Harper Says Canada May Outline 5 year Economic Steps

This is from Bloomberg.



My goodness I thought it was just the old bad Soviet Union that had 5 year economic plans. Now those ultra-conservative bloggers will be convinced that Harper is now a socialist!

It remains to be seen whether Canadians will be willing to leave Harper to rule for another five years. I hope not!


Harper Says Canada May Outline 5-Year Economic Steps (Update1)
By Theophilos Argitis
Jan. 9 (Bloomberg) -- Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said his government will take “big, comprehensive” actions over as many as five years to mitigate the impact of the country’s first recession since 1992.
“We should not underestimate the actions we need to take,” Harper said in a news conference today in Montreal. “We’ll assume that we’re probably going to have to look at a period of three-to-five years of such actions.”
The world’s eighth-biggest economy is slowing amid tight credit conditions for businesses, slumping shipments of cars and lumber to the U.S., and lower prices for exported commodities such as oil. Gross domestic product will shrink 0.4 percent this year and generate the country’s first budget deficit in more than a decade, the government predicts.
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty will release his annual budget on Jan. 27.
Worsening U.S. job figures “indicate” a period of difficulty for the global economy, Harper said. The U.S. lost more jobs in 2008 than in any year since 1945 as employers fired another 524,000 people in December, the Labor Department reported today in Washington.
“Certainly the numbers in the U.S. are very bad and continue to get worse,” said Harper, 49.
Flaherty, 59, said earlier today that his fiscal plan will include a “substantial” deficit to help revive the economy. The spending plan will generate a shortfall of between C$20 billion ($16.9 billion) and C$30 billion in the coming fiscal year, Harper said in an interview last month with CTV.
To contact the reporters on this story: Theophilos Argitis in Toronto at targitis@bloomberg.net. Last Updated: January 9, 2009 14:58 EST