Clemens Rettich’s Post

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People & process leader and educator

They aren't wrong. In my explorations of 'the idea of productivity' I came across the same underlying concerns (links in the comments). 🤔 There appears to be a resource-extraction mentality that still pervades much of Canada (interestingly, even Ontario). We seem uncomfortably comfortable with 'business activity IS extraction' rather than 'business activity is value-creation' as a higher operating principle. 🤔 We seem content with - as one successful entrepreneur I know put it - "The Canadian dream … start something, sell it, live in the Bahamas… to heck with your neighbours." Not that it needs to be said, but there are hundreds if not thousands of exceptions to this parochial, risk-averse, extractive behaviour. But rolled up in aggregate, it is hard to argue with as a force shaping unproductive Canadian business behaviour. Throw in another area we are too comfortable with - industrial anti-competitive concentration - and I'm thinking we have a good basis for a conversation about the root causes of Canada's decades-long struggle with productivity. There are also some serious issues with Tobias Lütke's interpretation of reality in this piece. For one, the continual banging of the capital gains drum, accompanied by the usual intellectually lazy mumbling of incantations about 'taxing innovation' is off-putting. We have a serious crisis of growing wealth concentration in Canada that must be addressed, and zero reliable evidence that the current planned changes in taxing capital gains will hurt investment. If Lütke has a bullet-proof plan that's better than a progressive tax on wealth, let's hear it. As BetaKit editor-in-chief Douglas Soltys, serial entrepreneur Ali Asaria put it, this is a bad look for any ultra-high-net-worth individual like Lütke. In the middle of exploding food costs, stagnant wages, and a housing crisis, we need solutions, not misleading and cynical statements of self-interest. “Let’s be Canada.” Lütke said. Sounds lovely. But what is that? And what's the plan? https://lnkd.in/dpW6UXzP

Shopify CEO says Canada must overcome “go-for-bronze” culture at BetaKit Town Hall

Shopify CEO says Canada must overcome “go-for-bronze” culture at BetaKit Town Hall

https://betakit.com

Patti Blackstaffe

Executive Leadership Accelerator and Advisory for Digital Transformation and Technology Leaders. | Author, Keynote Speaker, Consultant | Founder and CEO

7mo

So much to unpack that isn’t mentioned in the article. From our time consulting on both sides of the border, Canadians have a penchant for wanting to see if something works elsewhere before they are willing to try it. Many companies understand that our neighbours to the south have an economy of scale that is highly attractive (our big companies might have up to 20K employees, in the US it’s 300K.) Thus, they head south as soon as they can enter that market for higher consumer volume and fewer challenges with cross-border financials. As each year goes by we are slowly loosing the volume of spending consumers, ages 25-40 due to that generation being smaller than the retired generation - Risks of a venture without more spenders and working-age employees will prove daunting in the coming years. The Small Business Association in the US happen to provide group insurance and other significant benefits to startups and small businesses. Our small business incentives are far fewer and less attractive. Snow vs. California LOL It is a big onion, loads of layers. I must ask the question, is it risk-averse or is there a greener lawn over the fence? I’m out of room now so stopping. 😉

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