Retired from Statistics Canada. PhD economist, Queen’s Univ, "Go" player, R enthusiast. https://nitter.cf/t.co/kP9rv736UE
Ottawa
Joined February 2009
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Canadian households' available financial means from all sources totalled $2.5 trillion in 2022, including primary sources of income, transfers, new pension entitlements, CCA and a net $67 billion borrowed from corporations, NPISH, governments and non-residents. #cdnecon
Kleptocrats quarrel over the spoils. nytimes.com/2026/10/29/us/po…
Here is a detailed analysis of today's GDP report for August from StatCan. #cdnecon philipsmith.ca/gdp_report
On Oct 19 StatCan released a new Transportation Services Index of domestic "for-hire" freight transportation. It has no components. I asked what accounts for the drop in 2018 - as large as the one in 2020 - and they said they could not answer due to confidentiality requirements.
StatCan's fixed-weight index of average hourly earnings jumped up 13.3% in August, we are told. Looks like a glitch to me. #cdnecon
An interesting chart from the BoC's Monetary Policy Review, released this morning. #cdnecon
Taking a look at short-term economic growth indicators, real GDP and employment have been steaming upward but recent data on wholesale sales, exports, imports, residential construction have been less favourable. Inflation seems under control, except for energy prices. #cdnecon
Philip Smith 🇨🇦🇺🇦 retweeted
Once again turning the sacrifices of Canadian and other allied troops into a punchline.
The United States is the only country ever to have triggered Section 5 of the NATO Treaty, i.e. calling on allies for a joint military response to 9/11.
We were there. 1100 allied NATO troops made the supreme sacrifice, including 158 brave Canadians.
Shame on this man, and those who enable him, for repeatedly mocking their bravery.
Hegseth on Afghanistan:
I was a captain in Afghanistan, and we would go to the headquarters in Kabul, and there would be 50 flags at the headquarters.
It was a beautiful thing to see 50 different countries contributing to the NATO alliance and the ISAF mission there.
Except there were like maybe five that contributed. It was actually closer to one or two that, by the end, were actually involved in kinetic operations.
In fact, the ISAF patch, we would joke that it meant "I Saw Americans Fighting."
Readers added context they thought people might want to know
Over 1100 non-American soldiers from 31 US-allied countries were killed fighting in Afghanistan, approximately 1/3 of the total combat deaths.
t.co/x4tGhxJiFG
Philip Smith 🇨🇦🇺🇦 retweeted
⚡️ ZELENSKYY REVEALS WHAT HE TOLD TRUMP ABOUT STARLINK — AND WHAT HAPPENED NEXT! 🇺🇦
ZELENSKYY: “I told Trump: If you enable Starlink access inside Russia, we can quickly destroy their ballistic missile launchers.”
“Putin would come to the negotiating table, and I wouldn’t need to destroy a single energy facility. But instead, they shut down Starlink. They didn’t expand coverage — they restricted it.”
Ukraine asked for the tools to stop Russian missiles. Instead, Zelenskyy says its capabilities were restricted. 🇺🇦
Philip Smith 🇨🇦🇺🇦 retweeted
Zelensky is a Genius:
Trump: "I'm buying oil from Putin, which will help fund the war against Ukraine."
Zelensky: "Ok then I'm blowing up all the Yandex Data centers in Russia, which host the bot Traffic that Putin uses to Help Trump cause chaos in the US elections. Checkmate!"
Recent data from some new sector-based producer price indexes, developed by the BoC and released by STC, look a bit alarming. For sources, see the chart footnote. #cdnecon
Now that the September LFS data are available, here is an updated heatmap showing a variety of labour market indicators. #cdnecon
This is a reminder that I have several table viewers and dashboards available, free of charge and with no registration or use authorization necessary. philipsmith.ca/dashboards/
Long-term bond rates have risen sharply this year. Here's what has happened to federal interest payments on national debt in CA and US so far. Expect these ratios to go a lot higher as the debt turns over. #cdnecon
Everyone assumes Trump wants to boost US manufacturing, lower r and pdot, swing the trade balance, cut immigration and improve the US military, but is failing because of dumb policies. The alternative assumption - he is just doing Putin's bidding - fits the facts better.
The BoC released a description of its new projection and policy analysis model today. It's a very sophisticated model. Here's how the CPI YoY change responds in the model (deviation from control) to a 100 basis point policy rate increase (Chart 4). bankofcanada.ca/wp-content/u…
