Calgary Economy

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by Allan83

Here’s an interesting chart:


The story with it is titled, The Only Oil Price Going Up in the World Right Now:

I don't think that chart is WCS - it might be the synthetic price as that is about right. http://www.psac.ca/firstenergy/

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by Allan83

Here’s an interesting chart:

The story with it is titled, The Only Oil Price Going Up in the World Right Now:

That was a good read thank for posting.

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by MichaelS

Just to your point about the Democrats not wanting to engineer a couple of wars, what is your take on Obama and Kerry's strong desire to invade Syria last year? Were it not for Putin getting Asad to give up his chemical weapons, the Democrats would have led America into another war it seems.

Big difference to wanting to invade Syria because they're slaughtering their own people to starting a war over a false claim of weapons of mass destruction and making people think Iraq was involved in 9-11.

Not to mention desiring one thing is a hell of a lot different than doing.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by Ramsayfarian

Thanks for explaining the American political system to me like I'm five. In your defense, I could see how, one may think I need to be explained to at that level. However, I'm worried about your simplistic view as you make it seem like politics of late is normal and that it's really just a harmless a game. I hope you were just dumbing it down on my behalf.

Your comment did make me smile as I do appreciate the effort and the good nature in which you posted. I'm kind of news/world politics junkie and spend way too much time on the net.

I read your post as I was taking a break from reading this Rollingstone article about Chase Bankss involvement in the sub-prime fiasco. Very long slog, but so far it's been worth the grind. To stay topical, the lawyer whom the article is about is a Canuck and worked in Calgary after she got fired from Chase. She was the sole reason why they agreed to pay a $9 billion fine. Go Canadian Ethics!!
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics...0141106?page=3

I'm no expert but I do like to think that I have a fair understanding for a person of my limited intellect on how things work.

There's partisanship and then there's doing what's right for the country and fellow Americans, not what's best for big business at the expense of the well being of Americans and their country.

Yes Democrats are at the trough and their handling of Wall Street after the subprime crisis is bullshit and a crime unto itself.

The Democrats are also weasels, but they didn't engineer a couple of wars. On this last one they did stand by like sheep, but Bush and Co had whipped the country into a murderous frenzy. A trillion dollars later and over 100K confirmed dead and up to a million est as a side effect of living in a country that has had the shit bombed out of it.

Combine that with Obama's brutal handling of post war Iraq and the brutality of Al-Maliki and now we have ISIS. Which kind of makes us pine for the days of Osama and his loveable gang of misfits. Who got his start back in the 80s and was trained and supplied by Americans under a Reagan.

Now we are bombing American tanks and other assorted goodies that ISIS looted.

But I digress

Both parties are evil, however the Republicans with their new found friends in the Tea Party have sunk to new lows and have proudly embraced ignorance and mock science. They have realized only the truly rich or the extremely ignorant/frightened will vote for them.

In a free and democratic society, there is no way in the world the Republicans would have won the senate. Not with their track record. Not after the bullshit the pulled with the budget.
Republicans basically bought their victories and what they couldn't buy they tried to disenfranchise or gerrymandered the ridings.


Political reform is not going to happen, but they can start to fix things by overturning Citizens United and get big money out of politics. Until that happens there's no hope of changing anything.

In the mean time the Republicans will continue to destroy the middle class and continue to not give a crap about the less fortunate and help the rich get richer, and they will continue to win elections one way or another.

I don't mean to be crass, but any argument that goes down the path "democrats don't do X, only republicans do, here's some links" is indeed a juvenile approach to the political problem in the US. Democrats gerrymander districts just as much as republicans do.

What have the democrats done to help the middle class? They pay lip service to that problem only, just like republicans pay lip service to abortion and social rights and freedoms. Income inequality has only gotten worse during the Obama years. His landmark bill on healthcare was essentially written by republicans from a plan drawn up in 1993 - only this time with several more concessions to the special interests of both democrats and republicans.

The Tea Party is a joke. It's a news story propped up on Fox News for views. It attracts both stupid people who actually believe the Tea Party is a force in politics and smart people who are outraged that it exists. Fox News is great at that sort of thing. The Tea Party is largely responsible for driving independent voters away from the republican party and allowing democrats to hold onto their majorities for so long.

Republicans don't really care about winning elections, they care about money. Just like democrats. By having the pendulum swing both directions every 8 years, they can both raise billions of dollars to prop up the whole charade over and over and over again. It always amazes me how otherwise intellectual people can assume they can sleep soundly at night because they voted democrat who "obviously have the best interests of the American people at heart".

