Publications: Lawrence Zhang

Canada should pursue digital sovereignty through contractual safeguards and resilient systems, rather than Canadian ownership requirements that raise costs and create trade risks.

Canada was right to scrap the streaming levy, which would have functioned as a consumption tax on Netflix and Disney+ subscribers without ensuring that the money supported Canadian shows they would actually watch.

The United States has imposed tariffs on Canada and mused about making it the 51st state, and Canadians are reasonably asking what it means to run hospitals and government services on infrastructure operated by firms answerable to US law and, in the end, to US politics.

Canada may reach its AI adoption target and still miss its promised productivity gains. Delivering those gains will require deep adoption by large firms, supported by regulatory certainty and stronger tax treatment for AI deployment.

Age assurance should not become a default prerequisite for accessing the Internet, but it can still hold a place in a comprehensive approach to children’s online safety.

Canada funds university research but gives universities too little reason to turn that into Canadian firms, patents, and industrial capacity. To better align their incentives with national goals, funding should flow in part on standardized commercialization outcomes, with universities left to decide how to deliver them.

Bill C-34 gives platforms a reason to design safer services for children. But sequencing matters: If Ottawa brings the restriction into force before the Digital Safety Commission is operational, the fastest path to compliance will be removing the very users the bill means to protect.

Canada says it wants to be a technology and innovation economy, but its research budget still treats balance across disciplines as the priority. If innovation is the actual goal, the Carney government should shift funding from social sciences and humanities toward NSERC and CIHR.

A ban on personalized pricing would not make Canada more affordable; it would eliminate discounts at the bottom of the distribution and raise the floor for price-sensitive shoppers, the very consumers these proposals aim to protect.

The Canada Strong Fund is trying to be a sovereign wealth fund, development bank, commercial investor, industrial policy vehicle, and retail savings product all at once. Until Ottawa clearly defines its purpose, it risks becoming a debt-financed vehicle searching for a rationale.