Governments are major employers, and usually provide defined-benefit (DB) pension plans with full inflation indexing and generous early retirement provisions. Hence, changes in thinking about, and accounting for, the costs of DB pension plans have major implications for government finances. Both...

Financial instruments indexed to the general price level are of great potential use to borrowers and lenders alike. But up until recently, they have been relatively scarce – in part because private borrowers dislike offering protection against inflation that they do not control. Since the...

Canada is in the happy position of being able to address its fiscal challenges not just through eliminating deficits, but also by promoting growth in the economy and the tax base. This report takes a two-pronged approach: first, an accelerated plan to achieve budgetary surplus in three years;...

After several years of relatively robust performance, Canada is lagging its peers in business investment growth, according to a new report by the C.D. Howe institute. In "Equipping Canadian Workers: Business Investment Loses a Step against Competitors Abroad," authors Benjamin Dachis and William...

The ongoing transition of the Canadian pension system offers valuable lessons for the rest of the world. Improving the voluntary and contractual retirement saving arrangements that constitute the private pillars of the system requires recognition among policy makers and the public that shoring...

Early 2020 presents Canada with two challenges: amenic economic growth, and nervousness about the federal government's fiscal stewardship. The C.D. Howe Institute's Shadow Federal Budget for 2020 addresses both. It contains a number of measures to improve the rewards from work, saving and...

The Canadian Institute for Health Information's annual National Health Expenditure (NHEX) is a vital source of data on how much Canadians and their governments are spending on healthcare generally, as well as on specific categories. Because the NHEX reports give both preliminary numbers based on...

The cost of federal employees has risen rapidly, with total compensation per employee jumping nearly 5% per year on average over the past decade, says a new report from the C.D. Howe Institute. In “Premium Compensation: The Ballooning Cost of Federal Government Employees,” authors Alexandre...