Japan - Is the Government Keeping a Secret

Japan has been struck by disaster many times before, but none like this. This disaster has destroyed the nation and has ruined lives. It has shocked the nation into what seems to be likely called Haiti's Big Brother since it has the same effect, but worse it comes with a tsunami. There's an old Japanese saying that lies come in 3's and 8's. The Japanese said a 30km radius from the reactors, but now say you should be 80km away from the reactor. Three's and eight's isn't it. Don't you think.

The nuclear situation is something the government shouldn't be counted on. When the guy in trouble says no and many other smarter people say yes, they are probably not trying to show fear and that they are stupid. They also might feel embarrassed if the ask for help. Japan is a well developed country, it's not Haiti.

Japan has felt the disaster of it's reputation.

Who Should Pay After the Crash?

Car crashes come and car crashes go. Who shall pay nobody knows, but one things for sure the impact will be felt after the crash. That's right, all those dollars you spent on your car has gone down. Say it was worth $15,000, now it's $10,000. That's called diminished value or accelerated depreciation as we call it in Canada. Whatever it is, it's not usually covered in your insurance policy.

Would you buy a car that was in an accident? Probably not. That's the same thing the buyer would think if you were trying to sell your car if it had an accident. Would you like it? Probably not again. Yet this is the reality of this world. We want things with no problems and that makes things hard for you: the owner. No insurance company wants this to become the law because they don't want to pay for something that they can't quantify. You see if you drive it until the wheels go under, there is no diminished value. Thats the reason they won't pay. Usually people have to lawsuit just to get the money and brokers always try to keep it on the down low.

Georgia, USA is probably the only place where it's probably the law that diminished value must be compensated for the owner of the person in an accident regardless of who's at fault. They claim that since it's your property, you have the right to sell it and you'll never know if your never going to ever sell it. Since it's your property the insurance company is supposed to put you back in the place you were prior to the accident, isn't that the reason we pay for insurance. To get our money back?

Many brokers will fight over this issue. Some may even lawsuit against a law such as this to be passed. Yet know this fact, all the claims they make are false. The sky shall not fall, insurance rates will stay the same and you'll have a happier state/province.

The Fight For Bandwith

Now we all know how the government likes to intervene at things that could make the consumers unhappy. Take Wind Mobile which the Conservative government overturned the CRTC judgment that said Wind Mobile couldn't operate because it's owner, Globalive, was mostly controlled by Egypt's Orascom. The CRTC got overruled and Wind Mobile came. Now it's about internet.

The CRTC has delayed their ruling on giving internet providers the power to charge money to small providers by per GB. This would eventually get rid of the "unlimited" plan in Canada. If this were to happen then data caps would be strengthened even more. This was given pressure as the government knows who's affected: small businesses and any threat to let the unemployment rate go to down is bad for the look.

If the government succeeds to do so, not only small providers, but us consumers will also reap the benefits as we will have to offered unlimited plans as well. That means more Netflix for you.

The Alberta Oil Sands

The Alberta Oil Sands is where Canada gets it's oil from. This is probably the worst ways to get oil from the Earth. Extracting the oil from the oil sands takes a ton of carbon already in addition to the carbon you'll waste burning it, but that's not the problem. The problem is it's effect on nature in the area.

Last fall a study showed fish in Fort McMurray were poisoned. The fish apparently was deformed and toxic compared to normal ones. The government boasts about its world class monitoring system that's supposed to prevent these things from happening. This lead to another study by an independent panel, formed by the Alberta government, about the people that are supposed to monitor the oil sands. A group was monitored by scientists about how they were monitoring the sands. The scientists concluded that there was no leadership, no coordination, and bluntly no success.

Currently the government is given pressure to clean up from it's partners like the US. The panel recommended the study above to see the impact of the oil sands on the environment, but not just the carbon impact.

Canada's Economy: It's not great.

Canada, a country that welcomes immigrants and refugees from around the world and a country with freedom and a great atmosphere. Yet when I take Canada into economics, it doesn't do well on my list. Canada may be the best economy in the G7, but don't see that for too long.

