Category: It’s Probably Nothing

Cutting Meat

It's Probably Nothing 31 Comments

The main problem here is that its expensive to do anything in Canada. Labour costs are just one piece of the puzzle.

A shortage of workers in Canada’s meat-packing industry is not new. Companies in Alberta, Manitoba, Quebec and elsewhere have struggled to recruit and retain employees for decades.

In the last 18 months, some have blamed the Canadian Emergency Relief Benefit for making the situation worse as some workers choose to stay at home, but the meat sector is much more concerned about the Temporary Foreign Worker Program and how it is restricting meat processing in Canada.

Now, a plant with 1,000 employees is limited to 100 foreign workers. If the plant is already at 100 TFW, the company must hire Canadians to fill vacant positions. That’s not easy, as few Canadians want to live in rural areas or work at a slaughter plant.

“Our meat processors are having a hard time finding Canadians who are interested in these jobs,” said Marie-France Mackinnon, vice-president of public affairs and communications with the Canadian Meat Council.

The jobs suck, repetitive stress injuries are common, but they do pay well and the hours aren’t crazy.  You just might not feel like doing much else once you get home.

Protecting the Vulnerable

It's Probably Nothing Wuhan Flu 53 Comments

To quote Pete Townsend I hope I die before I get old.

COVID-19 was repeatedly cited as a cause of death at the Herron nursing home to obscure the fact that dozens of elderly residents died from thirst, malnourishment and neglect, a Quebec coroner’s inquest heard Tuesday.

In an emotional testimony, an auxiliary nurse recalled how the facility in Montreal’s West Island was already poorly run before the crisis, how most of its staff abandoned their posts when the coronavirus struck, and how the local health authority then took over in a high-handed and inefficient manner.

Inflation versus deflation

It's Probably Nothing Science 74 Comments

Austrian economist Daniel Lacalle interviews Monetary Metals CEO Keith Weiner about a number of topics that we’ve heard a lot about lately, such as inflation, monetary policy, Covid policy, lockdowns and their devastating effect on the economy. According to Keith, the main problem going forward is not going to be rising prices, but rather the progressive collapse in interest rates.

That Would Never Happen…

Chinada Claws of the Panda It's Probably Nothing 12 Comments

…here.

China’s Corporate Social Credit System: How businesses can prepare

The system touches on virtually all aspects of a company’s business operations in China. It assesses the performance and demeanor of companies, by analyzing topic-specific ratings (e.g. tax, customs and environmental protection) and compliance records (e.g. on anti-monopoly cases, data transfers, pricing and licenses). The automated system collects data, processes and rates it against the defined requirements. Based on their rating, Chinese authorities will reward businesses with “good” and sanction those with “bad” behaviour.

China has already introduced the system. It is expected to be fully implemented by the end of 2020.

Everybody Wants The Kids These Days

It's Probably Nothing 28 Comments

Push to Let Teens Drive Trucks Interstate Divides the Industry

Proposed legislation to test letting people as young as 18 years old drive big rigs interstate is exposing a divide in the trucking sector, where companies are having trouble finding workers for the grueling job of hauling goods over long distances.
A provision in the infrastructure bill the Senate approved in August would set up a pilot program allowing 18- to 20-year-olds to drive tractor-trailers across state lines. Most states allow people under 21 to get commercial driver’s licenses, but federal rules restrict those drivers to working within state borders.

Bubble, Bubble

It's Probably Nothing 6 Comments

Toil and trouble…

Another corporation involved in China’s real estate bubble is about to pop.

Embattled Chinese property giant Evergrande on Wednesday suffered a second credit rating downgrade in two days, raising fears the world’s most indebted company will default and sending its shares tumbling below their listing price 12 years ago.

The Hong Kong-listed firm has run up a mountain of liabilities totalling more than $300 billion after years of borrowing to fund rapid growth and a string of real estate acquisitions as well as other assets including a Chinese football team.

Industry collapse

Great Moments In Socialism It's Probably Nothing Let Them Eat Taser 57 Comments

While it is undeniably true that Covid subsidies have incentivized the withdrawal of employees from the workplace, who is going to seek a long term career in an industry such as hospitality that could be shut down repeatedly at the drop of a hat? Offering higher wages will do little to encourage people to stay in a career with prospects that are this dim. Furthermore, what investor is going to stake capital in this same industry that is rapidly filling up with stranded assets?

In June, 60 per cent of B.C. hospitality workers who were no longer working in the industry had voluntarily left their positions.

“Canadian businesses unable to find enough workers may be forced to operate at a reduced capacity, missing out on the opportunity to fully recover from long months of lockdowns or curtailed operations,” the economist stated.

Drowning in Debt

Great Moments In Socialism It's Probably Nothing 29 Comments

Small businesses have reopened their doors after a series of lockdowns, but they are still struggling under heavy debt loads.

