A crisis of capital : Canadian workers need more tools, buildings and equipment

Much more important in the long run is the rate at which business investment adds to Canada’s capital stock – the machinery and equipment workers use in their jobs, the intellectual property that a modern creative economy depends on, the structures where production takes place and the engineering infrastructure that plays a central role in a modern economy. [...] The amount of new investment Canadian businesses put in place is a key indicator of future prosperity: the more investment per worker, the better the chances for higher living standards in the years to come.1 Critically, trends in investment per worker in Canada compared to abroad shed light on how the business investment environment is developing here vis-à-vis other countries, and how prepared C [...] After rising to a comparative high of 90 cents in 2013, Canadian investment per worker is set to fall to 81 cents for every dollar of investment elsewhere in the OECD in 2015. [...] After a year of flat investment growth in Alberta and Saskatchewan in 2014, the recent plunge in commodity prices, particularly for oil, is expected to cut per-worker investment by more than 10 percent in these provinces in 2015. [...] More happily, total capital investment in Newfoundland and Labrador is expected to be higher in 2015 than it was in 2014, showing more resilience to lower oil prices than in the western provinces.