Ignatieff 's petro-populism
Once a man who preferred the intellectual high road, Michael Ignatieff now is plumbing that lowest common denominator of water-cooler populism: high gas prices. Could this really be the thinker who once parsed the fine points of global citizenship and human rights on the pages of The New York Times Magazine?
At a rally on Tuesday in the Toronto suburb of Scarborough, Mr. Ignatieff pledged to place MP Dan McTeague -a man already wellknown as a noisy demagogue -in charge of monitoring pump prices nationwide, should the Liberals win the May 2 election. For a thinking voter, it's as good a reason as any not to vote for the Liberals.
Mr. McTeague has made a career of bashing oil companies over gasoline prices while never quite managing to find any proof of collusion or gouging, two of his favourite accusations. The Pickering-Scarborough East MP has shown that there is less competition in most Canadian markets than in comparable American ones -so in most large Canadian cities one oil company tends to dominate above the others -but he has never demonstrated that this arrangement leads to higher consumer prices at the pump.
It's easy enough to understand how some Canadians accept the populist complaints pushed by Mr. McTeague. Gasoline prices seem to go up and down in lockstep at all stations at once (a reflection of the price of oil, and other global factors beyond any one company's control). This has enabled Mr. McTeague to stoke popular resentment against "Big Oil" with allegations of tacit collusion and price gouging.
But the truth is, gasoline is a consumer good that is particularly hard to fix. There are more than 7,000 gas stations in this country and, as Financial Post analyst William Watson has written, because there are so many selling a roughly identical product and because they all display their price out front in big, bold numbers, it would be difficult to gouge customers. Some competitor, somewhere, would quickly break ranks in a effort to increase their market share.
Besides which, Mr. McTeague's monitoring would accomplish little. Only through regulation of gas prices could the Liberals claim to be doing something about the populace's frustration. Should that occur, expect the result to be gasoline shortages and higher prices.
The rich aren't so bad after all
"Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me. [They are] soft where we are hard, and cynical where we are trustful.. They think . that they are better than we are because we had to discover the compensations and refuges of life for ourselves."
These words by F. Scott Fitzgerald summarize the classic stereotype of rich people: They are idle snobs who inherited their money and have little in common with, or sympathy for, people of lesser means. Throughout history, this view has formed the basis of many redistributionist creeds. The underlying premise -which has seeped into much of the anticorporate agitation on display in the current election campaign -is that the rich are infected, perhaps even from birth, with the taint of undeserved wealth.
But a study published on April 19 suggests that most of Canada's wealthy individuals are not a breed apart. BMO Harris Private Banking recently conducted an online survey of 459 Canadian millionaires. Of these, a scant 6% report that they inherited the bulk of their wealth. Ninety-four percent state that they are largely self-made, either as businesspersons or professionals. Eighty percent affirm that they enjoy greater wealth than their parents. And 76% believe it is important to give back to their communities.
What does this study tell us? First, that the rich are far from idle. Work is the underpinning of their wealth. Instead of envying their luck, we should seek to replicate their success -and teach our children to do the same.
Second, that upward mobility is a reality in our country. The myth that you cannot become rich unless you are born into money is false: Canada is a land of opportunity.
Third, that the rich have considerable empathy for those less fortunate. The BMO study confirms an earlier survey the company conducted in 2010, which found that overall, wealthy Canadians planned to give away between 1% to 3% of their wealth (assets, not income) that year.
The rich have more money than the rest of us -in some cases, a lot more money. But most have earned it themselves through hard work. This is something we should remember as we endure the catcalls of class warfare during this election campaign and beyond.
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