Previously the Bank of Canada minister issued a warning. He said we have more debt than our equity. This should have brought a warning to all to be more careful with their money, but are we? We may have tighter lending laws, but is it useful? The US had bad lending laws and banks lent money to anyone without researching them. Look at Canada, our unemployment rate is 8%, which is high. Also, many Canadians aren't going to be able to pay their mortgage if one goes out of work or if interest rates go up. What does that tell you? Well, it says that people get qualified before, but can't make the payments later. Isn't that like the US only with a delay. Lets take Lehman Brothers as an example. They sold companies at a discount and bought them back at a higher price. At first it was a profit, but it swallowed and destroyed the company didn't it?

Canada also doesn't have much to offer to the world. Look at our logging industry, we have it but nobody is buying. Banking, forget about it how would they survive if Canada increased interest rates from the lowest rate in years. Mining, at least there's some hope there until gold collapses soon. Medical, what do we have there? We have a low number of drug or research companies. The list could go on forever and with Canada having a low money supply and a high deficit. I think it's safe to say its only a matter of time.

Lets look at housing for a moment. People borrowing money that they know they can't pay back if interest rates were to rise. A bubble in markets like Vancouver and Toronto. The average home price at $344,000. Interest rates at all time lows, I think we get the picture. The housing market is at a bubble right now. The federal government has created it and is trying to stop it from popping, but it will devastatingly. The bubble will pop like how people said the Dot-com bubble would't pop or how banks were too big to fail in the US and the US housing market. They said it wasn't possible, but it happened. They tried to stop it, but it happened. How about Japan? They had a bubble and they barely borrow money to buy anything. They save money rather than Canadians and Americans. Look at their housing market, it collapsed too. Yet Canadian analysts say it's not possible, but what happens if the TSX would crash 200 points in one day. What if the Bank of Canada rose interest rates? What would happen analysts? What would happen!

They say it's impossible to try and trick you into spending more to sustain the economy. Canada could've crashed earlier and not be in such a big mess than if it were to crash now. Look it interest rates rose, the housing market would be full of foreclosures. People aren't saving a lot anymore and more people are out of work to pay their bills and mortgages and are taking a lot of debt. People try to lie to themselves saying it's a good investment without thinking of the side effects.

If the crash were to happen, it would've happened earlier as Canada wouldn't have hit hard. The harder you fall, the more you lose than to have done it earlier in life or history. It's the same with economics.

Should We Put A Price on the Polar Bear

The polar bear is an amazing bear for all of us to see. It's white and shiny fur makes it unique and endangered. This bear lives in the arctic north which makes it vulnerable to global warming. Yet, should we demote the bear to a price. Well thats what the Canadian government is doing.

The government has sent EcoResources Consultants to go tally up the cost of protecting the bear. This will help the government to determine whether or not the government should protect the polar bear or not. In essence they're trying to see how much a polar bear would cost to the economy. This might be good, in my opinion, it will show the government that the polar bear is important and has a value with only 15,000 left in Canada. If we don't do this, what will happen when everyone forgets about the polar bear? Won't there be a zero dollar price tag for it then?

Currently the bear is not protected in Canada, but not all are keen to this idea. In the meantime EcoResources has until February 2011 to present it's report telling the government whether it should protect it or not.

Wind Mobile - A Carrier Worth Mentioning

Wind Mobile is a new wireless carrier in Canada that promises cheaper plans and no contract phones. They currently have service in Vancouver, Toronto, Edmonton, etc. They plan to be a nationwide carrier and compete against the Big 3 : Telus, Rogers, and Bell. They are a carrier to look into if you want a cheap deal.

Wind currently has voice plans that are similar, but better to carriers like Fido or Solo Mobile. They have plans starting from $15 and all plans come with unlimited Wind-Wind calling and Call Control (Call Conferencing, Call Display, etc) standard on plans. This is a $10 discount off plans offered by other carriers. They also offer unlimited data and unlimited data laptop add-ons which make Wind cheaper than all of the Big 3 as they stress the words of cheap and reliable.

Wind also has no contracts as a standard. This means you buy the phone and you can use the plan as long as you like and you can quit anytime. You won't be penalized like Rogers or the other carriers with contracts. They let you quit anytime. They have found out that people don't like contracts and they have put that into their conduct.

Wind Mobile is the newest carrier by Globalive. This new company is small now, but I hope it'll make a change in practices and lower prices on the Canadian cellular business.