Canadians will get an idea today of what the COVID-19 pandemic could mean for Canada’s economy and the federal government’s balance sheet, with the release of a new report from the parliamentary budget officer. Yves Giroux is planning to post on his website this morning a “scenario analysis” that is intended to help parliamentarians gauge…

The black swan has landed.  The novel coronavirus pandemic is well underway worldwide, but it wasn’t until this month that Canadians started coming to grips with the economic pain it can bring, in addition to its heavy human toll. Economists are struggling to come up with best guesses as to what might be coming. There’s…

When Sunwing pilot Derek Butcher recovers from COVID-19, which he believes he picked up on the job, he won’t be returning to work. That’s because Sunwing is laying off all its 470 pilots on April 8, according to the pilots’ union, Unifor. Sunwings’ 1,063 flight attendants will also be laid off, effective April 1, said their employees’…

Construction is on Ontario’s list of essential services that can keep operating during the COVID-19 pandemic, but there are growing calls within the sector for a broad industry shutdown, such as the one Quebec instituted this week. Ontario workers on large job sites, unions and contractors who do smaller-scale residential and commercial projects are among…

The cost of buying a barrel of Canadian oil fell to less than a Barrel of Monkeys on Thursday as the oil price again crashed to record levels. Western Canadian Select (WCS) was selling for $6.45 US a barrel Thursday, down $2.84 US from a day earlier. That’s below last week’s record when it sold for…

A cyberattack has forced an unknown number of Ontario’s more than 400 Beer Store locations to go cash only, as their credit and debit processing capabilities were wiped out. Brewers Retail, a consortium of brewing conglomerates that owns the retail chain known as The Beer Store, was targeted by a cyberattack that wiped out most…