Canada

The legislated targets should be a tool used to stimulate technology research, development, and commercialization of Canadian innovations, not a goal in and of itself.

Reorienting economic policy around green growth, as opposed to boosting productivity or ensuring export competitiveness, is not the path to Canadian growth, as Robert Atkinson writes in Re$earch Money.

Canada should drop its Digital Services Tax, which will harm Canadian businesses, startups, and consumers and surely lead to a retaliatory response by the U.S. government.

Watch now for an engaging discussion with leading international experts and peers presented by ITIF’s Centre for Canadian Innovation and Competitiveness.

The Competition Bureau of Canada’s 2023 report assessing the state of competition in Canada has several methodological and interpretation issues that raise doubts about the conclusion's accuracy. As such, policymakers should not use the report as the foundation of competition policymaking or to justify a more aggressive antitrust regime.

There is no free lunch to be found by imposing base contributions on foreign online undertakings to fund the government’s preferred content. The Commission should reckon with the economic realities of its proposal rather than obscuring them behind anti-foreign rhetoric.

Canada is capturing less than half of its technological potential, allowing for groundbreaking research and innovations to sit unused or to be scooped up by foreign companies.

Rob Atkinson appeared on the Hub Dialogues podcast to discuss ITIF’s new Centre for Canadian Innovation and Competitiveness, what explains Canada’s poor performance on advanced industry sectors, and why Canadian policymakers should listen more to “productionists” over economists.

The artificial intelligence market in Canada is still in its early stages but is growing rapidly and becoming increasingly competitive. At this juncture, there is no clear evidence of market failure, substantial barriers to entry, or exclusionary practices that would necessitate intervention.

Canada needs a productivity commission. But instead of emulating Australia’s model, which is driven by orthodox neoclassical economics, it should take guidance from “productionists” with a deep understanding of firm, industry, and technology dynamics.