Focus on the economy

In the 1980s, former prime minister Brian Mulroney swept to power with a simple but compelling mantra: “Jobs, jobs, jobs.”

Less than a decade later, former U.S. president Bill Clinton captured the White House by keeping his campaign workers focused on the one thing that mattered to most to voters: the health of the economy. In case anyone forgot, the issue was plastered on a sign hanging inside his campaign headquarters that read: “The economy, stupid.”

Both leaders latched onto a fundamental truth: if the economy doesn’t work, nothing else will. Without a vibrant economy in which commerce is flourishing and people are working, the government will have less tax revenue to fund everything from health care and social assistance to the arts and education.

All of these sectors feed off the wealth that businesses generate and are dependent on a healthy and functioning economy. But when the economy breaks down, it’s only a matter of time before society as a whole begins to slowly wither and unravel.

So the question we need to ask is: does our economy work anymore? And does it work for the benefit of everyone, or just a select few?

Following the pandemic, governments around the world have been pumping trillions of dollars into the global economy to get it going again after three years of lockdowns, supply chain struggles and stagnation. But all of this economic stimulus has been done with borrowed money, and the subsequent buildup of debt is concealing the real economic decline taking place all around us.

Consumers and governments are still splurging, but our slowly eroding living standards are increasingly propped up with borrowed money. You don’t have to be a Nobel Prize-winning economist to know this will eventually come to a bad end.

Unfortunately, we haven’t focused enough on what drives the economy.

When you break it down, the economy is driven by three forces: smart managers, hard-working employees and investors, all of whom work together to turn the wheels of commerce.

All three of these forces, or stakeholders, have a right to a portion of the profits produced by the business. The plain fact is, no business can make a profit without employees. And those employees have a moral right to a share of the wealth they help generate.

We need to think about the economy in a different way — a way that allows everyone to benefit, not just an elite few. Canada could become a role model for the world if we adopted an economic charter of rights and responsibilities designed to share the wealth we produce more evenly among all Canadians while making taxation much fairer and requiring government to manage our public finances in a responsible manner.

In essence, the charter would provide a framework for balancing out the various forces that drive our economy. It’s a bold proposal — and readers could be forgiven for asking what makes me think such an idea could work.

Earlier this month, I turned 91 years young. I still go to work every single day. I own and operate a number of companies as well as a non-profit dedicated to improving the health and nutrition of Canadian schoolchildren. But what really drives me is my desire to share my hard-won experiences over the past seven decades as an entrepreneur and business owner.

I built Magna International from scratch in a rented garage and oversaw its growth and expansion into what it is today: a company with approximately 175,000 employees and over $40 billion in annual sales. And I’ve served on numerous corporate, government and university boards, including the NASDAQ stock exchange.

With the right conditions in place, fellow Canadians could create thousands of business success stories like my own. But in the end, it all boils down to the state of our economy — and that’s why we need a charter of economic rights. With a charter in place, we could build an economy that works for everyone, an economy where more wealth is created and more wealth is shared.

When it comes to the economy, if you’re not growing, you’re dying. We need to determine which path we want to take.

"IF THE ECONOMY DOESN’T WORK, NOTHING ELSE WILL.