Letters to the editor: 'We are sitting on vast sums of untaxed wealth.' Real estate value amid the housing crisis, plus ... - The Globe and Mail | Canada News Media
I believe nobody is on the high road in this war, and everyone is suffering.
Brenda TaylorSurrey, B.C.
One of the best analyses of the conflict I have seen anywhere. I find it balanced, historically informed and sensitive to the narratives so deeply embedded in the consciousness of both sides.
It is deeply empathetic to the pain and grief imposed upon both Israelis and Palestinians. It also points to a way forward that should be taken if this tragic situation is ever to be resolved.
Required reading for all, observers and participants alike.
Conrad BrunkWaterloo, Ont.
To be determined
Re “Taiwan’s sorrow: China, the march of history and the inevitable clash” (Opinion, Jan. 6): The point that Taiwan is subject to historical and structural forces greater than itself is well taken. But I believe the historically driven fatalism at the heart of that point substitutes reality with a clear answer.
Taiwan lives in a constant state of ambiguity: on questions of identity, international engagement, its demographic future and cross-strait relations. The search for answers to a puzzle that we have not yet solved, but also not yet failed to solve, should engage with this ambiguity.
The international community, Taiwan and China will all have a say in how this develops. Nothing is foretold.
D’Arcy WhiteNew Taipei City, Taiwan
Next generation
Re “Is a bedroom for the cat a sign of Canada’s new housing aristocracy?” (Report on Business, Jan. 6): As a geriatric millennial, this Gen X-boomer beef brought to mind the classic line from Disney’s 1970 film The Aristocats: “Ladies don’t start fights, but they can finish them.” Younger Globe readers may also recognize this vigilante sentiment from a certain Taylor Swift song.
It’s pretty simple: Numbers don’t lie. Younger Canadians have got the votes. We’ll tell others how it ends.
Nathan Hume Vancouver
Many members of my generation know that we have amassed unexpected wealth simply because we bought houses when we were younger. It’s what young couples did in the 1970s and 1980s: We got married, lived in an apartment, then bought a house.
We also know that we were fortunate to be comfortably settled before the era of hyper housing inflation created an unprecedented number of millionaires amongst us. We are sitting on vast sums of untaxed wealth while the support systems upon which we rely are breaking down, because young and middle-aged workers can’t afford to live and work in our cities.
Many of us did not retire our sense of responsibility when we retired from the labour force. We should support contributor Paul Kershaw’s call to action.
The CPP reduced my ability to invest in Canadian companies too small to interest pensions. Companies such as Zenon Environmental and Trojan Technologies, which did good things for humanity, were sold to U.S. multinationals because they could not raise enough capital here.
I could not opt out of the CPP, so I considered anything received from it as a bonus that could not be counted on. I do not regret that decision. Younger generations would be prudent to take the same course.
The whole rationale for pensions should be revisited. Ambitious young people need all the cash flow at their disposal to fund accommodation, education, investing, businesses or starting a family. If they are successful, they would not need pensions.
Why would Bill Gates or Taylor Swift want one? I believe compulsory pensions punish the young and dull Canada’s prospects as a nation.
John NewellToronto
On reconciliation
Re “How reconciliation is tied up in the Ring of Fire” (Report on Business, Jan. 6): For the members of Marten Falls First Nation who support it, critical minerals exploitation in partnership with private enterprise is seen as a last resort to clamber out of poverty and social problems in a context where the federal government “robbed Indigenous peoples of almost all of their traditional territories,” didn’t deliver many of the basic services promised and did not share revenues from resource exploitation; the provincial government dammed rivers on their territory with no consultation or sharing of economic benefits, destroying traditional hunting and fishing grounds in the process.
The term “reconciliation” means many things to many people, but I’m certain that resorting to resource exploitation with private companies, as a way of trying to climb out of the poverty and underdevelopment that Canadian governments have left them in, is not one of the definitions. Not even the people quoted mention the word “reconciliation.”
