A former high-ranking bureaucrat at Industry Canada delivered an interesting, albeit somewhat depressing, talk today on Canada's economic future. Andrei Sulzenko, who is currently a Fellow at the School of Policy Studies here at Queen's, argued that Canada's recent strong economic growth will not be easy to maintain in the future. His discussion ranged over a number of issues, including Canadian macroeconomic policy, but focused mainly on the challenge of improving productivity through microeconomic policies. The short story is that the problems are significant and that few people in the government are paying attention to them.
Sulzenko's argument is easy to accept. He did a good job of illustrating how the drivers of past economic growth, especially adjustments due to the implementation of free trade agreements, will not be the main drivers of future economic growth. Put bluntly, the North American free trade agreements were a one trick pony. To maintain solid economic growth in the future will require harder to come by improvements in productivity. Industry Minister David Emerson is one person who Sulzenko noted has identified the basic problem.
During the discussion, many references were made to how the US has, in many respects, better microeconomic policies than Canada does. I said that I was concerned with simply trying to play catch up with the larger US market and asked whether Mike Lazaridis's focus on basic research was perhaps an example of how Canada could successfully distinguish itself from the US market.
I'm taking a class with Sulzenko in the Spring term called Canadian Policy in a North American Context. It should be great.
