How to Foster Loyalty Among American Consumers

Renters are further harmed by a demand crush.Another major factor is that many of the negative consequences of Canada's immigration strategy are beginning to be felt most acutely by the country's poorest and most marginalized groups, including many of these immigrants.While the discussion about Canada's housing crisis frequently focuses on the high cost of homes and their impact on first-time buyers, a more pressing concern should be how our government's policies are raising the cost of renting, as renters typically have much lower household incomes than homeowners and, unlike homeowners, do not benefit financially from rising housing costs.To put the recent rent increase into context, consider how typical rents fluctuated before and after the current Liberal administration took office in 2015.Under the previous federal Conservative government, the average rent for a Toronto condominium rose from $1,570 in 2006 to $1,866 in 2015, a $297 (or 19%) increase in nine years. In comparison, average rents under our present Liberal government have risen from $1,866 in 2015 to $2,657 in 2022, a $791 (or 42 percent) increase in only seven years.Am I implying that our present government's change in immigration policy is solely responsible for the significant increase in Toronto's average rent? among course not, but among the most prevalent causes for the high cost of housing, including foreign purchasers, low mortgage rates, and even irrational exuberance, this one has the greatest direct impact on rentals.

Calculating the demand and price of a property 

is more difficult because the source of cash and the cost of debt are also key considerations, in addition to the normal elements such as the number of households in need of housing. Rent, on the other hand, is simply the cost of housing services, which is more closely related to demand and supply than to other factors.It's worth noting that the increase in condo rates since 2015 was not due to a lack of construction. After 2015, average yearly condo completions were 12 percent higher than before 2015. This increased supply did not lower condo rentals because Canada's population was expanding faster than the building completions.The impact on international students The other part of Canada's immigration laws that is sometimes forgotten is the increase in the number of overseas students attending institutions, which is not currently included in Canada's immigration figures. Foreign study visa holders in Canada have increased from 352,330 in 2015 to 621,565 in 2021, making them a significant element of the country's immigration stream.Matt Lundy of the Globe and Mail believes there is a simple explanation for the increase in overseas students: money.Foreign students pay five times more in annual tuition than domestic students, thus postsecondary institutions are doing what any profit-maximizing organization would do: enrolling as many foreign students as possible.

However, unlike Canada's permanent residency program

there are no targets for foreign study visa holders; postsecondary institutions can enroll as many students as they choose each year. However, while these institutions have the liberty to maximize their revenues by admitting as many foreign students as possible, they are not required to provide suitable lodging for the students they admit. Because post-secondary institutions have failed to plan for and invest in their students' housing needs, the burden of Canada's housing crisis has fallen in part on these sometimes financially strapped students who are moving to Canada for a better life but are left feeling exploited. When foreign students compete for the most affordable rents in their town, it puts additional pressure on low-income households looking for the same.It's time to ask tougher questions regarding the harmful consequences of Canada's immigration policy. According to economist David Green, immigration is not a panacea for economic recovery. Hub readers would be understandably perplexed by the present political uproar over the so-called "just transition" of oil and gas workers. Until recently, the term "just transition" was mostly used by academics, think tanks, and climate advocacy groups. It is currently at the center of a revived discussion over the costs and effects of the Trudeau government's climate change policy, including for specific areas, industries, and workers.

The controversy began about two weeks ago

with the release of an 81-page federal briefing document for Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson outlining the government's plan to transition workers from carbon-intensive industries like oil and gas production to greener jobs.It sparked a swift response from federal and provincial politicians, including Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, who said the briefing document confirmed her "worst fears" about the Trudeau government's plans to shift the centre of gravity of Canada's economy from carbon-intensive to less carbon-intensive industries.The resulting political conflicts are strange. The participants appear to be slightly confused about causes and symptoms. Premier Smith's issue is most likely not the federal government's intention to provide training and employment subsidies to help oil and gas workers transfer into new jobs. It is Ottawa's intention to jeopardize their current positions in the first place.However, it creates an intellectual and political schism between Ottawa and Alberta based on opposing views of how we should approach achieving our collective climate goals: is it about managing the decline of the country's oil and gas sector, or is it about what the Public Policy Forum refers to as "aggressive decarbonization" of energy production, transmission, and usage? How we respond to this topic in the coming years will have huge economic, political, and social ramifications.