will no longer pay for that product and bring down competition.

http://business.financialpost.com/2014/11/17/loblaw-under-investigation-by-competition-bureau-for-pricing-strategies-with-suppliers/

Canada lost 10,000 jobs in November

In this article, it states that Canada’s economy has lost more than 10,000 jobs last month which increased the unemployment rate 6.6%. Across Canada, there was a big decline in employment in Ontario where they lost 34,000 jobs and in Saskatchewan. However, the employment rate increased in Quebec and Newfoundland and Labrador and the employment rate in Quebec is said to be its biggest employment gain and the first time the province has shown any employment growth in more than six months. According to the article, the hardest hit across Canada was the retail sector losing 42,000 jobs and service production jobs lost about 28,000 positions.

This article demonstrates the government function of stabilizing the economy. It demonstrates this because it has to do with an increased rate of unemployment in which the government has control over trying to reduce the unemployment rate. However, according to the article the economy added more than 5,000 full time jobs but the added jobs had no effect due to the decline of 16,000 part time jobs.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/business/canada-lost-10-000-jobs-in-november-1.2861560

Macleans: Government Transfers Mitigate Income Inequality

Macleans

According to an article from Macleans, recent studies from the Ottawa-based Centre for the Study of Living Standards state that when it comes to income inequality, the government really does play a big part. Taxes as well as benefits provided by the Canadian government are some of the things that can be credited towards when it comes to minimizing the gap between the rich and the poor citizens of Canada. Although taxes and spending have repressed inequality, they have not been enough to stop the increase in inequality over time.

This study has shown that there although the government isn’t all that aggressive when it comes to using policy to reduce inequality, there is plenty of wiggle room for them to do so. When comparing Canada to other industrialized countries, we seem to fall short of the efforts being put into redistribution of income. Although this seems to be true, statistics have shown that income inequality was 44 percent less severe than it would have been if governments had not taxed the upper class more than the poor, and handed out benefits to low-income families.

This article states that things like old-age benefits or family benefits (transfer payments) were responsible for most of this dampening effect, whereas 30 percent of the reduction was accounted by taxation.

Although most would assume that the increase of inequality took place recently due to the public outcry, the study actually shows that most of it took place 2-3 decades ago.

Because of the lack of effectiveness of government redistribution of income in British Columbia and Alberta, they were obviously the most unequal provinces. Whereas the government programs in Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island were most effective because the rich and poor were closer together.

The Canadian government was most effective in 1994, and this study shows that if we were to have continued with that level of redistribution, we could have easily eliminated half of the rise in inequality over three decades. Because of the fact that we didn’t do so, Canada ended up ranking 24th  out of 35 countries in terms of equality in the late 2000’s. We also ranked 25^th out of 30 countries when it came to being active users of tax or transfer policies in order to redistribute income.