Business
Labour disputes loom large over Canadian economy
From the Fraser Institute
By Fred McMahon
With labour disputes on the rise, Team Canada faces our greatest economic challenges in decades. It’s a bad look when team members jump the bench for the walk-out/lock-out penalty box—elbows up on the team, not on the ice.
Economic difficulties have escalated in recent years—miserable productivity growth, COVID and its inflation-drenched recovery, the uninvited U.S. trade war, and a government spending spree that left Canada deeply in debt and exacerbated all other difficulties.
Over the same period, labour disputes grew. Hours lost to disputes have been trending down for decades, but up since 2015. For the nine preceding years, the average hours lost annually was 224,000; for the nine years since, it’s been 190,000, but increasing over the years. In 2016, 74,000 hours were lost compared to 362,900 hours in 2023 and 293,600 last year.
Ironically, work stoppages typically occur only if they can wreck havoc on the Canadian economy. They hit sectors where customers and clients have little or no alternative. When customers have choices, they’ll walk away from a shutdown supplier. That encourages workers and businesses to figure out a solution before a strike.
Disputes in transportation and government services are particularly damaging. When Air Canada grounds flights, people and businesses already have tickets and plans. Options are limited and pricey. There is only one Port of Montreal. If it shuts down, there are no other Ports of Montreal. Cargo diversion is, well, limited and pricey. When government employees go on strike, people can’t turn to another government for service.
In 2023 and 2024, Canada suffered 62 transportation such work stoppages, including at the ports of Montreal and Vancouver, Canada’s two largest railways, and the St. Lawrence Seaway.
More disputes are on the way. Canada Post workers recently walked off the job hours after the federal government announced a major move from door-to-door delivery to community mailboxes. In British Columbia, civil servants are on the picket line. Public service unions are preparing to fight efforts to bring federal finances under control. And Air Canada and its flight attendants are now in arbitration after attendants rejected Air Canada’s most recent offer by 99.1 per cent.
As Keith Creel, CEO of Canadian Pacific Kansas City, wrote: “Canada’s message to the world is not one of efficiency, affordability and reliability. Lately, and repeatedly, it’s been the opposite: Disruptions. Delays. Diversions.” This is not a good for Team Canada when Canada needs new investment and entrepreneurship.
Everyone involved in a labour dispute loses. That means Canada losses. Air Canada says its recent strike, three-days long, cost the company $375 million. Employees and customers lose through foregone pay.
More than half a million passengers were directly affected, piling up the losses. Worse is the ripple affect on those not directly affected. When any part of the transportation network is impaired, business and people suffer. The economy is further damaged as investors become skittish about Canadian uncertainty, exacerbating economic difficulties.
Things may get worse. Canada’s economy is shrinking due to the trade war and our own economic mismanagement. That means there’s less stuff to go around. People’s pay on average has to shrink. The economy is not producing enough for everyone to make up “lost wages.” If all wages go up, the economy doesn’t magically start producing more. Instead, money buys less, inflation grows, economic damage intensifies, and there’s even less stuff to go around.
Resentment deepens as workers fight each other over the limited supply of stuff. Those who win make those who lose pay a disproportionate slice of the cost.
Three ways could eliminate or reduce these costs. One is to end unionization in government and essential services. Let the market decide wages. If pay is too low, employees leave for other opportunities, forcing employers to up pay. Another is to incentivize unions to resolve disputes before strikes, for example, by allowing replacement workers. The third is requiring mandatory arbitration, which has an admirable record in Canada of resolving disputes. Legislation should take into account reasonable complaints, whether employers or workers are favoured, and address them.
If Canada’s employers and unions can’t get their act together, only action will avoid dead-loss damage to the Canadian economy, leaving the rest of us as drive-by victims of labour bickering.
Fred McMahon
Senior Fellow, Dr. Michael A. Walker Chair in Economic Freedom
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
You’ve probably heard by now the blockbuster news that Microsoft founder Bill Gates, one of the richest people to ever walk the planet, has had a change of heart on climate change.
