This week I’ll be traveling in Canada, talking with experts, business owners, and workers about the surprisingly strong recovery that Canada has experienced following the Great Recession.<\/p>\n
Over the last five years, Ontario and Quebec have actually grown jobs.\u00a0 People I’ve spoken to so far credit better government.\u00a0 Canada’s strong bank regulatory scheme prevented big failures.<\/p>\n
In fact, not a single bank failed in Canada, during a time when hundreds of American banks were toppling.<\/p>\n
And there is no mortgage crisis here.\u00a0 While US homeowners face down a tsunami, fewer than 1% of Canadian mortgages are in arrears.<\/p>\n
But there’s also a sense that Canada’s strong economic performance transcends this moment of turmoil.<\/p>\n
When you compare the struggling towns across northern New York with their counterparts the Canadian side of the St. Lawrence River, it’s hard not to see\u00a0 a growing gap in vitality and private investment.<\/p>\n
And when you match booming Kingston, Ottawa and Toronto with comparable American cities in the region — Buffalo, Detroit, Chicago — you see growth on the Canadian side and contraction in the US.<\/p>\n
So here’s the question:<\/p>\n
If southern Ontario is building a stronger, more diversified economy than the North Country, what are they doing that we can emulate?<\/p>\n
What’s happening here in Kingston — where I’m writing this blog post — that allows the population to grow and new businesses to open?<\/p>\n
And can those ideas be copied in Watertown, less than two hours away?<\/p>\n
Both communities sit in beautiful areas.\u00a0 Both have prisons and big military bases providing a foundation for the local economy.\u00a0 But Kingston is clearly pulling away, offering its citizens more opportunities, more prosperity.<\/p>\n
How come?<\/p>\n
Tune in this week as we talk about the very different political and economic climate in Canada — what is it that’s making a difference?\u00a0 And as always, share your ideas below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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