his is what a declining standard of living looks like.
This is what happens when government officials demand more and more power, reduce freedom, impose restrictions on commerce, and try to reengineer the economy to fit into some virtue-signaling worldview.
The economy of a relatively free country is simply way too complex for a centralized institution to effectively manage or control.
History has shown that the most successful economies are those that respect individual freedom and economic freedom, which leads to immense innovation and wealth creation.
Going back to our World War Two example, the United States and Canada both had a large private enterprise role in military production, which led to shockingly fast increases in productivity and raw production, dwarfing the production of the more centralized Axis & Soviet economies. The Soviets used a centralized system largely consisting of slave labour, yet ended up dependent on the US, Canada, and the UK for most of their trucks, many of their uniforms, bullets, food, and more.
The Axis powers were also highly centralized, with their power-obsessed leaders often micromanaging to the point of influencing minute details of military design. They ended up being outproduced by a hilarious margin.
The same is true today.
When governments step back and respect individual initiative and free enterprise, we see amazing innovation, efficiency, productivity, and growth.
And this ends up solving problems without any centralized effort.
Consider that emissions have fallen far faster in the United States without carbon taxes and centralized government authority than they have in Canada, despite our nation imposing carbon taxes and trying to snuff out our own energy sector.
Because of the embrace of innovation and freedom in much of the US, they have grown faster than Canada while being better at reducing emissions.
Will people choose their virtue-signaling or their standard of living?
In Canada, and in much of the world, people are now going to face a choice:
Will we continue to double and triple-down on naïve virtue-signaling, or will we protect our standard of living by standing up for the values and principles that made our standard of living possible?
Will we continue to demonize our energy sector, or will we realize what a tremendous gift our abundant oil and gas is for our country, and unchain that sector and show respect to the energy sector workers who have built so much of our country?
Will we watch as other nations profit and benefit at our expense, or will we wake up and realize that we are in an economic competition and our standard of living and lifestyle is at risk?
And finally, will we continue to give in to government fear-mongering and let politicians increase our taxes and keep imposing restrictions, or will we re-embrace individual freedom and free enterprise, trusting that innovation and wealth creation is best served by getting government out of the way?
The answers to those questions will determine whether Canada maintains our standard of living, or watches wealth and prosperity leave our country for more promising lands.
