The Role of Government in Promoting Business Innovation in the USA and Canada

Furthermore, the action exacerbates regional rivalries, complicating federal-provincial cooperation. (Heating oil is widely utilized only in Atlantic Canada, where Liberal fortunes have plummeted.) The system already had some questionable regional inequities. Québec, in particular, received favorable treatment. However, the clearly political nature of this decision makes it even worse.Maybe I shouldn't be shocked. The signs have been there for a time. Many government officials have long opposed carbon levies. Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, in my opinion, has done more damage to Canada's carbon price system than anybody else by aggressively promoting measures such as restricting oil and gas emissions, which utterly undermine the overall system.While I support carbon prices, my support is mostly based on their efficiency. If you care about the economy and the environment, broad-based carbon taxes are difficult to avoid. However, while the economics are evident, the politics may be too complex. The carbon tax may soon be obsolete. And we'll be thankful for the heating oil exemption.

Government policymaking is messy. It frequently entails a slew of concessions 

that result in moderately successful policy, or worse. It is rare for governments to identify a high-profile problem and adopt the textbook economic remedy without making concessions. That's why Canada's carbon tax is so shocking. If you had ten randomly chosen economists in a room and told them to cut carbon emissions, they would have come up with something quite similar to Canada's carbon price. We had a textbook solution. Unfortunately, the textbook simply flew out the window. The Trudeau government's decision to remove home heating oil from the carbon price is likely the most significant departure from the tax. The carbon tax will remain in place, but the policy's credibility is called into question. After all, if they're willing to create exceptions to carbon pricing now, it's simple to imagine them opting to scale back future increases steep enough to reduce carbon emissions. Of course, it may not survive a change in government. Andrew Leach, one of Canada's leading proponents of carbon pricing, stated, "We're probably into the regulation and industrial policy era now."  Now, I'm not sure what the next age will look like. I believe that, like Alberta, the federal government will decide to maintain carbon levies on large polluters even after a change of government. However, it does not appear that the Liberals are willing to rely solely on carbon fees to reduce home greenhouse gas emissions.  My advice to legislators searching for a way forward: focus on better urban planning. When it comes to greenhouse gas emissions, some of the most important factors are where people live and how they travel. If we want people to pollute less in their daily lives, we should develop more traditional, walkable neighborhoods like the ones this country was founded on. Because of one-size-fits-all urban planning, very few of those neighbourhoods remain today.

I'd like you to consider some of the older neighborhoods in your city. 

Places where young people wish to relocate but cannot afford to. Each city has a few. Kitsilano, West Queen West, Kensington, Osborne Village, Centretown, Schmidtville, and many more. What have they got in common? Each of them offers a variety of housing options, including townhouses, duplexes, and walk-up flats. Most day-to-day amenities are within walking distance, and there are numerous stores, restaurants, and entertainment options nearby.There are also a variety of transit options, from bike lanes to car lanes. Urbanists love to wax poetic about these neighborhoods, yet there is nothing fundamentally unique about them. They're basically the typical, full-service towns that we've established from the beginning of human habitation. That is, until current zoning regulations made such development unlawful in most areas.Illegal may sound like a tough term. However, most Canadian municipalities were only zoned for detached residences. That meant that once it was full of separate dwellings, there was no way to add more. Thus, they lost rather than gained population. Only the wealthiest Canadians can afford to live in these once working-class areas.

Because we have been unable to create more housing units in most 

high-amenity metropolitan neighbourhoods, individuals have been forced to relocate to communities that are more difficult to reach by transit. As a result, many of the lowest-income households rely exclusively on automobiles. Faced with falling affordability and longer commutes, they could benefit from greater housing and transit options. Looking ahead, any government serious about decarbonization will have to allow more conventional, walkable neighborhoods to be created. That doesn't simply apply to Downtown Toronto or Vancouver. We also need to make it easier for people in smaller cities to get around without a car, or at least travel to work without sitting in traffic. The federal government has begun to do its part by utilizing the Housing Accelerator Fund (HAF) to persuade municipalities to authorize new housing options. However, this only serves as a starting point. We need big cities to do more than just the minimum. As of now, the fundamental HAF criteria appears to be four units on a single lot (i.e., no rezoning is necessary). That's an excellent start for a city like London or Kelowna. It is insufficient for large cities in the Greater Toronto Area. Edmonton just approved to permit eight units as of right. That is a serious strategy if we want to make lower-carbon living accessible to more people. We also need to develop more densely populated areas outside of large cities. After all, a few downtown cores cannot accommodate the entire country's growth.