Re: Trans National Place (Winthrop Square) Part 2
Re. Canada and its recent economic (and architectural) activity that is - pound-for-pound - far outpacing that of the US, there are 2 big factors at play. These factors are relevant for Australia too ... but Oz is far away so I'll just say "Canada" instead of "Canada and Australia."
Both of these are political decisions and things that the US - if it had the political will - could replicate. However, the US has not replicated these decisions while Canada here has made serious, self-interested policy decisions that have allowed it to pull ahead of the US in per-capita GDP for the first time ever.
1) Immigration policy: The greatest stories in the world economy today are the continuing developments in high-tech, the rise of the BRICs, and the concomitant rise in commodities prices.
Canada has moved quickly to ensure it can attract the world's "best and brightest" immigrants to become a player in the high-tech economy. Canada welcomes huge numbers of high-skilled and educated immigrants, particularly those who study in Canada - the same people the US immigration system is largely stacked against.
As a result, Canada's immigrants are overwhelmingly educated, skilled people who pass their own (good) decisions to their children. Canada is now one of the most educated countries on earth with some of the best-achieving students. Its high-tech sector is growing hugely, driven partly by big US tech players (Google, Microsoft, Amazon to name a few) with significant Canadian operations - for the sole reason that they can "park" good employees in Canada when they can't get into the US.
The US, on the other hand, has an immigration system hostile to and suspicious toward skilled and educated immigrants. They have the whole book of rules thrown at them - while the world's unskilled and uneducated have free reign to enter the country and know they will never face any sort of deportation. As a result, the biggest drivers of our population growth are underskilled, uneducated migrant workers. And as much money as we put into education, when you have huge inflows of people for whom education is not a major fact of life, their children will enter the education system and act as a downward weight on performance.
While the US moves toward being a less-educated, less-skilled, lower-income nation as a result of our immigration policy, Canada's emphasis on skilled immigrants is the single biggest factor driving its phenomenal economic growth in recent years. The US is still a giant in tech - but this is in spite of, not thanks to, our immigration policies. If they were brought to Canadian levels (something the "Gang of 8" bill does not do at all with its continued reliance on unskilled / "guest workers" and amnesty for unskilled workers already here), the US tech sector would benefit hugely.
2) Energy policy: The other obvious choice for any country looking to attain prosperity today is in riding the commodities boom.
Canada has been aggressive in pursuing its economic interests amidst the Asia-driven commodities supercycle of the last decade, opening up energy exploration and production to sell on to China and Asia. Like Canada the US has huge stores of unconventional oil/gas assets. However, despite the actions of companies involved in fracking, the US has politically tied its hands behind its back in this question by severely limiting drilling and exploration permits, refusing to build up our energy infrastructure to meet new energy sources (e.g., the XL pipeline from Canada). This is another major recent source of Canadian affluence where US participation is much lower than it could be.
Oddly if you ask me, moving toward Canada and its economic growth (and in setting a path toward long-term economic growth via a high-skilled immigration policy) is not necessarily politically popular in the US these days. Maintaining a focus on low-skilled rather than high-skilled immigration is good for Big Business (cheap labor!), the mini-economy of lobbies and media and other groups that label everything they see as "racist" (including a policy that would make Asia rather than Central America the largest source of immigration), and the Democrats (low-skilled and low-educated voters = voters in favor of a robust welfare state). Oil is a convenient bogeyman.
But if you want a thriving economy today, you need to have a population growing more skilled, more educated, and more affluent - rather than the opposite of all these things - and if you have a commodity that China needs and will otherwise buy from other trading partners, you're only hurting yourself by not making that good available. This is why Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Montreal and Ottawa these days are doing a good bit better than many American cities - and why the Canadian economy (and the Australian) are leaving us in the dust.
