327

Prime Minister Mark Carney says Canada will double its non-US exports as Canadians can’t rely on US (apnews.com)

submitted 1 week ago by Pacino@lemmy.world to c/canada@lemmy.ca

60 comments fedilink hide all child comments

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 16 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Sure, just announce we are doubling exports. Anyone else noticing how Carney says stuff without any real detail on how he plans to do it? The CDN government has thousands of people for decades trying to increase exports abroad. We have little manufacturing left to export, so we're turned into a mining based economy.

I'm pretty tired of politicians selling old ideas as new. We need some innovation.

[-] humanspiral@lemmy.ca 2 points 6 days ago

This is a fair criticism. Canada needs investment. Path to actual export growth is investment from countries who would want to import from Canada, or investment that allows Canadians to invest to refine/value add to other investments. For an export strategy to work, we need to stop being on the wrong side of geopolitical hate, and be welcoming of investments from the part of the world that is growing, and can grow if free of US extortion.

[-] healthetank@lemmy.ca 26 points 1 week ago

I mean at the least it looks like we're taking some steps to avoid the clusterfuck that the USMCA resigning is likely to be by getting ahead of it.

Its not hard to double exports to other countries when your main trading partner (US) stops taking your stuff. Talking out of my ass, but it seems like doubling exports to other countries wouldn't be that hard when we wind up having a surplus because US trade dries up. Seems like it'd push prices of our goods lower and hurt Canadians, which is what he seems to be implying to me.

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 3 points 1 week ago

So, you are saying we sold all our possible exports to only the US?

Why should Europe import our lumber?

Carney is softening us up to the reality that tariffs will last as long as the US wants them to, and there is fuck all he can do about it.

[-] lemmy_outta_here@lemmy.world 22 points 1 week ago

Canada-indonesia free trade agreement: https://globalnews.ca/news/11449417/canada-indonesia-trade-agreement/

Canada-mexico trade agreement without USA: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwy8r042nx2o

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 5 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

And we had new trade agreements with Europe under Biden.

There is nothing really new here.

The Indonesia agreement is great for Indonesia, but puts Canada in $600M trade deficits.

Both deals are a few percent of US trade.

[-] lemmy_outta_here@lemmy.world 6 points 6 days ago

It’s true, i didn’t actually read the agreement.

As for the trade deficit, I’m not sure it matters to a great extent. When a rich country tades with a poorer country it is normal for the rich country to be able to afford more imports than the poorer country. However, the trade deal can still benefit the country with the trade deficit. Our raw materials and goods will still find new markets because they will be more affordable to indonesians, and canadian consumers will have indonesian goodss for cheaper. we have a relative advantage for certain high tech and biomedical stuff, so we might see job growth in areas that we are already strong in. I don’t care if my cheap manufactured goods are made abroad as long as other jobs are created. Alan Greenspan had an interesting take on trade deficits: i don’t have time to find the quote, but it is along the lines of “we give them dollars and they give us actual real-world goods - seems like a good deal.” Trade is not a zero sum game - it can provide an advantage to both sides, even when one side benefits more.

As for the deals being small compared to the us: there are no american-sized economies hidden under a rug or something. Carney can’t just make a new trading partner out of thin air. replacing US trade is a huge undertaking that will still be going when my children are dead of old age. Carney will not live long enough to fix everything, but it is wrong to say that he has done nothing.

[-] IndridCold@lemmy.ca 22 points 1 week ago

Both deals are a few percent of US trade.

Every bit counts. I would like to see a future where we aren't doing any business with the US.

The US is eating it's own head and will probably fail in the near future. We need to be ready for that.

[-] PsychoNaut@lemmy.ml 20 points 1 week ago

In many (if not most) sectors the Canadians have already seen a substantial switch to exporting to other regions. That’s why they have not seen a substantive decrease in exports despite the US tariffs. There are several sectors that are being held back because of other trade issues that the government has the ability to resolve and they’ve already been making friendly with several countries they were already having a variety of trade or political conflicts with under the previous government (China/India for instance). So the current administration absolutely has the power to help with this shift, which is economically wise.

[-] saigot@lemmy.ca 10 points 1 week ago

The details of how it gets accomplished are being released in early November with the budget.

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 week ago

Why wait until no one can assess the plan or the government falls.

Same bullshit as every other government.

[-] saigot@lemmy.ca 9 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

How would you like it to go? This is how it is meant to go, politicians announce a goal and a vague direction they want to go in, then table bills with the details filled out, it undergoes several layers of public debate and then it gets voted on.

[-] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 1 points 6 days ago

And how is that working out for Canada? Same old same old but apparently most of this thread lives in Ottawa. "public debate". Hilarious.

What we get, ALWAYS, looks great on paper with a bunch of asterisks and caveats and most of the measures never happen because some metric was never met, all by design.