Canada needs 'laser-focused' productivity strategy, Dodge says
BNN Bloomberg
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government and his provincial counterparts must be “laser-focused” on growing the productive capacity of Canada’s economy or risk falling further behind other nations, says a new report co-authored by former Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge.
Gross domestic product per capita in Canada has lagged other advanced economies for decades – cumulatively growing just 6.8 per cent between 2007 and 2023, compared with 21.4 per cent in the U.S., 19.6 per cent in Australia and 11.8 per cent in the euro area, Dodge and his co-authors write in the mid-year economic outlook published by the law firm Bennett Jones.
Yet Trudeau’s government has not prioritized productivity growth during its nearly nine years in power, Dodge said in an interview.
“The overriding objective of federal and provincial governments going forward has got to be to raise the productivity of workers,” said Dodge, who was central bank governor from 2001 to 2008 and now serves as a senior adviser at Bennett Jones.
