Quote:
Originally Posted by Fuzz
If that's the case, we would need to prepare for a much lower standard of living. If we compete globally on a level playing field, you can see how that would necessitate a drop in standards to the average, right?
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No I don't see how Canada giving up 125,000 auto plant workers would lower the standard of living for the rest of the country. It's not a core strength of our economy since this is a tiny industry in which we are not competitive in to begin with. The main advantages to manufacturing in Ontario were supply chain proximity to Detroit and logistics and transport for rails and up the St. Lawrence and decades of government incentives to buy votes for job creation. I fully expect a lot of the Eastern auto manufacturing and supply chain companies to start experiencing stresses (Magna, etc.) once the part-heavy/mechanically complex internal combustion cars start disappearing off the roads and get replaced with comparatively simple EVs.
If the government is going to subsidize research, technology investments, and industry, they could go after things like solar research or provide start-up capital to companies who want to do R&D and engineering of home-grown electric vehicles. But ultimately, those may not be built in Canada if we want them to be competitive on the worldwide market. Look at the C300 series by Bombardier. They recieved millions of dollars in government funding for decades but they ended up selling the design to Airbus to $1 so Airbus could build the planes in Alabama. Bombardier is an example of a company that just would not be competitive and has rightfully left both the large commercial jet and train businesses. That's how it should be if you can't compete without subsidies.
Rather, our standard of living goes up when the majority of consumers are given choice and affordable options. That goes for everything from cars to food products to cell phone contracts which are inflated in this country. The three biggest things Canadians feel immediate pain on are the cost of commuting (car payments, repairs, fuel, etc.), the cost of food, and the price of housing. Giving Canadians affordable EVs with afforable power (CANDU nuclear) and making food affordable suddenly makes the cost of living substantially easier to bear.