A recent report from Statistics Canada showing Nova Scotia to have the lowest Real GDP growth of any province in the country, should not be taken literally, according to a long time Professor of Economics at Dalhousie University in Halifax.
Ian McAllister, Professor Emeritus at Dalhousie University’s School of Economics, tells CKBW News that Real GDP is an overblown indicator of the welfare of a community or a province.
“The key question, that I think has to be asked, and I don’t think that’s it’s been asked enough in this region, is what kind of Nova Scotia, what kind of Atlantic Canada do we really want,” says McAllister.
According to Statistics Canada, Canadian Real GDP grew at 3.3% last year (2017) compared to Nova Scotia at 1.2%, the worst province in the country.
But McAllister says those numbers are just indicators, not an actual measure of how well we’re doing as a province. He says one shouldn’t get carried away by GDP numbers.
“You see, quite often you have government’s crowing that they’ve managed to get a GDP growth of ‘x’ per-cent in a year, isn’t that fantastic; well it may not be fantastic, it may mean that you’ve been spending some money in some pretty crazy direction,” adds McAllister.
The former Newfoundland economist notes the more you realize what GDP is actually measuring, the more suspicious you become of some of the things being done in a province or region.
