The Ben Mulroney Show - Will a peace deal in Gaza hold? How to keep the hardliners in check.

Episode Date: October 9, 2025

GUEST:   Bill Roggio/ Senior fellow at Foundation for Defense of Democracies Guest:   Wyatt Sharpe/BMS white house correspondent Guest: Dr. Eric Kam, Economics Professor at Toronto Metropolitan University GUEST:  Jeff Park/Aristotle Foundation If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://link.chtbl.com/bms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also, on youtube -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Insta: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ Twitter: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ TikTok: ⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠ Enjoy   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This podcast is brought to you by the National Payroll Institute, the leader for the payroll profession in Canada, setting the standard of professional excellence, delivering critical expertise, and providing resources that over 45,000 payroll professionals rely on. Hey, thanks, son. What do I owe you? Don't worry about it. It's payday. Payday, huh? I bet you it went straight into your bank account and you didn't even check your pay stuff. My what? Your pay stuff. Back in my day, you had to wait for a physical check. Then, you had to go to the bank. Deposit it, and wait for it to clear.

Your pay really meant something. Payroll is incredibly complex. It's art and the science. It literally keeps the economy moving. Parole professionals do a lot for us. You know, it's about time we do something for them. How about we ask our leaders to name a day in their honor, a national day to recognize payroll professionals?

I got it. This is perfect. Why don't we explain to people just how important the roles are the payroll professionals play in our lives. We can even ask them to sign a petition. We can even ask them to sign a petition to recognize the third Tuesday in September as the National Day to recognize payroll professionals. We'll rally support and bring the payroll party to the nation.

National payroll party? Precisely. Sounds like a plan, you know, just one thing. What's that? I'm choosing the music. What? And I'm sitting in the backseat. The whole way?

The whole way. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. If you've been following the news, like really following it, you know how exhausting it can be politics conflict uncertainty it's a lot to carry and for many men there's this expectation to stay calm stay in control and not talk about how it's affecting you but the truth is you're allowed to feel overwhelmed you're allowed to say i'm not okay right now and trust me i have been there whether it's the state of the world stress at home or just feeling like you've got to have it all together and have all the answers you don't have to hold it in better help is here to

help with the world's largest network of licensed therapists. They've already supported over 5 million people. You can connect with a therapist online from wherever you are. No wait list, no office visits. And if it's not the right fit, you can switch any time. It's time to put your mental health on the agenda. Talk it out

with BetterHelp. Visit betterhelp.com slash Mulrooney today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp H-E-L-P.com slash Mulrooney. I strongly welcome the news that a deal has been reached on the first stage of the peace plan in Gaza. This is a moment of profound relief that will be felt around the world, but particularly for the hostages, their families. families and for the civilian population of Gaza.

You're listening to The Ben Mulroney Show. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. That was the voice of UK Prime Minister Kier Starrmer, expressing optimism over the potential of this Gaza peace plan. To dig in, we are joined now by Bill Rogio, the senior fellow at Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Bill, welcome. Thank you, Ben. Always a pleasure. All right. Let me ask you your personal opinion. Are you optimistic? I'm not. I'm optimistic that they'll probably be a prisoner swap here.

Okay. And it will get the Israelis to halt their fighting for a period of time. But ultimately, Hamas is not going to lay down its arms. That's the key part of this plan, that Hamas disarm, that it not take part in the government, of a future government, and that you'll have a reinvestment in Gaza and international peacekeeping force, et cetera, et cetera. Hamas is, it's in their DNA. This is a, they've described themselves as a resistance movement. It's ideologically driven.

