The Decline of the Liberal Party- Swerved Into a Confederation Topic

[lenaitch]

Yup, that was the premise I was working on. Still dinged with development charges in many jurisdictions. Truth be told I didn't even consider looking at Barrie over to Tri-City down into the greater Golden Horseshoe. The chance of any private individual getting a single building lot free and clear of a developer or community development plan is slim to none.

500k is likely fair, the mix might just change. Scanning midwestern Ontario (Grey/Bruce/Perth/Wellington) single building lots seem to float in the 150-300k range (generally skewing higher), people in the area tend to use 200/ft for single level (unless you're your own general and getting some work done cash). If you're out of town looking at a 5-15k well, 10-20k septic.

Overall point is that there's not a glaring market innefficiency just waiting to be exploited by anyone with the gumption to do it instead of complaino g about the cost of a home

I doubt you will find a builder's lot in an urban area in Ontario unless it is an in-fill in an older area (or a tear-down) or a toney area of +acre lots. When your talking about a tract of urban lots (typically 40'-60' these days), developers want to develop their land as quickly and cheaply as possible, and councils want cohesive communities, at least in appearance. Site plans and restrictive covenants or go so far. Trades come in, work on multiple similar or plan book houses, then move on. General contractors get to coordinate trades on a large scale and the per-unit cost is a lot less than a bespoke build.

We live in a 'rural estate' subdivision of about 150 houses that has been around since 1995. None of the lots remain unsold but some are still vacant. I suppose some bought them as an investment, for retirement or whatever. When everything is 2 acres and up, if somebody builds next door, it's disruptive, but no where near what it would be if we were 40 or 50' lots.

The thing with moving to the boonies is employment and kids. Not everybody can WFH for an employer, set up a home business or become a social media influencer, and kids either need to be on a bus route, be driven, or home schooled. Rural connectivity is still a major problem, although Starlink may be on the road to solving that (not cheap). Major resource or infrastructure projects take a whole lot more people to develop than they do to operate. I don't know about other provinces, but Ontario will not approve new townsites at mines, etc. since they know they will inherit a ghost town down the road.

I'm all for living in the rurals; I left Toronto and never looked back, but I recognize it's not for everyone.

Again, why Barrie. Why not Barrys Bay? Or North Bay? Or Kapuskasing? Lots of land in those places.

I had two young Corporals, at separate times, that went north to Red Deer. To start their careers. One became a Mining Engineer and the other started as security at the mine and ended up as OPP there.

We're thinking of moving to the North Bay area next year (kid's there). Not cheap, even the outskirts which, like many northern communities, are limited.

Living in Red Deer and working for the OPP - quite the commute!

 

[Fishbone Jones]

That's a lot of words to say, "young people are dumb and lazy".

What built Canada was a need for a large labour force to harvest raw materials, and to then process those raw materials into things. That large labour force needed support services, and entrepreneurs could find ways to provide services to those labourers.

I'm not blaming anyone for anything, I'm simply pointing out that what you suggested is not a realistic solution. Perhaps argue my point, rather than lumping me into some broader generational bunfight.

That is your interpretation, not mine.
I'm not addressing your post further.You offered no solutions.
Only misplaced and ignorant blame. I only used your post to preface my post, with zero to do with you personally.
That's as far as I go with your post.
Try this stuff.

 

[torg003]

Living in Red Deer and working for the OPP - quite the commute!

I live in Red Deer, and I feel sorry for them.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

I live in Red Deer, and I feel sorry for them.

Sorry I meant Red Lake, Ontario. My mistake. I had been reading about Red Deer earlier.

 

[FJAG]

You are right about the 4-year program intended for the trades, but forgot about the 2-year programs. Those programs were to accommodate the kids who intended to stay in school only as long as the law required - or it was a condition of their probation.

I didn't know about any 2 year program but that didn't matter. Two of the kids that started Grade nine with me disappeared after the first week. They came back after one and two months respectively after having spent the interval in some youth correctional facility or other. They, of course, became the class heroes. A lot of the guys in that class never made it far beyond two years as it was.

