Op-Eds
Published in the Financial Post on June 29, 2011
By Finn Poschmann
The federal Parliament in 2009 handed Canada’s competition commissioner, Melanie Aitken, awesome legal power, and she is using it. She is free to do so — pending potential court reversals, or pending legislative change — but the current law raises serious concerns among economists and legal scholars. It also threatens big costs for businesses — which are inevitably passed to consumers — and a potential chill on competitive behaviour.
The concerns arise from amendments to the Competition Act in 2009, which gave power to the commissioner, through the Competition Tribunal, to seek from businesses that she believes have offended particular non-criminal…
Published in the Financial Post on March 16, 2011
By Philippe Bergevin
Visa and MasterCard, the two biggest credit cards companies operating in Canada, are currently targets of serious allegations. The Commissioner of Competition alleged in a recent referral to the Competition Tribunal that these companies, through rules they impose on merchants, have limited competition in the marketplace, resulting in increased costs to businesses and, ultimately, consumers.
These allegations have been vigorously disputed by the two targeted companies. Further, some of the economic arguments underpinning the legal case are, in my view, flawed and the solutions prescribed by the commissioner are unlikely to foster, and may…
Published in the Financial Post on March 2, 2011
By Larry Herman and Finn Poschmann
There's something bizarre and unsettling about the Globalive wireless business. We're not sure how it squares with good telecom policy or with ordinary constitutional principles of peace, order and good government.
Maybe this can be reconciled, but there are conflicting issues.
In 2008, Globalive purchased radio frequency spectrum at auction and proposed to start business as a telecommunications carrier. The Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) said no -it found that the company was controlled by a non-Canadian. Under the Telecommunications Act, you have to be Canadian-controlled to operate as a…
Published in the National Post on April 8, 2010
By William B.P. Robson and Colin Busby
Since the early 1970s, “supply management” has subjected Canadian dairy, poultry and egg production to government-mandated cartels. Introduced to increase producer power vis-à-vis intermediaries and consumers, and thus raise farm incomes, supply management supports higher-than-market prices by administering producer prices and restricting farm output through production quotas, while high tariffs prevent food processors and consumers getting alternative supplies from abroad.
The initial allocation of quotas in the 1970s was free; today, most farmers trade existing quotas to one another through provincial exchanges. Generally…
Free the garbage hostages
Free the garbage hostages In
Free the garbage hostages: Private collection is often, but not always, best; it's monopoly that needs trashing , (The Globe & Mail, July 17, 2009), Toronto, July 21 – Canadian cities have been hit by a number of municipal strikes that have largely halted garbage service. In a July 17 Globe and Mail essay, Policy Analyst Ben Dachis argues these strikes are fundamentally caused by public monopolies on garbage pickup. Introducing more competition in public service delivery would help prevent lengthy garbage strikes and lower costs for taxpayers.
For the essay click here.