It's entire reason for being is the destruction of the state of Israel. And unless it actually denounces, you know, it renounces those goals, its own charter. I just think we're back to square one here with Israel and Hamas going toe to toe to at some point in the future. Well, let's give our listeners a little bit of the lay of the land as to what is on the table. Israel and Hamas have agreed to the first phase of the U.S. brokered peace plan. It includes a ceasefire release of the reigning hostages in exchange for Palestinian prisoners and a partial Israeli troop withdrawal from Gaza. And the Trump administration's plan envisions an international security force, mainly from Arab and Muslim nations,

overseeing Gaza, U.S.-led reconstruction, and eventual Palestinian Authority reforms, though questions remain about Hamas' disarmament and Gaza's governance. And so, yeah, so right now we are at the starting blocks. And, but I've got to ask, Bill, like, yes, the Hamas in their DNA are terrorists. They're bloodthirsty. It's a death cult. We know that. But there are a lot of, there are, there were a lot of endorsements of this plan from within the Arab world and some pretty heavy hitting governments. And I've got to wonder whether they might hold, and I know that Qatar is the bad Qatar and Iran are the bad actors, but I think Qatar is the is the main fundraiser for for Hamas

and a lot of their leadership have what, Pieta Tera's in Qatar. And so I got to wonder whether the leadership of the countries endorsing this deal might put pressure on Qatar to tell their to tell their lapdog to stand down. Yeah, so we also, Turkey is a big backer of Hamas as well. So, you know, it's possible that Turkey and Qatar are, you know, understand that if they can get the fighting to stop if they could get this first phase and then oh it's unfortunate but we just couldn't get beyond the ceasefire and the um and the prisoner exchange which by the way this prisoner exchange hostage slash prisoner exchange is going to be massively lopsided as they always

are there's talk of 1700 Palestinians who were going to be freed many of them are convicted life sentences yeah didn't at one point didn't they float the idea that they wanted the the terrorists who who did October 7th, they wanted them released? Yeah. It's very as possible that they will be. That's pretty disgusting. That's a pretty disgusting ask. And it is.

And by the way, look, he is Sinwar, one of the men who was behind the October 7th effect. He was freed in a previous prisoner. Yeah. In, I believe it was 2010 or 11, and the Israelis killed him at some point last year. You know, the next generation of Hamas's. radical leadership is going to be released in exchange for what, 20 live and 20 dead hostages. These deals never work in the favor of Israel, and yet Israel constantly pursues them. It's stunning to me.

The impact of the hostages that has on the Israeli psyche is just something I cannot wrap my head around. I understand it, but at some point, the interests of the Israeli state have to come ahead of, you know, of a handful of hostages. And look, I don't trust Qatar. I don't trust Turkey. The Qataris, for instance, right? We have to remember Afghanistan. They were the ones that pushed the deal, the deal with Trump with the Taliban. And what happened, once the U.S. withdrew from Afghanistan, the Taliban took control of the country. You can't, you know, the Qataris are, you know, I always say beware of Qatari's bearing peace plan.

And we fall into this trap. We think that they're an honest broker. They're not. They're looking after the best interests of their client. So I don't see the Qataris. I don't see the first putting pressure on Hamas to disarm. Okay, Bill, what about Canada's role in all of this? You know, we took that extraordinary step of recognizing a Palestinian state far before any

of the preconditions were met. In fact, they haven't been met, so I wouldn't call them preconditions anymore. But so now we've recognized the state and our prime minister while he was in New York for the UN General Assembly, did a fireside chat where he was musing about the possibility of Canadian boots on the ground in some sort of peacekeeping initiative. What do you think in an ideal world where the peace holds? What role does Canada play, if any? Yeah, you know, look, I actually embedded with Canadian forces in Afghanistan into 2006.

And, you know, you certainly have a fine military. I was highly impressed by the Canadian troops, for the Canadian Light Infantry, the unit that I embedded with. You know, they can play a role in peacekeeping, although I would caution Western countries that Hamas does not plan to disarm. Yeah. I would not be sending troops there because it's a hot zone. It is.

And look, you know, Canada didn't have the will to stick it out in Afghanistan. I don't know, you know, if you have the national will to see through a difficult situation like in Gaza. But I think Canada has been very unhelpful in, you know, recognizing a Palestinian state. Who's the Palestinian president? the president of the Palestinian people. You know, put undue pressure on Israel and, you know. Well, Bill, Bill, you know, it just occurred to me.

Do, Deb, let me know. Canada recognized this, the Palestinian state. What about Egypt and Saudi Arabia, for example? Have they recognized a Palestinian state? Yeah, it's this Western desire. You're absolutely correct. It's an excellent point. This desire to genuflect to the Palestinians, particularly after what happened on October 7th, 2020, 23, is it's mind-boggling to me.

