[Canada] Canadian Politics Redux

[Barrister]

I'm not an economist so take this with a grain of salt, but if I was the king of Canada I'd ramp up to export tariffs on crude. Make the US relive the 70s. Take that revenue to offset the losses elsewhere. It'll take them a while to replace their source of crude oil. As that happens ramp down the tariffs to keep the pressure but still have them buy.


Now that that fantasy is said, I don't know what Canada can actually do. Probably nothing. Try to increae trade with Europe, I suppose. Hope that this time we can actually get a pipeline going east?

Look at a map of pipelines.

A significant amount of Ontario's oil comes from western Canada - via Michigan.  An export tax would just hurt a whole bunch of Canadians.

Yes - we absolutely need to increase trade with Asia and Europe.  That absolutely means more pipelines going east and west.

Problem is those are all 10 year projects and not going to help us out now.

[Threviel]

They should have started those in '16 when it was clear that the US was going full retard.

[Barrister]

I keep seeing on Twitter a bunch of posts along the lines of "Trump just wants Canada to secure the border.  So why doesn't Canada do it"?

But you guys get it - fentanyl is just the fig leaf as Trump needs to get himself under "National Security" in order to impose the tariffs unilaterally (because otherwise tariffs are taxes, and are up to Congress).

For example, now today Trump is talking about our banking sector.  And there's some basis for that complaint.  But we have some basis for complaints about the US (softwood lumber!).  You can't just go nuking our trade relations because you have a diuspute - in particular when you just signed a new agreement a few years ago.

[viper37]

I keep seeing on Twitter a bunch of posts along the lines of "Trump just wants Canada to secure the border.  So why doesn't Canada do it"?

But you guys get it - fentanyl is just the fig leaf as Trump needs to get himself under "National Security" in order to impose the tariffs unilaterally (because otherwise tariffs are taxes, and are up to Congress).

For example, now today Trump is talking about our banking sector.  And there's some basis for that complaint.  But we have some basis for complaints about the US (softwood lumber!).  You can't just go nuking our trade relations because you have a diuspute - in particular when you just signed a new agreement a few years ago.

There is nothing legally preventing a US bank from entering the Canadian market at the same conditions a Canadian bank operates.  But the laws are designed to prevent foreign competition and foreign acquisition of our banks.

ING Direct was a Dutch bank that tried to penetrate the virtual banking system in Canada.  Citibank has been trying and mostly failing.

In any case, I'm not in the mood to negotiate anything with Trump or any Republican Congress.  They do not respect their word and any signature isn't wort the paper on it.

[HVC]

I'm not an economist so take this with a grain of salt, but if I was the king of Canada I'd ramp up to export tariffs on crude. Make the US relive the 70s. Take that revenue to offset the losses elsewhere. It'll take them a while to replace their source of crude oil. As that happens ramp down the tariffs to keep the pressure but still have them buy.


Now that that fantasy is said, I don't know what Canada can actually do. Probably nothing. Try to increae trade with Europe, I suppose. Hope that this time we can actually get a pipeline going east?

Look at a map of pipelines.

A significant amount of Ontario's oil comes from western Canada - via Michigan.  An export tax would just hurt a whole bunch of Canadians.

Yes - we absolutely need to increase trade with Asia and Europe.  That absolutely means more pipelines going east and west.

Problem is those are all 10 year projects and not going to help us out now.

Spoil sport 

[viper37]

I'm not an economist so take this with a grain of salt, but if I was the king of Canada I'd ramp up to export tariffs on crude. Make the US relive the 70s. Take that revenue to offset the losses elsewhere. It'll take them a while to replace their source of crude oil. As that happens ramp down the tariffs to keep the pressure but still have them buy.


Now that that fantasy is said, I don't know what Canada can actually do. Probably nothing. Try to increae trade with Europe, I suppose. Hope that this time we can actually get a pipeline going east?

Look at a map of pipelines.

A significant amount of Ontario's oil comes from western Canada - via Michigan.  An export tax would just hurt a whole bunch of Canadians.

Yes - we absolutely need to increase trade with Asia and Europe.  That absolutely means more pipelines going east and west.

Problem is those are all 10 year projects and not going to help us out now.

Alberta never really wanted to sell its oil to Canadians as it paid more to sell it to the US and the Federal government didn't want to have refineries outside of Ontario to refine Canadian oil.  At the time, Newfoundland wasn't doing much drilling and once it did, there was only one refinery left, adapted to foreign oil.

The pipeline projects provided no benefits to Quebec but all the environmental risks in the St-Lawrence ecosystem, especially the natural gas one as it increased maritime traffic where all the whales came to give birth.

[Barrister]

Alberta never really wanted to sell its oil to Canadians as it paid more to sell it to the US and the Federal government didn't want to have refineries outside of Ontario to refine Canadian oil.  At the time, Newfoundland wasn't doing much drilling and once it did, there was only one refinery left, adapted to foreign oil.