CFIB says the average business owes close to $177,000 thanks to pandemic restrictions and closures. For businesses in the hospitality industry, that amount clocks in at $333,174 — almost double the average.

“The actual repayment of this debt will be the next big obstacle that small businesses will face, especially as many are still seeing a slow pick-up in revenues, capacity restrictions and uncertainty heading into the fall and winter months,”

No worries, the new segregation economy should fix that right up.

Bubble, Bubble

It's Probably Nothing 16 Comments

toil and trouble…

New mortgages surge to record high, raising red flag about HELOC growth

House-hungry Canadians drove new mortgage volumes up to a quarterly high, soaring 60.2 per cent to more than 410,000 in the second quarter from the year before, according to new data from credit company Equifax Canada.

The size of the average new mortgage loan also jumped by 22.2 per cent from last year to more than $355,000.

While new mortgage growth has been strong in major markets across the country, British Columbia saw the biggest increase, rising 85.7 per cent from last year.

The mortgage surge helped push overall consumer debt to $2.15 trillion, up three per cent from the previous quarter and up 7.5 per cent from the year before.

The Boy Crisis

If Women Ran The World It's Probably Nothing 17 Comments

Excellent podcast here.

Jordan Peterson talks to Dr. Warren Farrell about the problems facing boys these days mainly due to a lack of fathers, but a host of other factors as well. They dive into a number of topics, gender differences, raising kids, relationship problems, divorce, single parenting, schools.

Dr. Farrell has all sorts of data to back up what a lot of people already know. He has spoken to, and gotten the bum’s rush from, both the Trump and Biden administrations after outlining the various problems and presenting some common sense solutions. Details are in the podcast.

Audio version here  Video version here with a detailed breakdown of the when various topics were discussed.

For some reason they decided to title this podcast “The Four Do’s and Don’ts of Divorce” even though they spend very little time talking about that. Someone must of thought it was a good click-bait title. Regardless it gets more and more interesting as the conversation progresses. The opening clip in the video is a good hook.

The band played while the ship sank.

Great Moments In Socialism It's Probably Nothing 14 Comments

On a topic that is seldom discussed thus far in the election, it appears that zero percent interest rates are still working their “magic”.

The spike in mortgages is evidence of Canadians’ demand for more living space during the Covid-19 pandemic, which sent sales and prices to record highs. Driven by lower interest rates, the total amount of real estate-related debt outstanding in the country has risen 9.2% in the past year, the largest increase since 2008.

It’s Probably Nothing

It's Probably Nothing The Deplorables 11 Comments

Taking stock;

“When the pandemic struck, we started seeing all this panic buying,” Maddox said. “What’s really increased is the number of people that contact me. These are really personal emails. They’re not crazy extremists. These are single moms, elderly people, disabled people, regular working people. They’re realizing that things are changing. They can just feel things are changing rapidly,” he said.

“The riots [of 2020] were bad. The election was bad. Now what’s happening is the whole world is starting to change.”

Related In 2020, firearm retailer data showed 40 percent of gun buyers were first-time buyers, more than 8.4 million

Scarce capital

Great Moments In Socialism Great Reset It's Probably Nothing 8 Comments

What prolongs the life of a terminally ill fiat currency? The struggles of the debtors. And that struggle is getting a lot harder, especially if you live in a large metropolitan area.

The housing affordability chasm in Metro Vancouver is measured in a new report by the National Bank of Canada, which found that an annual household income of $253,000 is now needed to afford an average house in the region worth $1.47 million.

It would also take 411 months (34.3 years) of savings to cover the down payment for this home type, with a saving rate of 10%.

Subtly moving the goalposts

It's Probably Nothing Wuhan Flu 37 Comments

For months we’ve been told that getting vaccinated is the key to protecting yourself from Covid. This fully vaccinated South Dakota nursing home has been having a rough experience as of late, however. Is this a case of the mainstream media hitting the panic button (as we know they like to do), or an indication of a changing trend in infections and/or vaccine effectiveness?

Vaccinated seniors regularly deal with unvaccinated staff, visitors and community residents, face the rise of the more dangerous delta variant, and are less protected by vaccines that previously thought.

Maybe the back rent will just pay for itself

Great Moments In Socialism It's Probably Nothing Little Known Facts 26 Comments

One of the reasons why the public outcry over the pandemic restrictions has been so muted is that the full costs of the lockdowns are often obscured by government edicts that prevent markets from making those costs known. This weekend, one of those edicts finally expired.

As many as 1.95 million households across America owed a collective $15 billion in back rent when a nationwide eviction moratorium expired this weekend, according to Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia estimates.

That number will reach 2 million by December, according to the report released Friday. In Pennsylvania, about 60,000 renter households will owe $412 million come August.

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