And I don't, I really, again, just like, I can't wrap my head around this, to be honest with you. It's this desire to side with a death cult, as you can properly describe them. I can't understand it, Ben. I really struggle with this every day. Well, we've got a great friend of our show and a great friend to the Jewish people, great friend to the state of Israel, Warren Kinsella, who has a book that's going to be coming out in any day now that chronicles the work that organizations were doing prior to October 7th to lay the groundwork in the West for a moment like October 7th.

So that when that happened, you would see this ground, what would look like a ground swell of support. But in fact, it's orchestrated and it was planned and it was. designed. And so I think that's one of the reasons that we are where we are. But I want to thank you very much for joining us. I wish, listen, if this thing holds, you got to come back. You got to come back and we'll reset, we'll reevaluate. I'd love to eat my words on that. I hope I'm wrong. And unfortunately, I tend to be right on these issues. Well, that's why we have you on the show. Bill Rogio, Senior Fellow at Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Many thanks, sir.

Thank you so much, sir. Have a great day. Up next, the BMS White House correspondent. Oh, that's the Ben Mulrooney Show. We have a White House correspondent. I didn't know that. Welcome back to the Ben Mulrooney show. We are, we've been talking about the peace plan.

that is hopefully going to take root in the Middle East. We'll have to wait. We'll be watching every single day to see if the hardliners on either side are able to put some water in their wine and see the bigger picture. But there's a lot of the news that we're talking about today started in the White House. You know, we were talking about our prime minister. He had just been in the White House. We're talking about the auto sector.

and Howard Lutnik, saying that Donald Trump's coming for the entire sector. And so why not go to somebody who is at the White House right now? Let's go to the source of all of these stories, the White House itself. And that is where we find our BMS White House correspondent, Mr. Wyatt Sharp. Wyatt, welcome to the show. Thanks so much. So you're at the White House. I didn't make that up.

Okay, good. That would have, that would not have, that would not have looked good on me. What a fresh than a narrative. Yeah. Oh, so, so, okay, hey, listen, I got some questions here. How do you get into the White House? What? I'll go into that.

Yeah, Wyatt, how do you get into the White House? You're like, you walk down Pennsylvania Avenue, and you show up at the, where do you show up at the gate and you say, hey, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm famous in Canada. Oh, no, we lost him. Sorry, I heard a little boom. But, yeah. I see all these, in the movies, depending on when the movie was made, you either just show up and you wave at the guy if it was in the 60s, or in these days, I have to assume that there's bomb sniffing dogs and robots and all sorts of barriers you've got to go through. All right, Wyatt, you back? Wyatt, are you there?

I am, sorry. No problem. My question was, how do you get into? to the White House. As a civilian, how do you get into one of the most fortified homes on the planet? Yeah, it's interesting. I mean, a lot of what's happening right now to give you kind of a behind-the-scenes look is with the government shutdown, they're only allowing domestic media into the United States and no international media. So in order to get in, I kind of had to message some people who work in the White House and just ask them to make an

exception, basically, which luckily they did, which was very helpful, obviously. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. At 16, you have content. in the White House? I don't think Mike Droulet has contacts in the White House. No, he doesn't. He doesn't. It's a good thing that you are our White House correspondent. We just called you that.

But, okay, so, so now you're on the list. But now what's the security like to get it? It's actually, so like today the president of Finland is here, so it's a little bit heightened compared to usual. So, like, there's a couple of checkpoints. There's one that you kind of have to go through before you enter Lefayette Park. and then there's the one kind of on the north lawn side

where you have to wait for an escort to come. So basically someone from the White House press office comes, they walk, they get you from the north lawn security gate, then you go through like airport-style security, and then you're finally in. But it does take, I think we were waiting this morning for like 45 minutes before we actually got in. So it's pretty heavy, as you would expect.

