David Macdonald

David Macdonald

@davidmaccdn.bsky.social

Canadian Centre For Policy Alternatives Senior Economist in Ottawa

2K followers176 following146 posts

These funds, along with cuts in many departments, are going to fund Defence which hit the NATO goal of 2% this year. This is a fundamental shift of our foreign policy away from "helpful fixer" to self-interested trader and defence spender. Read all about it: www.policyalternatives.ca/news-researc...

policyalternatives.caThe end of Pearson’s dream: The devastating impact of federal cuts on international aid | CCPAPlanned cuts will shift Canada’s foreign policy away from peacekeeping and development to self-interested trade and defence

The cuts emerging from the fall budget at Global Affairs and Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship will drastically cut Canada's official development assistance over the next 3 yrs. We haven't seen values this low since 1964. 2/x

PM Lester B Pearson challenged Canada and the world in 1969 to contribute 0.7% of our economy to the development of lower income countries. We never achieved this target, but we were close in the 80s. This latest budget will push us down to 0.17%. Lower than in 1969 when Pearson made the pledge 3/x

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Finally IRCC has slashed its staff by between 2,000 and 3.000 people starting in early 2025. Those staff had managed to get backlogs under control in 2023 and 2024, most application streams on track. But with so many fewer staff application backlogs are blowing up again. 5/x

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We're going to accept about 5% more new Canadians in the next 3 years because of their skills, but now we're going to slash the integration supports by 30%. The Settlement Program helps them get jobs and use their skills to benefit us all. 3/x

In several big cities roughly half of the homeless pop is actually just asylum seekers. The cities pick up the tab and the feds re-imburse them...or they did. The feds are now cancelling that program to "save" money, but its really just cost downloading that onto four cities 4/x

One if the big reasons for this is that corporate margins are just much higher than they used to be, hitting on average 10.3% in 2025, just like the inflation/profit hey days of 2021-22. The "ordinary" margins we see now would have been extremes pre-pandemic

Things like tariffs can be very bad for corporate profits, but much higher prices on everything combined with higher margins are what is driving the record high dollar profits in 2025.

We just put up the application for this summer's progressive economics fellowship. Its a paid 4 month term to work with me at @policyalternatives.ca and 100 other progressive policy experts to create this year's Alternative Federal Budget. Apply now: ccpa.bamboohr.com/careers/48

ccpa.bamboohr.comResearch Assistant - 4 Month TermResearch Assistant Research · Ottawa, Ontario The Organization: The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) is an independent, non-partisan research institute concerned with issues of social, ...

Interesting to see that HALF of all econo activity in Canada is just gvts providing: health care, education, infrastructure, pensions. The other half is the private sector selling things. Cuts to govts are cuts to GDP growth...shocking ;) @policyalternatives.ca www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/daily-quo...

www150.statcan.gc.caThe Daily — Public Sector Universe, 2024Today, Statistics Canada is publishing the 2024 list of entities in the Public Sector Universe. This year's product presents public sector units from 2008 to 2024.
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Budget are about choices. We don't have to choose these cuts, we can choose to invest in Canadian priorities instead. Today our Alternative Federal Budget includes 100s of costed programs we should be choosing: www.policyalternatives.ca/news-researc... 7/x

policyalternatives.caAlternative federal budget 2026: Building true Canadian sovereignty - CCPAWhat true Canadian sovereignty and independence might look like when the public good is at the heart of budgetary planning
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So what's at risk? We've compiled over 120 programs that are going to sunset in the next three years. Many climate change programs, women fleeing violence, airline complaints resolution, student jobs programs are at risk 5/x

Many fed programs aren't permanent, they have to be renewed every few years. Over the next 3yrs, almost no programs will be renewed due to the 15% cuts. This "sunsetting" affects some depts more than others. 2/x

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Now that fees are falling fast, the real challenge is public space creation. Without strong public planning, for-profits will keep expanding in the easiest places—not where children actually live. We need much more proactive planning to hit the targets and do it with non-profit spaces. (8/10)

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The program was supposed to grow public and non-profit child care. Instead, it’s become a cash cow for private operators who dominate the growth: • 57% of new spaces since 2022 are for-profit • Only 30% are non-profit or public (6/10)

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That being said, child care deserts—blocks with almost no nearby child care spaces—are shrinking, but still widespread. BC, Alb, Sask, NL, Ontario have all rapidly reduced the number of kids living in child care deserts 4/10

But the real issue isn’t just how many spaces are created—it’s whether parents can find one. The federal benchmark is 5.9 spaces per 10 children. Only Quebec and PEI are already there. Many provinces won’t hit it, even if they hit their space creation targets (which many won’t). (5/10)

The fed’s goal isn’t just $10-a-day fees by 2026—it’s also 210K new full-time child care spaces by April 2025. So far, provinces are short 57,030 spaces. Some prov are on target or ahead. Others are far behind. (2/10)

Overachievers who are above their space creation targets: NB, BC & PEI Already have decent coverage: Quebec and PEI Strugglers: MB, NS & SK: only a fraction of their goals Progress is uneven—and often behind. (3/10)

These departments would see the highest cuts as they are service heavy departments. You need alot of people to process personal and biz tax returns, deal with missing transfer payments, help people get EI and their pension, as well as help people deal with passports and immigration issues. 5/x

Cutting that many people would almost certainly affect service levels. Folks will likely notice it in longer wait times on the phone to get help with your taxes. No help if your EI claim gets fouled up. Backlogs once again to get a passport. 6/x

The staff cuts have already started. The Carney cuts would be on top of the Trudeau cuts that were in Budget 2023 called "refocusing" gov. Those have already resulted in >10,000 lost FTEs this year. The "savings" from those cuts don't peak until next year (although I only include this years) 2/x