The pipeline projects provided no benefits to Quebec but all the environmental risks in the St-Lawrence ecosystem, especially the natural gas one as it increased maritime traffic where all the whales came to give birth.

Amazing.  Every word you said was wrong.

Alberta has always wanted to sell more oil to other customers.  The price of a barrel of Western Canadian Select sells at a discount to WTI (West Texas Intermediate) because we're largely locked in via pipelines to selling to the US.  Trans Mountain has actually helped that discount as we can now sell slightly more oil to Asia.

Canada's largest refinery is in New Brunswick.  There are no refineries in Newfoundland.  Newfoundland does have offshore oil. 

We can now see exactly why the Energy East pipeline (which would have taken oil to that NB refinery) would have benefitted Quebec - because it would benefit Canada in just such a trade dispute.

[Josephus]

The blithering idiots who voted for him don't know that; it allows the Mango Monstrosity to claim a win.

At this point I don't care if he claims a win. Avoiding economic catastrophe with this version of the United States is good enough.

 

Absolutely. Thing is even if he does claim a win; deep down I know he's still pissed.

[Richard Hakluyt]

He'll go to his deathbed pissed, there is something deeply wrong with him.

[viper37]

Alberta never really wanted to sell its oil to Canadians as it paid more to sell it to the US and the Federal government didn't want to have refineries outside of Ontario to refine Canadian oil.  At the time, Newfoundland wasn't doing much drilling and once it did, there was only one refinery left, adapted to foreign oil.

The pipeline projects provided no benefits to Quebec but all the environmental risks in the St-Lawrence ecosystem, especially the natural gas one as it increased maritime traffic where all the whales came to give birth.

Amazing.  Every word you said was wrong.

Alberta has always wanted to sell more oil to other customers.  The price of a barrel of Western Canadian Select sells at a discount to WTI (West Texas Intermediate) because we're largely locked in via pipelines to selling to the US.  Trans Mountain has actually helped that discount as we can now sell slightly more oil to Asia.

Canada's largest refinery is in New Brunswick.  There are no refineries in Newfoundland.  Newfoundland does have offshore oil. 

We can now see exactly why the Energy East pipeline (which would have taken oil to that NB refinery) would have benefitted Quebec - because it would benefit Canada in just such a trade dispute.

>Alberta has always wanted to sell more oil to other customers.

Non Canadian customers.  There's still a lot of resentment in Alberta about the NEP.


>Canada's largest refinery is in New Brunswick.
Does it refine Albertan oil?  Afaik, the Jean Gaulin refinery in Lévis does not refine Western crude oil and it's the biggest in Quebec.  It seems to have changed in 2018 when Montréal's refinery now refines Western crude oil.

The majority of the oil refined at Irving St-John goes to the US, as per their statement.  It's imported oil and Newfoundland oil.  The pipeline from Alberta was supposed to supply them in crude oil so they could export more of Alberta's oil to foreign market, not for domestic consumption.

EDIT:
It seems they do indeed refine Alberta's oil, exported through British Columbia and the Panama canal by tanker.
And indeed, only Suncor's refinery in Montréal can refine Western Crude oil.
https://www.nationalobserver.com/2018/11/13/news/guess-where-quebec-gets-its-oil

The pipeline projects would have offered zero benefit to Quebec and all the environmental risks with all the tankers in the St-Lawrence.



> There are no refineries in Newfoundland.  Newfoundland does have offshore oil. 
That is what I said.  I never said they had refineries.


>We can now see exactly why the Energy East pipeline (which would have taken oil to that NB refinery) would have benefitted Quebec - because it would benefit Canada in just such a trade dispute.

Natives along the way were opposed to the project crossing their lands.  Do you think it would have been wise to send the army to forcibly move them out of the way for the pipeline projects to proceed?

Do you believe that environmental regulations should be set aside for the needs of one province?

Do you believe that it is the role of the Federal government to subsidize provincial energy projects deemed non viable by the private sector?

[Barrister]

>We can now see exactly why the Energy East pipeline (which would have taken oil to that NB refinery) would have benefitted Quebec - because it would benefit Canada in just such a trade dispute.

Natives along the way were opposed to the project crossing their lands.  Do you think it would have been wise to send the army to forcibly move them out of the way for the pipeline projects to proceed?

Do you believe that environmental regulations should be set aside for the needs of one province?

Do you believe that it is the role of the Federal government to subsidize provincial energy projects deemed non viable by the private sector?

There were native protests about Trans-Mountain too.  Nobody needed to send in the Army - just the RCMP.

Environmental regulations for national projects (like pipelines) are set by the Federal government.  Nobody was saying they should be "set aside" - in particular since they were changed mid-way through.

It was the private sector which was proposing Energy East.  It was only deemed non-viable after Quebec put up as many roadblocks and obstructions as it could.


I have a feeling if Energy East was re-proposed today it would get a different reception.