And are you in the press briefing room? I was. Right now I'm standing out front of the West Wing at like the stakeout location area. because I guess Caroline Leavitt is doing, like, a media interview shortly. And so, like, all of the media will stand at the stakeout location and wait for her to be done what's called Pebble Beach, which is just like where all the tents are. And then as she's walking back to her office, people will stop and ask her questions. So hopefully we'll get one in, but we'll see.

So, yeah, do you have your question ready? Yeah, I mean, honestly, I think one of the big things being from Canada will be kind of the Trump Carney thing. Trump actually praised Carney quite a bit, which was not something that he usually does for, world leaders, if you think back to when Zelensky was at the White House even. And also, I mean, I think one of the other things is that Mark Carney being at the White House to most of the White House correspondence here, to most of the staffers here, they just thought of it as any other world leader because, I mean, I said today, the President of Finland's here, and world leaders being at the White House is just a normal thing. And so there's not a ton of focus on the fact that Mark Carney came

there, whereas in Canada, that's obviously a very big focus. So trying to bring as much Canadian spirit, I guess, here as possible. And let's talk about the Gaza peace deal. There's You know, there are people who are going to put their blinders on and they are going to trust in the process and the fact that Donald Trump is involved and he doesn't suffer fools. You know, I just had an expert on the show who is not confident at all because he says it's in the DNA of Hamas to not want to put down their arms and they can't just wake up one day and stop hating Israel and Jews so to the point that they're not going to. They're not going to do something to try to kill them and destroy Israel. But we're going to have to wait and see. But this is the first best chance at peace in a very long time. What's the sense where you are?

I think a lot of it right now is just very much focused on kind of the narrative and on the communications aspect of things. So if you think about Trump himself, he very much wants to be branded as practically the president who is delivering peace. And that's certainly working for him in a number of respects on the global stage. He looked to people like Anthony Albanese, for example, the prime minister of Australia. He's the leader of the Labor Party. He's very liberal.

And he even came out and had said, yes, Donald Trump should take some credit for this. You had Hillary Clinton who came out and said that Trump, if he is able to self-peace in the region, is actually someone who should be considered for the Nobel Peace Prize, which was kind of like a joke, I think she was saying it as. But it does just kind of speak to the fact that if he can do something that no other president has been done, maybe people should like acknowledge that he was able to do it as opposed to. just disliking it because it came from him and because it came from Trump. And I actually think people like Donald Trump obviously has a number of faults that people will criticize.

But I think that those faults are some of the same faults that world leaders overseas have who are engaging in some of these conflicts. And as a result, they take him more seriously than they took someone like President Biden or someone else. Yeah. And his superpower is his straight talking in matters like this. I'm not suggesting he straight talks all the time, but in matters like this, where he knows. knows what he wants and he's and he's got his eyes on the prize and it's a uh if hamas doesn't do what they say they're going to do or if um netanyahu cannot deliver the votes from his cabinet those those two situations he will have something to say about and it will be very

strong and it will be and and he will he will chastise the whoever fails very very publicly Yeah, I think that's certainly sure. I mean, and you can look again. I mean, I mentioned President Zelensky. If you look to the war between Russia and Ukraine, the last time that he was here, one of the most infamous now moments of a world leader ever visiting the White House was when Vlodemir Zelensky came. And then, of course, Donald Trump and him had a very public dispute in the White House

where then Zelensky left Washington early. And that's just yet another example that can kind of stand as to how Donald Trump will say whatever he wants, regardless of what the media will perceive it as, regardless of kind of what the repercussions will be. And it speaks to Trump's mentality in the sense of he truly does believe that there's no such thing as bad press and that if his name is in the media, then that's a good thing. And obviously, it's working for him, given some of the popularity numbers that he has. And even since, you know, he has not followed to run some of his campaign promises,

that hasn't actually had a huge impact on it in the sense of a lot of Americans in the United States right now are buying more into his argument over things like the government shutdown, for example, than they are about, you know, some of the Democrats. rhetoric. Wyatt Sharp, do you get high school credit for any of this stuff that you do? You know, it's an interesting question. Maybe I'll send this clip to my teachers and ask them afterwards. I will say I'm in a politics class right now, so I think just the understanding that

I'm gaining in stuff from these types of experiences certainly helps in those types of classes. But all things consider, I mean, I think it's just really fun to do it. You didn't answer the question, sir? The answer is no. but um well that is great a baloney mr sharp i think maybe maybe i'll inquire maybe i maybe i'll think that i should have credit okay well if you're not but if you're not getting credit

wyatt then that means you have the same amount of work that everybody else does but the difference is they're in class right now and they're not in washington so how do you so how do you catch up for when you miss a class yeah i mean i'll say the nice thing is like in this specific example we're going into thanksgiving break but usually you're certainly correct in the sense of I do have to miss it. I'm out of school. Last year was interesting because there was three elections all in one year, and so there was a lot of school that was missed.

