THUNDER BAY – Opinion – What will the New Year bring? Livio Di Matteo, the Northern Economist is looking ahead for the exciting trends and developments that 2012 will bring the world economy – internationally, nationally and of course right here in the Most Serene Kingdom of Thunder Bay.
In a fund-raising effort worthy of We Are the World, Silvio Berlusconi and William Shatner will team up and record an album to raise money for European debt relief. The lead song on the album will be Lucia in the Sky with Diamonds. They will conclude with a video duet of the famous “Au fond du temple saint” from Bizet’s The Pearl Fishers in which they both lament lost love real or imagined against a visual backdrop featuring German Chancellor Angela Merkel and the Starship Enterprise.
As part of the 2012 Diamond Jubilee celebrations for Queen Elizabeth the Second, a giant wire will be strung across the two “iconic” Beacons on Thunder Bay’s waterfront park and decorated with red, white and blue bunting and giant Union Jacks. Once the Jubilee Celebration is over, the Beacons will be converted into an exciting new tourist attraction. Giant oversize clothes will be strung from the wire and in honor of the prominent natural Thunder Bay harbor landmark, the beacon exhibit will be rechristened The Sleeping Giant’s Clothesline.
As part of its Green Energy Strategy designed to save the environment and create jobs and prosperity, the Ontario government will announce that it is embracing new airship technology and build a fleet of airships to provide transportation infrastructure to the Ring of Fire and Ontario’s far north. However, it will be decided that the base for construction and deployment of the new technology will be at Queen’s Park in Toronto. Despite the uproar in northern towns starved for jobs, this will not be the result of indifference to the north or a desire to generate employment in Toronto. A consultant’s study will conclude that the Queen’s Park location is best suited to the production of high performance Lighter than Air Technology hot air inflation equipment.
In a daring move, Canada’s First Nations will announce that under their inherent rights and obligations as sovereign nations, the Canadian Federal Government will be placed under third party management and will send in former Auditor-General Sheila Fraser and Parliamentary Budget Officer Kevin Page as Administrators Plenipotentiary and Extraordinary with a joint mission to audit the Federal Government’s structural deficit forecast.
The European Union will create a new joint stock company – Acme International Finance Corporation and collect all of its member’s sovereign debt obligations and sell them to this new agency at a discount, which will then use them as collateral to issue bonds that will be known as Your Owes. The Acme International Finance Corporation will then be jointly purchased by the Canadian Pension Plan and the Ontario Teacher’s Pension Plan Fund and the equity value donated to create a massive public endowment to generate income that will help finance and sustain the Canadian public health care system.
The Oxford English Dictionary will add a new definition of the word “imminent” to its definitive compilation based on its use in Thunder Bay to describe the eventual announcement of a waterfront hotel. The entry will read:
im·mi·nent [im-uh-nunt]
adjective
1. likely to occur at any time: eg. After a festering illness, death was imminent.
2. overhanging: eg. The unstable mass of rock means that danger is imminent.
3. possibly occurring in a time frame that is immediate, or perhaps within a longer time frame ranging from several days to one or more years depending on inter temporal perceptions of the fullness of time and space. Eg. The announcement of the hotel proprietor on Thunder Bay’s waterfront is still imminent.
It is going to be an exciting New Year for us all!
Livio Di Matteo
Livio Di Matteo is an economist in Thunder Bay, Ontario specializing in public policy, health economics, public finance and economic history. Livio Di Matteo is a graduate of the Fort William Collegiate Institute (1898-2005) whose school motto “Agimus Meliora” has served as a personal inspiration. Livio Di Matteo holds a PhD from McMaster University, an MA from the University of Western Ontario and an Honours BA from Lakehead University. He is Professor of Economics at Lakehead University where he has served since 1990. His research has explored the sustainability of provincial government health spending, historical wealth and asset holding and economic performance and institutions in Northwestern Ontario and the central North American economic region. His historical wealth research using census-linked probate records is funded by grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. He has constructed, assembled and analyzed nearly 12,000 estate files for Ontario over the period 1870 to 1930. Livio Di Matteo writes and comments on public policy and his articles have appeared in the National Post, Toronto Star, the Winnipeg Free Press and Thunder Bay Chronicle-Journal and NetNewsledger.com. Livio Di Matteo has had an entry in Canadian Who’s Who since 1995.
This article was originally posted on Livio Di Matteo’s NORTHERN ECONOMIST Blog at http://ldimatte.shawwebspace.ca.