The wife went to D&M Thompson BTW.

I know it well. I did my first year at RH King and finished off at Birchmount Park.

 

[mariomike]

I'm not sure if the bill is well thought out in it's entirety, but removing the restrictions on adding a 2nd/3rd unit to the same property could have an absolutely huge impact for those that have the space and make use of it.

First I heard of that. It would have an "absolutely huge" impact on our neighbourhood.

We don't have consistent elevation levels. Our streets are not straight or even. They follow paths of green and open space. Very winding with steep hill sides and ravines. There are no sidewalks. Surrounded by the Humber River, Grenadier Pond, Rennie Pond, Catfish Pond and Lake Ontario. Directly beside these bodies of water tends to be a lot of open space, allowing for wildlife to thrive and also keeps the residential area a safe distance away in case of a flood, or other natural disaster.

If it comes from Queen's Park, I do not suppose our local ratepayer's association will have any say in the matter.

 

[IKnowNothing]

First I heard of that. It would have an "absolutely huge" impact on our neighbourhood.

We don't have consistent elevation levels. Our streets are not straight or even. They follow paths of green and open space. Very winding with steep hill sides and ravines. There are no sidewalks. Surrounded by the Humber River, Grenadier Pond, Rennie Pond, Catfish Pond and Lake Ontario. Directly beside these bodies of water tends to be a lot of open space, allowing for wildlife to thrive and also keeps the residential area a safe distance away in case of a flood, or other natural disaster.

If it comes from Queen's Park, I do not suppose our local ratepayer's association will have any say in the matter.

Vague but some info

Not carte blanche- set backs, maximum lot coverage, OBC septic requirements etc. still apply. It doesn't do much for the adults on the outside looking in now. But for those of us that have gotten ours and are more worried about our children it does present an option to plan for, work towards, and take a multi-generational approach without having to share a space or buy separate properties.

 

[mariomike]

Vague but some info

Not carte blanche- set backs, maximum lot coverage, OBC septic requirements etc. still apply. It doesn't do much for the adults on the outside looking in now. But for those of us that have gotten ours and are more worried about our children it does present an option to plan for, work towards, and take a multi-generational approach without having to share a space or buy separate properties.

Thanks for that, IKN.

Ontario announces sweeping housing changes that allow three units on one property

The Ontario government announced sweeping housing changes on Tuesday that will override municipal zoning laws in some situations and allow for the construction of up to three units on each residential lot.

toronto.ctvnews.ca

 

[lenaitch]

Thanks for that, IKN.

Ontario announces sweeping housing changes that allow three units on one property

The Ontario government announced sweeping housing changes on Tuesday that will override municipal zoning laws in some situations and allow for the construction of up to three units on each residential lot.

toronto.ctvnews.ca

The way I understand it, the change to the provincial law was enabling legislation, and much of the site plan rules were left up to the muncipalities. I know in Barrie they had to go back to the drawing board to clean up some of their rules after a couple of 'tertiary' builds really pissed off neighbours and damaged or impaired adjoining property

 

[lenaitch]

I didn't know about any 2 year program but that didn't matter. Two of the kids that started Grade nine with me disappeared after the first week. They came back after one and two months respectively after having spent the interval in some youth correctional facility or other. They, of course, became the class heroes. A lot of the guys in that class never made it far beyond two years as it was.


I know it well. I did my first year at RH King and finished off at Birchmount Park.

The 2-year tech guys were the better pool players and the 2-year business (clerical) girls were the 'fun girls'.

 

[Good2Golf]

For a site where people bitch a lot about Canadians not being financially literate, weird seeing some basic suggestions for cutting extras to pay for the basics being met with derision. If you see the quote in full context, she was saying 'every little bit helps' not this fixes things. Doing the same to all your expenses is part of balancing your cheque book.

