This report highlights the main challenges and opportunities Ontario faces in the lead-up to the 2015 federal election. It outlines 32 recommendations across six issues areas that would strengthen Ontario’s economic future.

Ontario has many of the essential strengths needed to succeed in the highly competitive global economy. The province is home to several thriving ecosystems for innovation and startups, boasts the highest post-secondary attainment rate in the world, and is the most attractive region in North America for foreign investment. The Canada-U.S. dollar exchange rate realignment is also expected to better support the manufacturing sector’s competitiveness. Ontario is again poised to lead the country in economic growth.

While Ontario long served as Canada’s economic engine, the province has found itself buffeted by emerging global headwinds and changing economic tides over the past 15 years. The rise of emerging markets, an aging population, climate change, urbanization, international macro-economic shocks, and an unstable currency have impacted Ontario’s regions and industries to various degrees. Overall, these forces have contributed to flattened productivity, sluggish growth, higher than average unemployment and increased public debt in the province. Nearly 40 per cent of Canada’s population resides in Ontario, and the province’s share of national GDP is almost twice that of Quebec’s or Alberta’s. What happens in Ontario profoundly affects the rest of the country. As Canadians prepare for a federal election this year, the economic fortunes of Ontario should be top of mind for each of the federal political parties. Continue Reading Many of the tools needed to meet Ontario’s challenges lie in the hands of its provincial and municipal governments, the private and not-for-profit sectors and other actors. However, there are a number of key policy levers only available to the federal government. The structure of fiscal federalism, for example, continues to shift resources away from Ontario at a time when the province’s fiscal capacity and per capita GDP are below the national average. According to the latest available figures, Ontarians transfer approximately $11 billion a year to the rest of Canada, equivalent to nearly 2 per cent of the province’s GDP. That federal fiscal transfers leave Ontario in worse shape rather than better off is something that the federal government alone can change. View PDF