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The federal Liberals’ Fall Economic Statement will be issued on November 21. We can only hope Finance Minister Bill Morneau is taking the time until then to draft an urgent plan to deal with Canada’s deteriorating competitiveness because it is seriously undermining our standard of living.

The World Economic Forum’s Competitiveness Index ranked Canada 12th overall, after the U.S. (first) and below a number of smaller countries, demonstrating that being small in size need not be an impediment to being competitive. Canada came in a dismal 34th place in the adoption of information and communication technology, a depressing 53rd in regulatory burden and a scary 96th in tariff complexity.

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Since 76 per cent of our trade is with the U.S., representing a fifth of our economy, how Canada fares relative to its neighbour is crucial. Unfortunately, we are at a distinct disadvantage on personal and corporate tax rates, resource development, labour productivity, regulatory burdens, internal trade barriers, access to capital, size of market, incentives to invest and encouragement of entrepreneurship. Some of these disadvantages are unavoidable, but most result from dysfunctional policies.