I would say my teachers are super supportive, number one, like if I have to, like, move a test because I was absent for a political reason, then that's fine. I remember last year on, like, the rating system that our teachers used, there was probably two times in French where the French teacher had wrote extension

requested due to political reasons. I think they're very understanding of it. And always appreciate it. for sure as well. All right, Wyatt Sharp, the Ben Mulroney Show, political White House correspondent. Thank you very much. Enjoy the rest of your day there, and let's hope you get that question into Caroline Leavitt.

Thank you so much. You too. Up next, our candy prices, pushing Halloween shoppers to chips. This podcast is sponsored by BetterHelp. you've been following the news, like really following it, you know how exhausting it can be. Politics, conflict, uncertainty. It's a lot to carry. And for many men, there's this expectation to stay calm, stay in control, and not talk about how it's affecting you. But the truth is,

you're allowed to feel overwhelmed. You're allowed to say, I'm not okay right now. And trust me, I have been there. Whether it's the state of the world, stress at home, or just feeling like you've got to have it all together and have all the answers. You don't have to hold it in. Better Help is here to help with the world's largest network of licensed therapists. They've already supported over 5 million people. You can connect with a therapist online from wherever you are. No waitless, no office visits. And if it's not the right fit, you can switch any time.

It's time to put your mental health on the agenda. Talk it out with BetterHelp. Visit BetterHelp.com slash Mulrooney today to get 10% off your first month. That's BetterHelp, H-E-L-P.com slash Mulruni. Let's face it, finding your next favorite podcast can be tough. But that's about to change. Curious Cast Discovery is the destination for award-winning podcasts from true crime and history like crime beat. Documentaries like Stop, Rewind, The Lost Boy, music with Uncharted, and even the paranormal, like Dead Man's Curse, all 100% ad-free for less than the price of a coffee.

Curious Cast Discovery, available now on Apple Podcasts for just $4 a month. In the 70s, four young women were found dead. For nearly 50 years, their cases went cold. I'm Nancy Hixed, a senior crime reporter for Global News. In the season finale of Crime Beat, I share how investigators uncovered shocking evidence of a serial killer. And hear exclusive interviews with the killer's family. Listen to the full season of Crime Beat early and ad-free on Amazon music

by asking Alexa to play the podcast Crime Beat. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney Show. you so much for joining us, and thank you for helping us build this show on every platform where you might find us. We so appreciate everyone following us on Instagram, and now we want to turn our attention to YouTube. We want you to like, we want you to subscribe, and we want you to share that content. Thank you so very much. All right, we've got a lot of economic headwinds in this country, and no better person to help us navigate these treacherous waters than our good friend, economics professor, Eric Cam of Toronto Metropolitan University. Welcome,

him, my friend. Benedict, it's an honor, as always. Well, everybody's favorite, I don't know what you'd call this guy, court jester, Howard Lutnik, came to Toronto, and spoke at a

very official meeting, but it was called Chatham Rules, which means you can't take pictures and you can't record it, but people still got word as to what he said. And he's essentially signaling the death knell of the Canadian automotive industry.