Yes, the Iraqi war was a particularly egregious exploitation of political power to profit certain special interest groups, but it is merely a difference of degrees as the US has been consistently at war since 1775.



Congress has been bought and paid for, now for hundreds of years. I remember a sad political cartoon published around the 1920s with the railway lobby, tobacco lobby, grain lobby all standing dutifully behind their representatives in the house of representatives with their sacks of cash sitting neatly in front of them. There is only one solution to the problem, and it isn't the republicans or the democrats.

[Allan83]

Originally Posted by MalcolmTucker

I don't think that chart is WCS - it might be the synthetic price as that is about right. http://www.psac.ca/firstenergy/

Yeah, something isn't quite lining up.

[MichaelS]

Originally Posted by Ramsayfarian

Big difference to wanting to invade Syria because they're slaughtering their own people to starting a war over a false claim of weapons of mass destruction and making people think Iraq was involved in 9-11.

Not to mention desiring one thing is a hell of a lot different than doing.

So all of their talk was just talk? You don't think they really wanted to do it?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...814_story.html
Citing indisputable evidence of this use of chemical weapons, but if I remember correctly, it wasn't necessarily black and white. Especially if you asked the Russians. I know they are not necessarily the most trust worthy (Russians) but based on their track record, neither are the Americans.

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by geotag277

I don't mean to be crass, but any argument that goes down the path "democrats don't do X, only republicans do, here's some links" is indeed a juvenile approach to the political problem in the US. Democrats gerrymander districts just as much as republicans do.

I don't think you're being crass, more condescending than anything, but that appears to be your style. Not sure how you can call me juvenile for posting a few links when your follow it up is an embedded image. That's very adult of you. Going forward I will try to limit myself to memes and clipart.

Who said anything about fixing the problem? My reply was in response to your condescending post on the political system in the US works.

My points, which you seem to have completely missed, is that both parties are evil, but the Republicans are a tad worse. And that in a sane world there's no way the Republicans should have won based on their record of late.

One of the reason attributed to their win was their recent gerrymandering and the fact that they helped to eliminate about 5 million folks from the voters role. Saying it's ok because the Democrats have gerrymandered is what I would consider a juvenile argument.

My only comment with regards to fixing it was it will never get better if you don't take big business out of the picture.

I'd post a link about Citizens United, but I'm trying really hard to be more mature. I did find a good graphic for you, but it was way too large so I deleted it.

Cheers!!

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by MichaelS

So all of their talk was just talk? You don't think they really wanted to do it?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...814_story.html
Citing indisputable evidence of this use of chemical weapons, but if I remember correctly, it wasn't necessarily black and white. Especially if you asked the Russians. I know they are not necessarily the most trust worthy (Russians) but based on their track record, neither are the Americans.

I'm sorry MichaelS, but I'm not following your point.

My comment was about The Bushes/Republicans leading America into two different wars until false pretences. I wasn't implying that the Democrats would never go to war or never considered going to war.

I'm anti-war, but I think helping out the Syrian people is a hell of a lot more justifiable than the Bush and company reasons for invading Iraq both times.

Funny thing is when they finally did find chemical weapons in Iraq the Republicans actually covered it up and it's just coming to light now. The reason for the cover up was because the weapons were long abandoned and built with the collaboration of the west.

One country's freedom fighter is another country's terrorist. With the States more often than not, their freedom fighter becomes their terrorist. It's like a perpetual motion machine. They just keep feeding the beast.

[ByeByeBaby]

Originally Posted by Ramsayfarian

I'm sorry MichaelS, but I'm not following your point.

My comment was about The Bushes/Republicans leading America into two different wars until false pretences. I wasn't implying that the Democrats would never go to war or never considered going to war.

I'm anti-war, but I think helping out the Syrian people is a hell of a lot more justifiable than the Bush and company reasons for invading Iraq both times.

Funny thing is when they finally did find chemical weapons in Iraq the Republicans actually covered it up and it's just coming to light now. The reason for the cover up was because the weapons were long abandoned and built with the collaboration of the west.

One country's freedom fighter is another country's terrorist. With the States more often than not, their freedom fighter becomes their terrorist. It's like a perpetual motion machine. They just keep feeding the beast.

Remind me again how this relates to Calgary Economy?

[Ramsayfarian]

Originally Posted by ByeByeBaby

Remind me again how this relates to Calgary Economy?

