essays
The Blindingly Obvious Global Energy Transition
Canadians are not ready for the global energy transition.
From Hammurabi to Trump: Protecting Consumers and Competition in a Complex World
A good economy needs good rules.
In an age of economic instability, what can we learn from the 1970s?
The 1970s oil crisis totally rearranged the global economy. Let's learn from that.
The Challenges and the Opportunities of Building Sustainable Finance at Scale in Canada
The Future (Price) of Oil
The IEA estimates that global demand for oil will begin to decline by or before 2030. How bad could this be for Canadians?
Three Thoughts on Economic Development in Vancouver
In my time as an economic developer I’ve seen many mistakes and successes, I want to offer a few reflections and learnings to help others in the field.
The Business of Biodiversity
Biodiversity threats could more damaging than the climate crisis. Building economic models that sustain and regenerate nature, while supporting human prosperity are few and far between - but there are some promising initiatives worth following.
The Delicate Economics of LNG
BC continues to debate the opportunities, costs, and need for liquefied natural gas (LNG) as an export. Both the climate and economic benefits are overstated, and represent not only a serious risk, but also diversion of needed resources.
Economic Progress and Inequality in Canada
The number of Canadians living in raw, material deprivation appears to be decreasing as compared to spikes in the 1990s, but the ability of low-income Canadians to participate in the benefits of increased economic outputs in relative terms appears fairly flat. We need more solutions to address this.
AI and Copyright Law
AI companies are drawing on massive datasets to build large language models (LLM), often breaking various aspects of copyright law. We need new and better systems to share the value created from these kinds of systems.