Lots of things the government can be doing to (but not consistent with being small government) but smart phones, entertainment etc are all padding if you need to cut expenses to pay for food.

Which is fundamentally true about having one’s financial house in order, but the very same government that arguably set many up contrary to such wisdom, by vomiting CERB and other manna from heaven monies like it’s flowing from an endless fountain not tied to national debt.

 

[Good2Golf]

My Company also gave me a $5000.00 signing bonus so it actually didn't cost me anything.

Ah, I’d love to be in your 10% tax bracket!

 

[daftandbarmy]

Which is fundamentally true about having one’s financial house in order, but the very same government that arguably set many up contrary to such wisdom, by vomiting CERB and other manna from heaven monies like it’s flowing from an endless fountain not tied to national debt.

Which may have, coincidentally, done a good job of moving people at the lower end of the income spectrum out of 'job finding' mode.

 

[Navy_Pete]

Which is fundamentally true about having one’s financial house in order, but the very same government that arguably set many up contrary to such wisdom, by vomiting CERB and other manna from heaven monies like it’s flowing from an endless fountain not tied to national debt.

I don't know, I saw a lot of people who would have been completely foxed without CERB as they were out of work due to COVID.

If the various level of governments are going to shutter businesses for pandemic reasons, just see it as a cost of the health policy. I'm sure there are smart people that can crunch the numbers between things like CERB and loss of future earnings from the 'do nothing and let COVID rip' option, which likely would have completely broken the health care system which has been neglected for ages.

Which may have, coincidentally, done a good job of moving people at the lower end of the income spectrum out of 'job finding' mode.

CERB was pretty short term, but given that schools were gone remote, for any family it takes a lot to pay for day care. If it is going to cost someone income to go to work, have to scramble to find day care etc plus the risk of catching COVID why would they?

Some people will be parasitic wastes on any kind of social safety net, but lot of working poor/borderline folks that needed the lifeline.

 

[dapaterson]

Most business folks I knew complaining "nobody wants to work because of CERB" were complaining months after it had ceased.

The challenge industries like hospitality had were that they traditionally have high rates of staff turnover; they did not hire when public health measures were in / out because they did not want to get saddled with cost of personnel if they didn't know what the future held; and then all tried to hire to fill their multiple vacancies at the same time, and discovered that finding and holding quality staff was more challenging.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Canadians have a skewed, pablum fed view of Canadian politics. Very few watch anything that resembles foreign news or what goes on outside our borders. They rely on legacy MSM to educate and explain things to them. They see nothing to contradict these views. So they believe them. When legacy media says he's making great decisions and looking after Canada. Well, that's not how the EU sees him. These are people that have seen what dictators look like and are capable of. Not enough Canadians know what the world really thinks. And he hasn't even passed his internet censorship bill. There will be less knowledge allowed to Canadians.

This is not the first time he's been called out. An earlier instance had our legacy media describing the audience on their feet as a standing ovation for trudeau. In fact, they were on their feet and walking out on him in protest of his dictoral stance of Canadians.

But you can watch for yourself the respect his style of oppression garners from Europe. You can also see the narcissistic descriptions where he skews the narrative and heaps all the credit on himself, implying he is an elder statesmen amongst those attending. Someone who thinks only his measures and solutions are the way to prosperity and unity. The internet is full of instances where he is called out by prominent people for being a dictator, but it never shows up on the news here. Does it? Now ask,yourselves why.

 

[IKnowNothing]

Canadians have a skewed, pablum fed view of Canadian politics. Very few watch anything that resembles foreign news or what goes on outside our borders. They rely on legacy MSM to educate and explain things to them. They see nothing to contradict these views. So they believe them. When legacy media says he's making great decisions and looking after Canada. Well, that's not how the EU sees him. These are people that have seen what dictators look like and are capable of. Not enough Canadians know what the world really thinks. And he hasn't even passed his internet censorship bill. There will be less knowledge allowed to Canadians.