Again? I don't remember reminding you before, I'm pretty sure this is the first time, but here it goes.
It all started with someone saying that the Republican victory might bode well for Keystone.
I then said something to the effect that at least some good came out of the states going full retard.

Which prompted geotagg to chime in with a grade 5 civic lesson.

I retorted with a juvenile rant which actually did tie things back to Calgary and indirectly the economy.

I'd post the link, but I've recently learned those are for kids, but here's a small excerpt. I've taken the liberty to bold the pertinent parts.

"In the spring of 2012, Fleischmann, who'd moved back to Canada after leaving Chase, was working at a law firm in Calgary when the phone rang. It was an investigator from the States. "Hi, I'm from the SEC," he said. "You weren't expecting to hear from me, were you?"

The always educational Geotagg then once again derailed the thread with a rousing demonstration of how an adult debates. I got caught up in his enthusiasm and rushed to demonstrate what I learned, but only to fail miserably when my graphic was way too large.

Somewhere in there Michael confused me, so I asked for clarification as I didn't want to appear rude and ignore him and I truly want to know where he's coming from.

This is where you came in asking to be reminded again. And again as I didn't want to appear rude, as it appears that you might have a memory issue, I wrote this missive. Despite the fact that you could have easily scrolled up and figured everything out on your own. After all, the entire derailment is less than a page.

Anyways, I hope that helped. Let me know if you need me to remind you a "third" time.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by Ramsayfarian

I don't think you're being crass, more condescending than anything, but that appears to be your style. Not sure how you can call me juvenile for posting a few links when your follow it up is an embedded image. That's very adult of you. Going forward I will try to limit myself to memes and clipart.

Who said anything about fixing the problem? My reply was in response to your condescending post on the political system in the US works.

My points, which you seem to have completely missed, is that both parties are evil, but the Republicans are a tad worse. And that in a sane world there's no way the Republicans should have won based on their record of late.

One of the reason attributed to their win was their recent gerrymandering and the fact that they helped to eliminate about 5 million folks from the voters role. Saying it's ok because the Democrats have gerrymandered is what I would consider a juvenile argument.

My only comment with regards to fixing it was it will never get better if you don't take big business out of the picture.

I'd post a link about Citizens United, but I'm trying really hard to be more mature. I did find a good graphic for you, but it was way too large so I deleted it.

Cheers!!

You certainly have a way to cut through the BS and call it like you see it. I will cop to everything you accused me of, including the juvenile condescending tone of my online rhetoric.

In reality I strike a balance between trying to crudely get my point across, and putting in the effort to make said point in as few words as possible and as politely as possible. I am aware my posts tend to come off horribly in most cases, but I am honestly attempting to engage in a debate regarding the points raised.

Concerning your point that republicans gerrymandered and restricted voting therefore are a tad bit worse, I would simply reply that you are cherry picking abuses of power to unfairly paint one party in a worse light than the other. There is a long list of democratic abuses of power, including the ACORN scandal that attempted to unfairly tip the balance of demographics who were enticed to vote in elections.

Again, I have to say there is a fair bit of cognitive dissonance in the people who think that by supporting the democrats they are somehow on the "right" side of the argument. That is a genius trick of the democratic brand that allows socially progressive people to think that way. It is the exact same trick the republicans use to promote small government and limited government interference. Somehow the continuing egregious instances of expanding government under republican administrations and shrinking social equality under democratic governments are irrelevant to the conversation.

I will again posit that the only real problem that needs to be talked about in US politics is the money involved. Everything else is just masturbation by both parties.

[MichaelS]

Originally Posted by Ramsayfarian

Somewhere in there Michael confused me, so I asked for clarification as I didn't want to appear rude and ignore him and I truly want to know where he's coming from.

Didn't mean to confuse, nor was i looking for an argument. You had mentioned that the democrats don't want to engineer wars, and i wanted to get your take on their planned invasion of Syria, which they were hell bent on doing until Putin one upped them. While you point out that it was for a noble cause, I am a bit more skeptical. Anyway, doesn't really matter what either of us thinks as it won't change history, and this is off topic.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by MichaelS

Didn't mean to confuse, nor was i looking for an argument. You had mentioned that the democrats don't want to engineer wars, and i wanted to get your take on their planned invasion of Syria, which they were hell bent on doing until Putin one upped them. While you point out that it was for a noble cause, I am a bit more skeptical. Anyway, doesn't really matter what either of us thinks as it won't change history, and this is off topic.