Yes, he is. And that did not play well either on the markets or politically or economically. I mean, this is really, really bad. And I'm glad that people are taking this seriously because tariffs, even simple tariffs on automobiles and automobile parts, Ben, just degrade the predictability of our economy. I mean, they increase transaction risk. They increase uncertainty. And then as much as Canadians say, well, we can try some tit for tax. retaliation. I mean, what is that going to do? That's just going to, well, number one, we can't really compete with the United States in a sense. If they decide that they are only going to purchase cars that are produced in the United States, they don't really need Canada. And unfortunately, we need them. So, you know, this looks like a trade war. And it's a trade war dynamic that's eroding the trust we have in institutions like the NAFTA or the new version of NAFTA. But you can rest assured that this is not a war we can win. And so what I'm looking at as an economist is that almost it's obvious to say profit

and investment pressure on our auto firms is just going to be debilitating. What about the employment and the regional impact if this actually happens? And I know the government says we put together something called a strategic response fund to buffer job losses, but you can't, Ben. You can't buffer job losses on Canada's number one import and number one export. If it ceased to exist, and that's a stretch, but if it ceased to exist, the Canadian economy, and I'm only going to say this once, could not bounce back. Well, didn't Australia close down its automotive industry years ago,

and they replaced it, at least in part, with some sort of like military build? And they start building their own equipment. and is that not something we could couldn't we find a way to plug the holes just a little bit you could find the way to plug the holes a little bit but the effect on government revenues from this from lower taxes collected from increased expenditure from support funds to retraining the unemployment effects i mean the need to support the sector let's just say you like you just said you're dedicated to supporting the sector and keep it from dying. I play the opportunity cost. If you're going to do that then, what are you not going to do

in other sectors? This is a bathtub right now and someone's pulled out the stopper and we can't get it back in. Okay, let me ask one question. I've been putting it out there in the ether with no basis in knowledge. So I'm going to ask somebody who actually knows these things. What happens if Donald Trump gets his way? And he brings every business back to the United States. He and enriches his country by multiple factors. And because he's a binary guy and for every battle, there has to be a winner and a loser, America's win is the world's loss. What then happens to their ability to sell their goods around the world if he is impoverished

us to the point that we can't buy them? I know you want me to say in a sense. I know you want to say that. If you tell me that that's not how it works, I'll stop saying it. Well, I'm going to tell you that's not how it works because that's not how business works. And there may be very little political will to do business with Donald Trump, but let's just say he achieves world domination and he's devastated Canada and he's devastated other countries. But he comes to them and says, all right, now let me make you a deal that's going

to make your country much better off. If it avoids complete country disaster and bankruptcy, and by the way, destroying your employment, I have a feeling that countries are going to belly up to the bar and say, okay, Mr. Trump, what can you do for me? Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough. All right, let's move on. So that's good news for the Americans. Let's look at what we're used to talking about, bad economic news here in Canada.

There's been this trend of redevelopment of the areas around big malls, right? The malls were sort of getting hollowed out. And now they're trying to repurpose parts of them adding grocery stores and adding education places, adding health care services, really turning them into the hub of a town. And what you need in a town is you need citizens. So they've been building massive condo developments around some pretty big malls, especially in Toronto. But one of them is just, it's just not working. No, one of them is not working. And in fact, it's the one by Cloverdale Mall.

I think they call it the clove. Pretty soon they're going to change it to the broke because that's what it is. And the reality is, Ben, is the oversupply, the failure to sell. units suggest to me that pricing, product features, expectations. There's a massive misalignment in this market between demand and supply. And anytime you have that massive disengagement, you know, you're going to have financing and risk, huge finance and risk mismanagement for developers. So what do they do, right? They just send out cancellation signals. And in some areas, they just, they have to correct the overbuilding. And no, you can't tear down buildings,

but it stops the new constructions. So it stops the number of available units, which stops the decrease in our, you know, rent has been going down in Toronto and in Canada. But, you know, as investor and speculative risk diminishes, we're going to head in the wrong way. And what scares me, and I know I feel like a broken record sometimes, is two things. Number one, what we call downstream impacts, right? Construction, jobs, suppliers. They're all going to be negatively affected if we have whole buildings open and empty. And then number two, what is the signal to the market? What does it do to investor confidence if we're not underwriting new projects? I mean, this again, there's, I hate in any industry when there's this massive disconnect