This is not the first time he's been called out. An earlier instance had our legacy media describing the audience on their feet as a standing ovation for trudeau. In fact, they were on their feet and walking out on him in protest of his dictoral stance of Canadians.

But you can watch for yourself the respect his style of oppression garners from Europe. You can also see the narcissistic descriptions where he skews the narrative and heaps all the credit on himself, implying he is an elder statesmen amongst those attending. Someone who thinks only his measures and solutions are the way to prosperity and unity. The internet is full of instances where he is called out by prominent people for being a dictator, but it never shows up on the news here. Does it? Now ask,yourselves why.

This interaction was widely reported in the Canadian media when it happened in March. That reporting also came with context and factual reporting of the EU members backgrounds, so most reasonable Canadians were able to accurately infer that those voices were not in any representative of the "how the EU (in aggregate) sees him"

There's plenty of reason's to dislike Trudeau. No need to ignorantly (or dishonestly) misrepresent the opinions of Europe's Randy Hilliers to be more than they are.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Some people will be parasitic wastes on any kind of social safety net, but lot of working poor/borderline folks that needed the lifeline.

Sidebar-wise:

Once upon a time I was hired to help a researcher look at 'welfare', and how long people tended to stay on social assistance.

Despite claims to the opposite, more than 90+% of clients accessed social assistance for less than 18 months. It was actually operating as intended: as a social safety net.

There was a very small % that you could call 'generational' welfare recipients.

Also, counter-intuitively, most welfare recipients were identified as single men under 35 years of age. A good reflection of the 'boom and bust' cycles of a natural resource focused Canadian economy.

 

[Navy_Pete]

Sidebar-wise:

Once upon a time I was hired to help a researcher look at 'welfare', and how long people tended to stay on social assistance.

Despite claims to the opposite, more than 90+% of clients accessed social assistance for less than 18 months. It was actually operating as intended: as a social safety net.

There was a very small % that you could call 'generational' welfare recipients.

Also, counter-intuitively, most welfare recipients were identified as single men under 35 years of age. A good reflection of the 'boom and bust' cycles of a natural resource focused Canadian economy.

For sure, I think that was consistent with what they found in the Ontario basic income pilot program before it was shut down early, and that most people used it to try and go back on re-training, or were at least healthier because they weren't worried about where money was coming from to pay the bills (so less trips to ERs because they also usually had no family doctor).

If I hadn't been living at home at the time I would have been on welfare before I joined after getting laid off with zero notice when one of the US tarriffs on softwood kicked in. I think most of the marginal general labour jobs in factories and elsewhere is typically young males in that sub 35 age range. And it's not that people didn't want to do something different, but when you need to work 60 hours a week to pay your bills, can be a challenge to get out of that. Especially for folks that made bad decisions when they were younger (like dropping out of school or getting a criminal record) where it really limits your options to move forward.

Combine that with the gig economy where you can work a lot but never qualify for unemployment for when things take a downturn, and the real inflation massively outpacing wages and can get pretty bleak.

Aside from just supporting fellow human beings, I think the social safety network probably reduces all kinds of expenses elsewhere; emergency healthcare, criminial justice etc are all aggravate by poverty and that costs huge amounts already, so suspect on just basic financial grounds it has a lot of secondary/tertiary benefits that are hard to directly link to, but intuitively make sense.

 

[mariomike]

Saw this in the news,

Contest was 1st under Pierre Poilievre's Conservative leadership​

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/byelection-mississauga-lakeshore-sousa-chhinzer-1.6682803

By Tuesday morning, with 233 of 234 polls reporting, Sousa had secured 51.2 per cent of the vote. His Conservative opponent, Ron Chhinzer, came away with 37.3 per cent, and the NDP's candidate, Julia Kole, secured 4.9 per cent of the vote. The Green Party was not far behind the NDP with 3.2 per cent, while the People's Party of Canada earned the support of 1.2 per cent of votes cast.