Trump has brought back Kevin Hassett, former chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, to help guide the administration’s response to the coronavirus pandemic and the financial harm it’s unleashing across the U.S.
The White House is also adding Joe LaVorgna, a veteran Wall Street economist, to help the National Economic Council (NEC) navigate the complex toll the outbreak is taking on financial markets. Trump is also moving to fill another key role by announcing his intention to nominate Mary Toman to be undersecretary for economic affairs at the Commerce Department.
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“We just decided we needed some help on the virus and other things,” NEC Director Larry KudlowLawrence (Larry) Alan KudlowMORE, a member of the White House coronavirus task force, told The Hill in an interview Wednesday. “We’re just trying to enlist all the best people we can.”
Hassett, a conservative and veteran adviser to Republican administrations, served as the top White House economist from September 2017 to June 2019. He regularly touted Trump’s efforts to cut taxes and streamline regulations to boost economic growth in frequent media interviews, departing the White House as the president’s trade battles with China and Europe reached a fever pitch.
Kudlow said he had asked Hassett — “a good friend and close to the administration” — to brief the NEC after leaving the White House, and asked him to come on as an informal adviser as the coronavirus pandemic escalated.
“A bunch of us thought it would be a good idea to bring Kevin in,” Kudlow said, adding that Hassett will help compile data to project when normal economic activity can safely resume in certain parts of the country.
While Hassett was brought on to help with the coronavirus response, LaVorgna’s path to the White House was underway before the pandemic derailed the financial sector, Kudlow said.
LaVorgna joined the White House after serving as chief economist for the Americas at Natixis, a French investment bank. Before that he spent 20 years at Deutsche Bank and was a contributor at CNBC, where Kudlow was a host for more than a decade.
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Kudlow said LaVorgna was brought on to bolster the NEC’s view into financial markets, which have been roiled with volatility as the pandemic spreads.
“He’s just one of the best Wall Street economists, business and financial economists and we just needed some strength there,” Kudlow said.
The White House declined to make Hassett and LaVorgna available for interviews.
Their additions come amid a significant shift in tone and approach among Trump and his top economic advisers after weeks of downplaying the potential health and financial threats posed by the coronavirus.
As of Thursday, there were more than 79,000 confirmed U.S. cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the novel coronavirus, resulting in more than 1,110 deaths, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. now has more cases than any other country.
Last week, a record 3.3 million Americans applied for unemployment benefits, and substantially more are believed to have lost their jobs as businesses across the country close amid government efforts to slow the spread of COVID-19. The sudden halt to nearly all nonessential economic activity has threatened to bankrupt thousands of businesses and spur a wave of missed mortgage, rent, credit card and loan payments that could upend the financial sector.
More than a decade of consecutive monthly U.S. job gains and economic growth has all but formally ended, mere weeks after Trump and his top advisers exuded confidence that the resilient economy could weather the virus.
“The virus is not going to sink the American economy. What is or could sink the American economy is the socialism coming from our friends on the other side of the aisle,” Kudlow said on Feb. 28, several days after top public health officials warned that spread of the coronavirus within the U.S. was inevitable.
“The stock market is worried, it’s fearful. But if you’re the long-term investor,” Kudlow continued, “you might think about buying the dip.”
All three major stock indexes have crashed more than 10 percent since Kudlow’s suggestion, while the number of coronavirus cases has skyrocketed from several dozen in late February to tens of thousands.
Kudlow said Wednesday that the White House recognized the potential danger posed by the pandemic by the first week of March. He rejected the notion that he and Trump were too optimistic, insisting that no one could have predicted how quickly the virus would spread.
“It became clear that the coronavirus was going to be a much greater problem, Frankly, the way it’s taken off and exploded was virtually unimaginable. No one anticipated this,” Kudlow said Wednesday.
“As this situation develops, everybody realized we had to change strategies from containment to mitigation, for example. The economic consequences were going to be much greater.”
OTTAWA – Canada’s unemployment rate held steady at 6.5 per cent last month as hiring remained weak across the economy.
Statistics Canada’s labour force survey on Friday said employment rose by a modest 15,000 jobs in October.
Business, building and support services saw the largest gain in employment.
Meanwhile, finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing experienced the largest decline.
Many economists see weakness in the job market continuing in the short term, before the Bank of Canada’s interest rate cuts spark a rebound in economic growth next year.
Despite ongoing softness in the labour market, however, strong wage growth has raged on in Canada. Average hourly wages in October grew 4.9 per cent from a year ago, reaching $35.76.
