[Lurch]

If I were to predict a collapse anywhere, it would be based on the imbalance in Western economies between economic output that's truly a "value-added" output, and output that's somewhat parasitic, adding no true value. How much of Canada's (or America's) economy is based on production vs. "services??"

Production--natural resource exploitation, food production, manufacturing, construction, and other similar areas make up a small part of these economies.

Services--retail, banking & finance, social services, entertainment, and similar sectors produce no tangible output, but compose the largest fraction of the economies.

It's an interesting balancing act. I can't say it's a "house of cards" as Looger recently did, but I can see how you would say it's ... fragile.If I were to predict a collapse anywhere, it would be based on the imbalance in Western economies between economic output that's truly a "value-added" output, and output that's somewhat parasitic, adding no true value. How much of Canada's (or America's) economy is based on production vs. "services??"

Production--natural resource exploitation, food production, manufacturing, construction, and other similar areas make up a small part of these economies.

Services--retail, banking & finance, social services, entertainment, and similar sectors produce no tangible output, but compose the largest fraction of the economies.

It's an interesting balancing act. I can't say it's a "house of cards" as Looger recently did, but I can see how you would say it's ... fragile.

I disagree, which I guess is the fundamental basis of a modern economy. The growth towards a services economy is simply a reflection of the reality that it takes much less labour/new investment to produce the goods people want. So, given that people want services, the true material wealth created by hewers and diggers gets spread around. Basically, your secondary and tertiary economies are simply a function of the ease with which modern economies perform the core chores of growing food, mining metals and building houses.