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[QUOTE=CaptainCrunch;5989580][QUOTE=iggy_oi;5988928]Those people's jobs and livelihood were at stake before the NDP even got into office, having our entire economy supported by an industry that lives and dies by a commodities world market price which is set by people we have zero influence over was always playing with fire.

You know that's how modern economics works, for all of the talk of diversification, every region will always have a primary industry that they depend on. You could argue that Ontario that relies heavily on manufacturing is in serious trouble as nations like China and India keep their pay down to undercut in the major manufacturing center.



Please prove this because up until the threat of carbon tax, minimum wage increase, the increase in business tax rates, property taxes and personal taxes, has caused a shrink on stagnation of Calgary's population from the ages of 20 to 30 according to the Calgary Economic Development corporation, the growth for 30 year olds to 50 year olds is not significant at all.According to their population growth estimates, that shrinkage of prime working age people will continue to shrink until 2020.

Yes oil has been our economic backbone, and yes you could argue Ontario is
in trouble due to the reasons you've stated, so if both situations appear to be unreliable for long term stability does is not make sense to look for alternatives?

As for your proof that people's livelihood was in jeopardy and the exodus had begun before the NDP took office, take a look at the unemployment stats:

http://economicdashboard.alberta.ca/Unemployment

While it doesn't show the numbers of people coming and going, which I'm sure you know enough about census stats to agree it would be tough to get very accurate numbers on inter provincial transient workers, you can clearly see that the unemployment rate began rising around the end of 2014, well before the NDP took office. I thing you'll also agree that in Alberta a rise in unemployment usually leads to people leaving.

Where are you seeing rent shrinking, and do you really think that as property rates have increased and a carbon tax has come in that landlords are going to cut their rent? Not likely. The only benefit of this idiotic government is that the rent bubble has burst as people have stopped coming here to work so rents have temporarily stagnated, but again as utilities increase rents will increase. I Hotel rates decreasing goes towards the fact that people aren't coming here, that's not a positive thing. Eating out, I haven't seen costs come down, and again when the carbon tax comes into play and effects logistics, and utilities and you add in the bump in minimum wage to hospitality workers those costs are going to go up.

Have you looked at rental prices these days? Most places are offering 1-2 months free rent as incentive to sign a 1 year lease. Landlords won't have much choice with vacancy rates being what they are right now. If you can't rent out your place at $800, good luck renting it out at $900.

If you have businesses in the spectrum that go under of collapse, new companies aren't going to flood in to take their place, that makes no sense whatsoever, that sector will shrink because of the uncertainty of the business environment. Nobody goes into business out of the goodness of their hearts, they come in to be successful. So if the small restaurant sector shows a lot of failure there won't be new restaurants jumping into the breech to open. Go look at downtown Calgary and there aren't a lot of new ones popping in to replace the failed ones.

They don't necessarily need to be in the same industry, but there are still examples of businesses thriving in a market where another business in the same infantry failed before.

That's nice, but as its pointed out, car sales are down, people aren't going to spend 15,000 for a new furnace and upgrade their houses to save $20.00 a month, that makes no sense whatsoever. Even talking to guys in furnace, hvac, home reno's people aren't spending money right now, they're going to sit on their cash in case the bottom falls out on this economy completely.

Sales are down sure, but I did say those who are better off, in other words not hurting from the downturn, so if they were planning to invest in that furnace but never got around to it and there will now be some benefit in doing it, they might just do it. I know a few people in construction who say they are pretty busy with Reno work because people are taking advantage of cheaper labour costs, but I'm sure that varies from company to company.