between demand and supply and that's the condo. That's the world of condos right now in Canadian big cities. Eric, what happens in a situation where they, they, they, built, let's say they've built, let's say they plan to build eight condo towers and they build two and then they stop construction on the other ones. What happens to the value of those two condo buildings that were built on the assumption that there would be a critical mass? Right. Now all of a sudden you're living in a condo building with no neighbors and I have to assume that you're you're already facing headwinds because what you bought was not the fullest expression of what was supposed to be there. Yeah, market absorption to

capacity. It's lower than expected if that happens. And so you start to have massive sell-offs. The listeners will have heard the expression, 10 cents on the dollar. And eventually, if the price of a building falls low enough, the market says that somebody will purchase it, finish it, and then try to either sell those units or rent it out. So, you know, it's funny. Economics is the problem, but economics is also the solution. The problem is it's in the meantime. What do we do in between those? buildings getting bought and then sold what happens to well first of all what happens to the people that can't afford those units that's another question but also again what is it due to the labor supply of that industry because it tanks it there's nothing good from having unsold units in the condo or apartment business then ericam thank you very much my friend stay healthy and the one story we didn't talk about that we actually promoted was the fact that it is it is on we are

uncovering that this Halloween, parents are opting to give chips away rather than chocolate. There are more chips have been sold, I think, at this point than at this point compared to last year than in years past. And candy is, or chocolate rather, is falling off the shelf. And the reason that that's happening is the cost of chocolate has come up a lot. How much? Oh, the percentage, like apparently 28. percent from 21 to 2021 to 2025. That's a lot.

Excuse me. A third. Isn't it a third? Yeah, a third. So that's the thing. That's the thing. All right. We're going to take a break. But when we come back, more on the Ben Mulroney show. Welcome back to the Ben Mulroney show. Thanks so much for spending time with us. Look, we do a census. And that's a snap. of the country. And then you do a sense of a few years later, it's another snapshot.

But it's incumbent upon very smart people to compare one snapshot to the other to see the evolution or in some cases devolution of the country. And we are joined now by a person who was part of a team that did just that. Jeff Park from the Aristotle Foundation. Welcome, Jeff.

Thanks for having me then. Okay, so we're talking about property taxes. They're going up. but it actually means there's actually more going on than that. Right. So why don't you tell us what were you looking for and what did you discover? So the narrative is always that municipalities don't have much control over their own property taxes, you know, so many of the, so much of it is requisitions and it's set by a formula and all these kinds of things. So we wanted to look at what were the differences in the real property tax burden across different cities during this time period where we can get the most accurate possible data where we're not going off the city's own word on what they spend and all that sort of thing.

And so what I found really interesting was in every province's largest city west of Atlantic Canada, the proper tax burden has increased. and on average, for example, Calgary's nominal property tax rose 28%. However, what makes it worse is the average home value fell 7.3%. And the average home income declined 13% in the same period. So I guess you have a formula where you combine those things and it churns out the tax burden. Correct, yes. So we're trying to measure people's actual ability to pay. their property taxes.

So all that goes into the mix. And so for people who lived in Calgary during this period, and I was one of them, you're hit with this triple whammy of your actual home value falling. Yeah. Your assessed home value, maybe not so much, or at least not falling as quickly as your actual home value, wages falling.

but even the nominal tax rate for Calgary were going up during this time and certainly either whether you consider the effective tax rate or the overall tax burden was skyrocketing, eye-popping numbers. Yes, the tax burden rose 47% almost double the increases of Saskatoon and more than triple Vancouver's.

That's a, so you own a house on day one and you have a certain ability to pay it. And then a few years later, it goes up, 47% you now have 47% more trouble paying that that that that bill that's right that's right unbelievable tell me tell me some more of the findings uh that that came out of this report yeah so uh Toronto which your listeners may find hard to believe actually uh actually cut their effective tax rate over this time now the the overall tax burden did continue to go up.

Now, there you go. You told me, don't go, don't look over there. He said, Ben, don't look over there. Go look here at the tax burden. That's the thing that matters. Exactly. Exactly. So that's how actual homeowners, actual taxpayers, that's what they're going to feel.