Marisa Berry MéndezMontreal
History lesson
Re “How George Brown helped create Canada in spite of himself” (A Nation’s Paper, Jan. 6): Writer John Ibbitson deftly characterizes Globe founder George Brown as “solid, mutton-chopped, determined, stiff-necked, hot-tempered, principled.” He terms Brown’s political opponent John A. Macdonald “the very opposite,” which implies that Macdonald lacked not only facial hair but principles.
A further assessment would grant Macdonald his own principles, including a conviction that English and French, Protestants and Catholics, must work together as equals in governing Canada. But Brown, as is acknowledged, was virulently anti-French and anti-Catholic for many years, until his marriage to Anne Nelson Brown.
Macdonald put principle into practice through his political partnership with George-Étienne Cartier, a major reason why he became prime minister and Brown didn’t.
Roy MacSkimmingPerth, Ont.
Around the time of George Brown’s ascendancy, my great-granddaddy arrived from Britain with his family. For services to the British crown, he received a grant of land near Lake Simcoe in Ontario.
He erected a large house on a clearing in the forest. He also believed “everything was newborn” as they “carved frontier farms out of forests.”
The newcomers couldn’t understand why existing residents of the land were so upset with this obstacle set plumb in the middle of an ancient trade route. Now Indigenous peoples are broadening our perspectives, though progress is sometimes slow.
Geoff HoareVancouver
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Letters to the Editor should be exclusive to The Globe and Mail. Include your name, address and daytime phone number. Keep letters to 150 words or fewer. Letters may be edited for length and clarity. To submit a letter by e-mail, click here:letters@globeandmail.com
TORONTO – One expert predicts Ottawa‘s changes to mortgage rules will help spur demand among potential homebuyers but says policies aimed at driving new supply are needed to address the “core issues” facing the market.
The federal government’s changes, set to come into force mid-December, include a higher price cap for insured mortgages to allow more people to qualify for a mortgage with less than a 20 per cent down payment.
The government will also expand its 30-year mortgage amortization to include first-time homebuyers buying any type of home, as well as anybody buying a newly built home.
CIBC Capital Markets deputy chief economist Benjamin Tal calls it a “significant” move likely to accelerate the recovery of the housing market, a process already underway as interest rates have begun to fall.
However, he says in a note that policymakers should aim to “prevent that from becoming too much of a good thing” through policies geared toward the supply side.
Tal says the main issue is the lack of supply available to respond to Canada’s rapidly increasing population, particularly in major cities.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 17,2024.
OTTAWA – The Canadian Real Estate Association says the number of homes sold in August fell compared with a year ago as the market remained largely stuck in a holding pattern despite borrowing costs beginning to come down.
The association says the number of homes sold in August fell 2.1 per cent compared with the same month last year.
On a seasonally adjusted month-over-month basis, national home sales edged up 1.3 per cent from July.
CREA senior economist Shaun Cathcart says that with forecasts of lower interest rates throughout the rest of this year and into 2025, “it makes sense that prospective buyers might continue to hold off for improved affordability, especially since prices are still well behaved in most of the country.”
The national average sale price for August amounted to $649,100, a 0.1 per cent increase compared with a year earlier.
The number of newly listed properties was up 1.1 per cent month-over-month.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 16, 2024.
MONTREAL – Two Quebec real estate brokers are facing fines and years-long suspensions for submitting bogus offers on homes to drive up prices during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Christine Girouard has been suspended for 14 years and her business partner, Jonathan Dauphinais-Fortin, has been suspended for nine years after Quebec’s authority of real estate brokerage found they used fake bids to get buyers to raise their offers.
Girouard is a well-known broker who previously starred on a Quebec reality show that follows top real estate agents in the province.
She is facing a fine of $50,000, while Dauphinais-Fortin has been fined $10,000.
The two brokers were suspended in May 2023 after La Presse published an article about their practices.
One buyer ended up paying $40,000 more than his initial offer in 2022 after Girouard and Dauphinais-Fortin concocted a second bid on the house he wanted to buy.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 11, 2024.