For several decades Gates poured billions of dollars into the climate industrial complex.
Some conservatives have sniffed that Bill Gates has shifted his position on climate change because he and Microsoft have invested heavily in energy intensive data centers.
AI and robotics will triple our electric power needs over the next 15 years. And you can’t get that from windmills.
What Bill Gates has done is courageous and praiseworthy. It’s not many people of his stature that will admit that they were wrong. Al Gore certainly hasn’t. My wife says I never do.
Although I’ve only once met Bill Gates, I’ve read his latest statements on global warming. He still endorses the need for communal action (which won’t work), but he has sensibly disassociated himself from the increasingly radical and economically destructive dictates from the green movement. For that, the left has tossed him out of their tent as a “traitor.”
I wish to highlight several critical insights that should be the starting point for constructive debate that every clear-minded thinker on either side of the issue should embrace.
(1) It’s time to put human welfare at the center of our climate policies. This includes improving agriculture and health in poor countries.
(2) Countries should be encouraged to grow their economies even if that means a reliance on fossil fuels like natural gas. Economic growth is essential to human progress.
(3) Although climate change will hurt poor people, for the vast majority of them it will not be the only or even the biggest threat to their lives and welfare. The biggest problems are poverty and disease.
I would add to these wise declarations two inconvenient truths: First: the solution to changing temperatures and weather patterns is technological progress. A far fewer percentage of people die of severe weather events today than 50 or 100 or 1,000 years ago.
Second, energy is the master resource and to deny people reliable and affordable energy is to keep them poor and vulnerable – and this is inhumane.
If Bill Gates were to start directing even a small fraction of his foundation funds to ensuring everyone on the planet has access to electric power and safe drinking water, it would do more for humanity than all of the hundreds of billions that governments and foundations have devoted to climate programs that have failed to change the globe’s temperature.
Stephen Moore is a co-founder of Unleash Prosperity and a former Trump senior economic advisor.
From the Daily Caller News Foundation
At Tesla’s Austin headquarters, investors backed Musk’s 12-step plan that ties his potential trillion-dollar payout to a series of aggressive financial and operational milestones, including raising the company’s valuation from roughly $1.4 trillion to $8.5 trillion and selling one million humanoid robots within a decade. Musk hailed the outcome as a turning point for Tesla’s future.
“What we’re about to embark upon is not merely a new chapter of the future of Tesla but a whole new book,” Musk said, as The New York Times reported.
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The decision cements investor confidence in Musk’s “moonshot” management style and reinforces the belief that Tesla’s success depends heavily on its founder and his leadership.
Tesla Annual meeting starting now
https://t.co/j1KHf3k6ch— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 6, 2025
“Those who claim the plan is ‘too large’ ignore the scale of ambition that has historically defined Tesla’s trajectory,” the Florida State Board of Administration said in a securities filing describing why it voted for Mr. Musk’s pay plan. “A company that went from near bankruptcy to global leadership in E.V.s and clean energy under similar frameworks has earned the right to use incentive models that reward moonshot performance.”
Investors like Ark Invest CEO Cathie Wood defended Tesla’s decision, saying the plan aligns shareholder rewards with company performance.
“I do not understand why investors are voting against Elon’s pay package when they and their clients would benefit enormously if he and his incredible team meet such high goals,” Wood wrote on X.
Norway’s sovereign wealth fund, Norges Bank Investment Management — one of Tesla’s largest shareholders — broke ranks, however, and voted against the pay plan, saying that the package was excessive.
“While we appreciate the significant value created under Mr. Musk’s visionary role, we are concerned about the total size of the award, dilution, and lack of mitigation of key person risk,” the firm said.
The vote comes months after Musk wrapped up his short-lived government role under President Donald Trump. In February, Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) team sparked a firestorm when they announced plans to eliminate the U.S. Agency for International Development, drawing backlash from Democrats and prompting protests targeting Musk and his companies, including Tesla.
Back in May, Musk announced that his “scheduled time” leading DOGE had ended.
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