And so that's what we were trying to measure. And that did continue to go up for everyone. But because of relatively founder fiscal management in Toronto and Montreal, actually, Yeah, I've got a lot of listeners that are listening to you say that, and they're shaking their heads. They don't know what city you're talking about. They don't know what governments you're talking about. I can understand, and it certainly cuts against the type. And, of course, we should clarify we're talking about from 2016 to 2021, because otherwise we're reliant on incomplete and mostly city reported data.

So we're looking back now that stat can has released all their data. on the city. And we can compare between cities. We're doing that. And by the way, there is a fuller report coming that will look at every municipality above 200,000 residents in Canada. But we wanted to get this snapshot out quickly. Jeff, is there a Rubicon that if once we cross it, we can't come back? Oh, absolutely. We talk about this in the reality check that you can definitely have either a vicious cycle or a virtuous cycle that can quickly feel like it's inescapable for municipal decision makers where you're making the city either a less attractive or a more attractive place to live based on the affordability. And so sometimes these

decisions, you know, the counselors aren't entirely wrong when they say that their decisions feel locked in, but it's often by decisions of previous councils. And there is a way off the spiral in either direction. We've seen fortunately and unfortunately that cities can bring their spending back into because, again, most cities, their actual mill rate increases increase by a formula based on what they spend. So it really does have to do with having to bring the spending under control in order to bring that back under control. And, you know, we talk about this, we talk about, I just referenced the Rubicon, but there is an intellectual Rubicon that the, the former provincial liberal government discovered

when it was years ago, and they were, they kept hiking taxes and hiking taxes, and then they were expecting, they were expecting a certain number to, to come, to present itself for what they thought were going to be the annual revenues of the province. Then the number came in far lower than what they expected. And what they realized is people in their minds, as you know, taxpayers had, taxes had gotten so high that they crossed an intellectual Rubicon. They said at this point, now it's now worth it for me to engage in active and very legal tax avoidance strategies. And I got to wonder if that could happen at the municipal level. And I guess that's what you're talking about about the virtuous or the or the vicious cycle because if you keep following using

these policies people will leave or they will avoid taxes and then you're then but you've got these programs you've got to pay for so the only way to pay for them is to hike taxes which then turns the city into a less attractive place and so on and so on is that is is that what you think is going to happen could happen absolutely and and and and and I think I mean again we we showed that for all the largest cities in there municipality west of the Atlantic provinces, uh, this was, this was the trend of the tax burden increasing. And, uh, and some, some places were experiencing a reasonably good economy at that time, some places experiencing a reasonably, reasonably bad economy, but I will say, uh,

you know, Calgary, Calgary at Edmonton, we saw Edmonton's burden remain relatively flat compared to Calgary while experiencing the same Alberta economic downturn over this, over this period. So the decisions that are made by councils can lock you into a trajectory over time where it may become more and more attractive for people to, again, as you say, sort of legally avoid these property tax burden. Yeah. Yeah, well, I mean, you know, I had never thought about, you know, our buying power and the value of our home as something that you should look at as part of a system that then, that then turns out your, um, your tax burden. But that's exactly what it is, right? If, if all of a sudden you are, you are worth less and you have less money, then the cost of

that increase is going to, is going to be more to you. Right. So, you see, you take that for granted because you're one of the smart people. Ah, you come on my show and you blow my mind. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Enjoy the rest of your week, my friend. Thanks so much, Ben. Yeah, I mean, Mike Droulet, I don't know if you heard that,

but our guest posited that Montreal and Toronto, had relative to some other cities in the country, had relatively good governance as it related to taxes. I know. I just about fell out of the chair. But that's, those stats are, pre-Olivia chow. But the problem is

that they do not release the statistics. They don't release the numbers as they go. You're right. Because they don't want it to look bad on them. With most Subaru models, all-wheel drive comes standard. With most Subaru models, all-wheel drive comes standard. Heated

front seats, high ground clearance, car play standard eyesight driver assists to help when you're distracted by fall foliage standard guy announcing the radio ad now wanting a Subaru uh yeah standard Subaru Subaru uncommon come standard hurry into your local Subaru dealership today for lease rates from 1.99% for 24 months on select models and get great value that you guessed it come standard conditions apply see dealer for details hey uh seriously can I get one