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Sometimes only an economist could find this stuff.
One of the more interesting quarterly reports on the outlook for the provincial economy comes from Scotiabank. First of all, they are pretty much in line with others in the banking community with targeted growth of 1.6 per cent this year and 2.0 next year. That is virtually identical to a couple others.
But they have identified a few subject areas that largely go unnoticed but are worthy of a comment.
The first is in the field of information and communications exports. This is largely engineering in nature and falls into the category of the knowledge economy. On this one, the whole country is doing well and the Prairies are especially strong. B.C., is leading this one, but Saskatchewan is not far behind.
The bank also isolated the acquisition of machinery and equipment. This is a signal that business is tooling up for the future. The Prairies are definitely the leader in this category. And, on reducing government deficits, Saskatchewan was the strongest performer – moving towards a balance, while other provinces are falling back into deficit spending mode.
