Alberta Separatism is starting to go mainstream

[davidI]

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I assume that question if for @dj_patm ?

Yea, sorry - you must have posted just seconds before me.

[killramos]

Dunno if this is the right place for this, but it’s the funniest headline I have read all week.

https://globalnews.ca/news/6199755/quebec-cn-strike/

Quebec has less than 5 days propane left due to CN strike, premier says

[ExtraSlow]

OK that is hilarious.

[ThePenIsMightier]

This isn't hilarious, but it's mildly entertaining:

[suntan]

The Indians are getting involved, now the left-wingers are going to be really confused.

[ExtraSlow]

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The Indians are getting involved, now the left-wingers are going to be really confused.

I think you mean Pakistanis.

[tonytiger55]

Question for those in favor of separation.

Even the most optimistic forecasts for Oil Demand are calling for Oil Demand to start to decline by 2040, most are now calling for peak demand in the 2030's. If that means that the Alberta Oil industry will be a shell of it's current self by the late 2040's or early 2050's, do you still want to separate? What do you see as the basis for the economy then?

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2040 Peak Demand has been the industry standard for quite some time and has recently started to be brought forward. BoA has it at 2030 (https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-G...-A-Decade.html), Opec says 2040's, everyone else tends to be in the middle to late 2030's. This shouldn't come as a surprise to someone who is so sure of the economics of a separated Alberta.

How do you forecast Alberta creating wealth should it be Separated from Canada? Are you seeing heavy investment in other non-petroleum industry by current government that you think will be ready to fill the gap by the 2030's-40's or sooner? Once oil revenue starts to drop significantly, how will the government be able to invest in the infrastructure needed to bring in new industry? Do you think that cutting funding to the universities will affect Alberta's ability to attract young talent and entrepreneurs to the province? The students of today would be the business leaders in 20 years. Outside of Alberta, Canada has a growing service economy and while you're totally right that losing the benefit of what is currently the Nations biggest export will hurt, it's 8% of Canadian GDP. It's over 30% of Albertas GDP and much higher indirectly. Remaining in Canada would allow us to receive the same equalization we currently send out of the province as well as receiving federal funding for infrastructure and other projects.

Again you're relying on the energy sector, and while I completely disagree that you'll have any easier of a time getting product to market after a potential separation (the US has not been able to build two pipelines out of Alberta today even with Trump in office, if someone like Bernie gets in then what?), that is not what I was asking. I'm asking what you think will drive the economy of a separated Alberta in 2030 and on? The only recent example we have of a similar situation playing out is Brexit, where capital flight is what most economists predict and that is a much stronger and attractive market than anything we can offer. Why would you see Capital come into a now have-not Alberta should they leave? What does Alberta have to offer outside of Oil that will bring in capital and attract investors and why haven't we seen anything today in a depressed economy with wages and costs being as low as they have been in Alberta for well over a decade and a half? It seems like, from my view, that all signs point to the market deciding that capital is best spent outside of Alberta once oil demand starts to drop which is what we see today when prices are suppressed to similar levels.

The first question is a almost a impossible question to answer as the question is framed on a the idea that the Government makes the investment, funding to universities as the means to attract talent and entrepreneurs.
That is completely false.

The issue of separation is not entirely based on oil. It’s the governing principles behind it.
The whole issue of a country not being able to utilize our resources highlights that fact.

I think the question you are trying to ask or a better framed question is what will be our economy/export/ wealth generation should we separate?

So lets break it down.
Alberta, BC and Sask is very resource rich. That is a given fact. Not a belief.

I don’t think the government should invest. I think the government’s role is to create the foundations so investment and capital can flow easily.

Should we choose to separate we would need to create the foundations to in having a strong financial services sector. Anything you try to create will flow through that. To cite a example. The former UK Margert Thatcher paved the way for the development of Canary Wharf(the hub of the UK financial services) in the late 70’s/early 80’s. This has had a huge effect in allowing capital sub services, industries to grow.

I don’t know the current state of the steel industry in the west here. But that is industry that would grow. Anything we build requires steel and lumber.
Oil has a large number of byproducts. Look at everything around you, plastics, sub electronic components. Resource extraction runs on carbon. That’s not going to change in the next 30 years.

We would have a stable government. I would like to think we retain the Queen as the head of state.

To understand these points is crucial in understanding the answer to the question.

What ive mentioned above gives the foundation so capital, talent and investment can flow into the separated provinces. Why..?

Well globally take a look. If you have a shit ton of money. The government will take it unless you follow suite. Look at what is happening around the world. Once you make your money in Russia, China, Middle east, India etc. You want to get the hell outa there as the higher powers will take it away.
Where would you go or invest it?

