A previously secret (and still heavily redacted) RCMP report warns the Canadian government to expect civil unrest once citizens realize how totally screwed the economic situation is, the National Post reports.
"The coming period of recession will … accelerate the decline in living standards that the younger generations have already witnessed compared to earlier generations," reads the "Whole-of-Government Five-Year Trends' report for Canada- of which the aforementioned heavily redacted version was made public thanks to an 'access of information' request filed by Matt Malone, an assistant professor of law at British Columbia’s Thompson Rivers University, and an expert in government secrecy.
"For example, many Canadians under 35 are unlikely ever to be able to buy a place to live," the report continues.
According to the report, labeled as "special operational information" and originally intended to be distributed only within the RCMP and among "decision makers" in the federal government, trends are in motion "that could have a significant effect on the Canadian government and the RCMP."
The authors warn that Canada's current situation "will probably deteriorate further in the next five years," and that in addition to worsening living standards, Canada faces unpredictable seasonal catastrophes, including wildfires and flooding.
Another major theme of the report is that Canadians are set to become increasingly disillusioned with their government, which authors mostly chalk up to “misinformation,” “conspiracy theories” and “paranoia.” -National Post
"Law enforcement should expect continuing social and political polarization fueled by misinformation campaigns and an increasing mistrust for all democratic institutions," reads one of the report's "overarching considerations," the Post reports.
"Erosion of Trust"
"The past seven years have seen marked social and political polarization in the Western world," reads part of the first sentence of a heavily redacted section, entitled "erosion of trust," with the remainder deleted by government censors - who also eliminated most of a section warning about "paranoid populism."
"Capitalizing on the rise of political polarization and conspiracy theories have been populists willing to tailor their messages to appeal to extremist movements," reads the section's one redacted sentence.
As the Post further notes, the RCMP's warnings are in-line with available statistics when it comes to declining living standards and inaccessible home ownership.
Canadian productivity — measured in terms of GDP per capita — has been trending downwards since at least the 1980s. But this has accelerated dramatically in recent years — even as per-worker productivity rises in many of our peer countries.
An analysis last year by University of Calgary economist Trevor Tombe found that if Canada had merely kept pace with U.S. productivity growth for the last five years, Canadian per-capita earnings would be $5,500 higher than they are now.
Meanwhile, housing affordability has reached “worst-ever” levels in most of Canada’s major markets, according to a December analysis by RBC. On average, even condos are now so unaffordable that only 44.5 per cent of Canadian households had sufficient income to buy one at current prices. As for single-family homes, only the richest 25 per cent of Canadian households had any hope of obtaining one. -National Post
"Economic forecasts for the next five years and beyond are bleak," reads the RCMP assessment of the rest of the decade, adding a quote from France's Macron which reads "the end of abundance" is nigh.
