Worthwhile Canadian Initiative

Fareed Zakaria does an excellent job in his Newsweek article of outlining why Canada's banking and immigration system is going to ensure its economic and demographic growth during this period of fear and turmoil.

Guess which country, alone in the industrialized world, has not faced a single bank failure, calls for bailouts or government intervention in the financial or mortgage sectors. Yup, it's Canada. In 2008, the World Economic Forum ranked Canada's banking system the healthiest in the world. America's ranked 40th, Britain's 44th.

In his article Fareed discusses why Canada's banking system is as sound as it is now. Canadian banks are leveraged at around 18 to 1, whereas US banks are at 26 to 1 and European banks at 61 to 1.

Over the past 15 years, as the United States and Europe loosened regulations on their financial industries, the Canadians refused to follow suit, seeing the old rules as useful shock absorbers.

While some may have heard of Canada's package for US automobile manufacturers, most don't know that Ontario and not Michigan has been North America's largest ca-producing region. Why?

American car companies have moved so many jobs to Canada to take advantage of lower health-care costs that since 2004. [Canada's] health-care system is cheaper than America's by far (accounting for 9.7 percent of GDP, versus 15.2 percent [in the USA]), and yet does better on all major indexes. Life expectancy in Canada is 81 years, versus 78 in the United States; "healthy life expectancy" is 72 years, versus 69.

Mr. Zakaria makes many insightful comments on the state of Canadian affairs in his article and I highly encourage you to read the entire article here.