Regarding being for a noble cause, all the myriad conflicts the US has been involved in can be painted with a noble and humanitarian light. Hindsight is 20/20 regarding the results of some of these conflicts (and subsequent failures) but again it's simply a difference of degrees regarding the motivations.

I don't personally believe that conflicts are driven by corruption, war profiteering will always happen, but I do believe the people actually making the decisions regarding these things are trying to do the best they can.

[ItsALondonThing]

Thanks for the thoughts on the sensitivity of Alberta's economy to the global crude price, although I'm sad to see its sparked a disagreement on politics. Along the same lines, and this is of particular interest to us who are leaving the UK for Canada in a few months time, what is an approximate rate vs the US$ which would equal parity on something like the Big Mac scale? Are consumer prices and living costs roughly equal at $1.05 or $1.1 for example. The loonie has been particularly robust against sterling for almost a year now.

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by ItsALondonThing

Thanks for the thoughts on the sensitivity of Alberta's economy to the global crude price, although I'm sad to see its sparked a disagreement on politics. Along the same lines, and this is of particular interest to us who are leaving the UK for Canada in a few months time, what is an approximate rate vs the US$ which would equal parity on something like the Big Mac scale? Are consumer prices and living costs roughly equal at $1.05 or $1.1 for example. The loonie has been particularly robust against sterling for almost a year now.

That's tricky to nail down as each province has a pretty different consumer price index. You can see here how Alberta generally does in comparison to other provinces:

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/tables-tabl...pis01j-eng.htm

The benchmark for the CPI measured here is prices in 2002, so you can see Calgary has particularly high energy and housing cost inflation over the last decade. The "Big Mac Index" in 2002 was 1.34 (implied PPP to the USD $) so if you think in those terms that should give you a rough idea of where we're at in 2014.

[Ramsayfarian]

I replied to Geotaggs comment in the Watercooler thread as we fairly off topic and good forbid we continue to piss off the guy who only contribution is to bitch that we're off topic

[geotag277]

Personally I never understood this mentality that two adults can't have a conversation that slightly veers off topic of the original post. As if by letting a conversation happen outside the scope of the original post will lead us all into an anarchic state where the forum will be replaced by a Purge event wherein we hunt each other down like animals. Because that is the next logical step after discussing the two party system in the United States.

I've seen more interesting discussions get completely shut down due to being "off topic" than I have seen interesting discussions stay 100% on topic to the original point and spirit of the original post. Let people discuss things, if you aren't interested, don't read it. This militant enforcement of staying on-topic is doing more harm than good.

[Spring2008]

I don't think it's a big deal either. Started off with oil demand/supply factors and went off into a bit of a tangent on politics, bit of a tangent but less so and more relevant/interesting than some of the cupcake type talks on the construction thread.

[kora]

Canadian urban GDP study shows why analysis is long overdue
David Parkinson
The Globe and Mail
Nov 11 2014

"A Statscan study shows Calgary had the second-highest GDP per capita in Canada in 2009, following Regina ....

Statscan said that from 2001 to 2009, Calgary and Edmonton accounted for nearly as much GDP growth as Toronto – even though their combined population was less than half of Toronto’s .....

Regina had the top GDP per capita in 2009, by the way, at $65,404, followed by Calgary at $61,246 and Edmonton at $59,941. Toronto was seventh in 2009, down from third in 2001."

[geotag277]

Originally Posted by kora

Canadian urban GDP study shows why analysis is long overdue
David Parkinson
The Globe and Mail
Nov 11 2014

"A Statscan study shows Calgary had the second-highest GDP per capita in Canada in 2009, following Regina ....

Statscan said that from 2001 to 2009, Calgary and Edmonton accounted for nearly as much GDP growth as Toronto – even though their combined population was less than half of Toronto’s .....

Regina had the top GDP per capita in 2009, by the way, at $65,404, followed by Calgary at $61,246 and Edmonton at $59,941. Toronto was seventh in 2009, down from third in 2001."

I'm not sure any of that is really unexpected. Toronto is the major population centre in Canada, it would be very challenging for it to rank high in a GDP per capita metric - it is much easier for smaller population centres to have an inflated "per capita" anything.

Consider the list of the highest GDP per capita cities in the US

New York is 7th (essentially tied with Toronto), Los Angeles is 16, Chicago is 18.

The top "per capita" GDP contributors are all middling population centres with very strong focused (and one could say lack of diverse) industries propping up their economies.