In Alberta the NDP stopped a lot of the means of provincial foreign immigration investment. This was one of the key drivers. There are a lot of talented people that know how to do shit better than us and have clean legit money.
The lack of the ability for people to invest creates uncertainty in the market. Local investors don’t want to take the risk due to the market being so volatile, they don’t have access to capital either and hence take a bigger risk. This in turn can have a effect on job creation. Thus in turn the government (NDP) manipulates this data to create a case for their own argument to spend more and create artificial jobs.

To create one component of a wealth export is to attract foreign immigration investment. They can bring fresh capital to create the businesses and industries, that would attract the talent, entrepreneurship and additional capital. Some of them know how to create and run shit better.
They don’t have to worry about the government stealing their money and investment. The standard of living here is higher, The water tastes amazing, low pollution, good education standards, a shit load of land to grow and build on, low taxation, access to plentiful resources for your business projects with low regulation. It’s a entrepreneurs wet dream. Who else in the world has this?

You don’t have to worry about government blocking everything. You want something done, boom legislation is created without the numptys out east blocking it.

So over time, oil does not need to be the main export or industry. Again the basis of the economy starts with the new government creating the foundation for this to happen.
The entrepreneurs creates the industries as it’s a stable low tax environment, they have access to clean capital in a stable resource rich environment with land aplenty. This attracts additional investors and talent. There is soo much that can be done in this province. It boggles the mind how this is not happening.

Up until now, this has been blocked. This is not fiction either.
The UK has been doing this for years.

Brexit is a separate discussion. But in short capital is flowing out of the country in the short term due to the volatility and the possibility of a Marxist government after the election in December. Why would you invest when Jeremy Corbyn (opposition leader) wants to nationalist everything and tax corportations? (hell they can come to Alberta).

Alberta is young horse. Yet everyone keeps gas lighting it to think it’s a weak ass donkey.

[Buster]

@tonytiger55 ... Ronald Reagan showed that Trickle Down Economics doesn't work!!11!!

[AndyL]

Just in case they didn't know... Pipelines don't go on strike

[killramos]

This propane stuff is completely gold.

[Misterman]

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This propane stuff is completely gold.

We are sitting here on 18 loaded rail cars of Propane that were destined for Quebec when the strike started. There's part of me that wants to go out and take a middle finger picture next to those cars for meme creation.

[AndyL]

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This propane stuff is completely gold.

Yup... Although its not making things as crazy expensive as I'd like... But im still of shut off the taps mentality.

So i never thought I'd say this but where can we go support these striking CN workers? They are definitelu getting screwed and really need my support!

[phreezee]

In Quebec, 55 per cent of survey respondents said they would be "happy" or "OK" to see Alberta leave the country.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...a0D-VgVmqSniPw

[davidI]

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In Quebec, 55 per cent of survey respondents said they would be "happy" or "OK" to see Alberta leave the country.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calga...a0D-VgVmqSniPw

I'm sure the percentage of Albertans who would be "happy" or "OK" if Quebec separated would be just as high or likely even higher.

[msommers]

Survey the entire country per province and I'm sure a significant amount of them would show >50% in favor of Quebec leaving.

[04Terminator]

I took the poll to mean they support Alberta in its sovereign decisions

[Kobe]

I was wondering, it seems everyone complains about government funding but we are the only province that doesn't have PST

Would a 5% additional tax not help?

I'm fine paying an extra 5%

[phreezee]

I'm not fine with paying extra taxes with my post-income tax money. We already face annual property tax increases. I'm all for cuts to government funding.

[dirtsniffer]

The more they take the more they waste

[Buster]

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I was wondering, it seems everyone complains about government funding but we are the only province that doesn't have PST

Would a 5% additional tax not help?

I'm fine paying an extra 5%

Funding at the provincial level is a symptom of the problem, but not a cause. I would say that equalization is also just a symptom. So no, a PST won't solve the cause of the problem.

The problem is that the RoC has has always had the power to impose serious restrictions on the West, arbitrarily, with no capacity for Alberta to resist. This has resulted in problems to one degree or another over the years (current equalization being one, for example). But it changed into a massive problem once the RoC bought into hysterical ideologies and took a very hardline approach to Alberta and Saskatchewan.

The current environment is what happens when a root cause becomes obvious instead of papered-over. Canada is a non-functional federation and useful changes to that federal are almost impossible to implement. The argument that the pros-cons balance for Alberta to remain in the confederation has finally swung to one side. The RoC and the current federal regime have been too stupid to understand that modest appeasement, and throwing scraps and bones to Alberta has worked in the past and likely would continue to work. But no policy can fix the dysfunction of Confederation's structure. The best it can do is create short term remedies that mollify Alberta without actually solving the problem. But I think Albertans are coming around to the realization that even beneficial policies at this point are simply the majority patronizing them.