Friday’s report also shed some light on the financial health of households.
According to the agency, 28.8 per cent of Canadians aged 15 or older were living in a household that had difficulty meeting financial needs – like food and housing – in the previous four weeks.
That was down from 33.1 per cent in October 2023 and 35.5 per cent in October 2022, but still above the 20.4 per cent figure recorded in October 2020.
People living in a rented home were more likely to report difficulty meeting financial needs, with nearly four in 10 reporting that was the case.
That compares with just under a quarter of those living in an owned home by a household member.
Immigrants were also more likely to report facing financial strain last month, with about four out of 10 immigrants who landed in the last year doing so.
That compares with about three in 10 more established immigrants and one in four of people born in Canada.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 8, 2024.
The Canadian Institute for Health Information says health-care spending in Canada is projected to reach a new high in 2024.
The annual report released Thursday says total health spending is expected to hit $372 billion, or $9,054 per Canadian.
CIHI’s national analysis predicts expenditures will rise by 5.7 per cent in 2024, compared to 4.5 per cent in 2023 and 1.7 per cent in 2022.
This year’s health spending is estimated to represent 12.4 per cent of Canada’s gross domestic product. Excluding two years of the pandemic, it would be the highest ratio in the country’s history.
While it’s not unusual for health expenditures to outpace economic growth, the report says this could be the case for the next several years due to Canada’s growing population and its aging demographic.
Canada’s per capita spending on health care in 2022 was among the highest in the world, but still less than countries such as the United States and Sweden.
The report notes that the Canadian dental and pharmacare plans could push health-care spending even further as more people who previously couldn’t afford these services start using them.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 7, 2024.
Canadian Press health coverage receives support through a partnership with the Canadian Medical Association. CP is solely responsible for this content.
As Canadians wake up to news that Donald Trump will return to the White House, the president-elect’s protectionist stance is casting a spotlight on what effect his second term will have on Canada-U.S. economic ties.
Some Canadian business leaders have expressed worry over Trump’s promise to introduce a universal 10 per cent tariff on all American imports.
A Canadian Chamber of Commerce report released last month suggested those tariffs would shrink the Canadian economy, resulting in around $30 billion per year in economic costs.
More than 77 per cent of Canadian exports go to the U.S.
Canada’s manufacturing sector faces the biggest risk should Trump push forward on imposing broad tariffs, said Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters president and CEO Dennis Darby. He said the sector is the “most trade-exposed” within Canada.
“It’s in the U.S.’s best interest, it’s in our best interest, but most importantly for consumers across North America, that we’re able to trade goods, materials, ingredients, as we have under the trade agreements,” Darby said in an interview.
“It’s a more complex or complicated outcome than it would have been with the Democrats, but we’ve had to deal with this before and we’re going to do our best to deal with it again.”
American economists have also warned Trump’s plan could cause inflation and possibly a recession, which could have ripple effects in Canada.
It’s consumers who will ultimately feel the burden of any inflationary effect caused by broad tariffs, said Darby.
“A tariff tends to raise costs, and it ultimately raises prices, so that’s something that we have to be prepared for,” he said.
“It could tilt production mandates. A tariff makes goods more expensive, but on the same token, it also will make inputs for the U.S. more expensive.”
A report last month by TD economist Marc Ercolao said research shows a full-scale implementation of Trump’s tariff plan could lead to a near-five per cent reduction in Canadian export volumes to the U.S. by early-2027, relative to current baseline forecasts.
Retaliation by Canada would also increase costs for domestic producers, and push import volumes lower in the process.
“Slowing import activity mitigates some of the negative net trade impact on total GDP enough to avoid a technical recession, but still produces a period of extended stagnation through 2025 and 2026,” Ercolao said.
Since the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement came into effect in 2020, trade between Canada and the U.S. has surged by 46 per cent, according to the Toronto Region Board of Trade.
With that deal is up for review in 2026, Canadian Chamber of Commerce president and CEO Candace Laing said the Canadian government “must collaborate effectively with the Trump administration to preserve and strengthen our bilateral economic partnership.”
“With an impressive $3.6 billion in daily trade, Canada and the United States are each other’s closest international partners. The secure and efficient flow of goods and people across our border … remains essential for the economies of both countries,” she said in a statement.
“By resisting tariffs and trade barriers that will only raise prices and hurt consumers in both countries, Canada and the United States can strengthen resilient cross-border supply chains that enhance our shared economic security.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 6, 2024.
