Economy
Nighttime light intensity exposes failure of autocratic regimes

From the Fraser Institute
When people have more economic freedom, they are allowed to make more of their own economic decisions, free of constraints imposed by others. During the 1960s and 1970s, despite the relative economic success of most western democracies, most of the rest of the world rejected strong pro-market policies, with the notable exception of Hong Kong. Milton Friedman said Hong Kong offered “an almost laboratory experiment in what happens when government is limited to its proper functions and leaves people free to pursue their own objectives.” Hong Kong’s success served as the primary example of the uplifting potential of economic freedom.
However, without a quantifiable measure of economic freedom, it was difficult to generalize these claims. This led to the conception and production of the Economic Freedom of the World (EFW) index by the Fraser Institute. Armed with a measure of economic freedom, researchers could test the claim that economic freedom leads to prosperity.
Since its inception, the multiple editions of the dataset routinely confirmed that economically freer countries have higher income levels, enjoy faster economic growth, are more resilient to shocks, and produce great reductions in poverty and income gains all along the income ladder.
But in fact, in a recent article published by the European Journal of Political Economy and co-authored with Macy Scheck and Sean Patrick Alvarez, I offer evidence that the EFW report often underestimates the potency of economic freedom.
Why? Because the economic statistics produced in countries ruled by autocrats are not believable.
In autocratic regimes, rulers must bolster their legitimacy to prevent coups or uprisings, so they produce statistics that exaggerate their country’s performance. And since neither the opposition nor independent authorities are allowed to challenge these claims, autocrats can get away with lying about the size of their economies.
Autocrats also repress economic freedom (along with other freedoms), so any estimation of the effects of economic freedom on economic development will likely be exaggerated due to the lies of dictators.
How can we correct these lies? It’s not as if the autocrats would let us check their books. But fortunately, we don’t have to. We simply need a measure of economic activity that correlates with economic development and cannot be manipulated. Namely, nighttime light intensity, as measured by satellites orbiting the Earth.
Satellites provide accurate and unbiased information, which dictators cannot manipulate. Nighttime light is artificial (manmade) and its level should depict (all else being equal) levels of development. It’s why one can often see images of North and South Korea at night where the former is in utter darkness and the latter sparkles like a Christmas tree.
By examining the relationship between light intensity and economic development as measured by GDP in democracies—where data is generally reliable—one can estimate the extent of inaccuracies in the economic data reported by dictatorships and then create corrected data.
In our article, based on satellite data, we found that in more than 110 countries (including dictatorships), the association between economic freedom and income levels was between 10 per cent and 62 per cent greater than previously estimated. We also found that when using the corrected data, one extra point of economic freedom (on a 10-point scale) generated between 5 per cent and 24 per cent more economic growth from 1992 to 2012.
These results are a powerful answer to those who doubt the value of economic freedom. And they offer a way to see past the lies of dictators.
Alberta
Pierre Poilievre – Per Capita, Hardisty, Alberta Is the Most Important Little Town In Canada

From Pierre Poilievre
Business
Why it’s time to repeal the oil tanker ban on B.C.’s north coast

The Port of Prince Rupert on the north coast of British Columbia. Photo courtesy Prince Rupert Port Authority
From the Canadian Energy Centre
By Will Gibson
Moratorium does little to improve marine safety while sending the wrong message to energy investors
In 2019, Martha Hall Findlay, then-CEO of the Canada West Foundation, penned a strongly worded op-ed in the Globe and Mail calling the federal ban of oil tankers on B.C.’s northern coast “un-Canadian.”
Six years later, her opinion hasn’t changed.
“It was bad legislation and the government should get rid of it,” said Hall Findlay, now director of the University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy.
The moratorium, known as Bill C-48, banned vessels carrying more than 12,500 tonnes of oil from accessing northern B.C. ports.
Targeting products from one sector in one area does little to achieve the goal of overall improved marine transport safety, she said.
“There are risks associated with any kind of transportation with any goods, and not all of them are with oil tankers. All that singling out one part of one coast did was prevent more oil and gas from being produced that could be shipped off that coast,” she said.
Hall Findlay is a former Liberal MP who served as Suncor Energy’s chief sustainability officer before taking on her role at the University of Calgary.
She sees an opportunity to remove the tanker moratorium in light of changing attitudes about resource development across Canada and a new federal government that has publicly committed to delivering nation-building energy projects.
“There’s a greater recognition in large portions of the public across the country, not just Alberta and Saskatchewan, that Canada is too dependent on the United States as the only customer for our energy products,” she said.
“There are better alternatives to C-48, such as setting aside what are called Particularly Sensitive Sea Areas, which have been established in areas such as the Great Barrier Reef and the Galapagos Islands.”
The Business Council of British Columbia, which represents more than 200 companies, post-secondary institutions and industry associations, echoes Hall Findlay’s call for the tanker ban to be repealed.
“Comparable shipments face no such restrictions on the East Coast,” said Denise Mullen, the council’s director of environment, sustainability and Indigenous relations.
“This unfair treatment reinforces Canada’s over-reliance on the U.S. market, where Canadian oil is sold at a discount, by restricting access to Asia-Pacific markets.
“This results in billions in lost government revenues and reduced private investment at a time when our economy can least afford it.”
The ban on tanker traffic specifically in northern B.C. doesn’t make sense given Canada already has strong marine safety regulations in place, Mullen said.
Notably, completion of the Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion in 2024 also doubled marine spill response capacity on Canada’s West Coast. A $170 million investment added new equipment, personnel and response bases in the Salish Sea.
“The [C-48] moratorium adds little real protection while sending a damaging message to global investors,” she said.
“This undermines the confidence needed for long-term investment in critical trade-enabling infrastructure.”
Indigenous Resource Network executive director John Desjarlais senses there’s an openness to revisiting the issue for Indigenous communities.
“Sentiment has changed and evolved in the past six years,” he said.
“There are still concerns and trust that needs to be built. But there’s also a recognition that in addition to environmental impacts, [there are] consequences of not doing it in terms of an economic impact as well as the cascading socio-economic impacts.”
The ban effectively killed the proposed $16-billion Eagle Spirit project, an Indigenous-led pipeline that would have shipped oil from northern Alberta to a tidewater export terminal at Prince Rupert, B.C.
“When you have Indigenous participants who want to advance these projects, the moratorium needs to be revisited,” Desjarlais said.
He notes that in the six years since the tanker ban went into effect, there are growing partnerships between B.C. First Nations and the energy industry, including the Haisla Nation’s Cedar LNG project and the Nisga’a Nation’s Ksi Lisims LNG project.
This has deepened the trust that projects can mitigate risks while providing economic reconciliation and benefits to communities, Dejarlais said.
“Industry has come leaps and bounds in terms of working with First Nations,” he said.
“They are treating the rights of the communities they work with appropriately in terms of project risk and returns.”
Hall Findlay is cautiously optimistic that the tanker ban will be replaced by more appropriate legislation.
“I’m hoping that we see the revival of a federal government that brings pragmatism to governing the country,” she said.
“Repealing C-48 would be a sign of that happening.”
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Pierre Poilievre – Per Capita, Hardisty, Alberta Is the Most Important Little Town In Canada