18 Big Ideas to Supercharge Canada’s Economy

Canada is at a crossroads. We have an increasingly complex relationship with our southern neighbour and a brand-new government — plus a housing crisis, an affordability crisis, and heaps and heaps of uncertainty over AI, productivity, trade, and the job market. People are understandably anxious about how all this will shake out and, more broadly, about Canada’s place in the world. But here’s the thing about being at a crossroads: it presents a rare opportunity to try fresh approaches and take fast action. And Canada, to its good fortune, has lots of smart people who can help on both fronts, especially when it comes to boosting business and the economy.

That’s why this week, instead of our normal news analysis, we contacted dozens of influential Canadians and asked them each to share one bold idea for transforming the economy. (Some of them couldn’t limit themselves to just one!) We got so many ideas that we’re dedicating this entire edition of TLDR to them. We’re not here to endorse anything, but we do admire the ambition of the ideas, and we hope some inspire you or force you to think. We’d love to hear your big ideas; below, you can enter yours in a pop-up window after you rate today’s edition. Now, let’s get to it:

Scrap single-family zoning laws in all major cities. “To improve housing affordability, Canada should implement certified, standardized building plans for four- to six-story townhouses, inspired by Paris’s Haussmann public-works plan, with guaranteed two-week approvals if compliant. We should also reserve 15% of land for parks. This approach would encourage mixed-use development, boost housing supply, and support public transit, all without creating concrete jungles.” —Patrick Pichette, former CFO of Google

Stop ‘sin taxes’ on new homes. “Taxes account for 25% of the cost of a new home in the GTA. Governments need to recognize that new housing construction is not a sin and not discourage it through the tax system.” —Mike Moffatt, founding director of Missing Middle Initiative

Expand affordable child-care programs. “The implementation of affordable child care has been a game-changer for Canadian parents. These programs have driven down child-care costs by at least 30% since 2022, and expanding them across Canada would help unleash economic growth.” —Sue Tomney, CEO of YW Calgary

Make competition a priority for finance regulators. “Competition drives down costs and benefits customers. Yet over the past two decades, market concentration has only increased in Canada’s financial industry. That’s why Canadians pay $8.5 billion in excess banking fees annually compared to customers in the UK. The Competition Bureau gets a lot of heat, but the mandate for all financial regulators should include promoting competition, and right now that’s not the case. It’s time to change that.” —Mike Katchen, co-founder and CEO of Wealthsimple

Use the tax code to turbo-charge business investment… “Governments traditionally mitigate economic downturns by supporting household spending. Policymakers should do the same for Canadian business investment, which has been weak for a decade. Start by changing our tax system to over-incentivize business investment in new technology, and supplement this with a trigger that automatically supercharges company spending during economic downturns.” —Stephen Poloz, former Bank of Canada governor and special advisor for Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt

… and keep our homegrown entrepreneurs from fleeing south. “If the United States has significantly lower taxes than Canada, people are going to take their investments and themselves south. Which they’ve been doing. Canada doesn’t need to cut taxes to the floor, but our tax levels need to be competitive to encourage people to try to create wealth in Canada.” —Graeme Thompson, senior analyst for Eurasia Group

Build new transportation corridors — fast. “The Trump tariff agenda was a wake-up call. If we want to secure our future economic prosperity, we need to diversify our markets away from the U.S. This is a huge opportunity to fast-track the construction of transportation corridors to move all of our natural resources to new, or expanded, deep-water ports.” —Derek Evans, executive chair of Pathways Alliance and former CEO of MEG Energy

Safeguard Canada’s trade sovereignty. “Canada’s long-term infrastructure plans should include a new icebreaker fleet to secure our northern sovereignty. This will reduce our defence dependence on the U.S. and help us build resilience for the next 100 years.” —Patrick Pichette, former CFO of Google

Cut red tape for skilled refugees… A Sudanese professor in Somalia shouldn’t have to cross another border to give her fingerprints at a Canadian embassy, but that’s the case if she wants to immigrate to Canada. Let’s remove burdensome requirements and enable displaced individuals to leverage their skills for Canada.” —Dana Wagner, co-founder and managing director of TalentLift Canada

… and get rid of the ‘Canadian experience’ work requirement catch-22. “International students and immigrants are often shut out of job opportunities due to employers’ vague demand for ‘Canadian experience’ — a barrier that wastes talent and stifles growth. Let’s create a national strategy to modernize foreign-credential recognition.” —Isaac Garcia-Sitton, executive director of international student enrollment, education, and inclusion at Toronto Metropolitan University

More government grants for bleeding-edge tech. “Many companies see the value in AI and automation but lack the resources to integrate them. Expanding government grants for tech adoption would boost efficiency across sectors. At the same time, increased government funding for accelerators would provide startups with the mentorship, capital, and infrastructure they need to grow.” —Fatima Zaidi, founder and CEO of Quill and CoHost, and co-chair of #Tech4SickKids

Incentivize employee ownership. “More than 75% of Canadian small-business owners are planning to retire in the next decade. For our country to stay prosperous and self-reliant, we need to keep these businesses locally owned. Canada took an important first step in 2024 with the Employee Ownership Trust, but we need to go further by expanding tax incentives and making the transition to employee ownership easier for businesses.” —Charlie Iscoe, co-founder of CommonShares

Launch a nationwide Made-in-Canada industrial campaign. “Let’s use Canadian steel and aluminum to build subways, buses, and ships right here in Canada, putting Canadians to work.” —Lana Payne, president of Unifor Canada

Improve parental leave benefits for entrepreneurs. “Founders who own over 40% of their business only qualify for a special Employment Insurance (EI) program that requires registration a full year in advance. If small businesses are the backbone of our economy, we should support them whenever they grow their families. The government should: a) provide support regardless of reported self-employment income; b) allow EI access regardless of ownership share; and c) offer flexible leave.” —Erin Bury, co-founder and CEO of Willful

Launch a national hunger-alleviation program. “Twenty-five percent of Canadians face food insecurity. Reducing hunger would benefit citizens as well as drive economic growth, because it’s hard to be productive when you’re hungry. Canada should implement a program where people earning over $250,000 a year contribute $1,000 annually to food banks. If the provinces matched these contributions by 3x–1x and the federal government did by 2x, the program would generate $1.2 billion annually.” —Patrick Pichette, former CFO of Google

Friday afternoons off for everyone! “Switching to a four-and-a-half-day workweek has improved our teams’ mental and physical health and their productivity. And we are just as effective in four and a half days versus five. —Erin Bury, co-founder and CEO of Willful

Break up Canada’s telecom oligopoly. “We have some of the world’s highest mobile-phone costs, which telecom blames on our small population and large geography, but 80% of us live in relatively dense areas. Canada has tools to boost competition: support independent wireless providers, let Mobile Virtual Network Operators operate without owning infrastructure, speed up CRTC disputes, and on and on.” —Brice Scheschuk, managing partner of Globalive Capital and co-founder of Wind Mobile (now Freedom Mobile)

Capitalize on the skills and experience of older Canadians. “More than nine million Canadians are aged 55 to 74 — a vast reservoir of talent and insight. Their engagement can bridge skill gaps, boost productivity and growth, and reduce health-care costs. Governments and employers must collaborate on customized training for this cohort and eliminate financial disincentives to work from pension programs.” —Zabeen Hirji, retired CHRO for the Royal Bank of Canada

Interviews were edited for length, clarity, and accuracy.

Written By

Claire Porter Robbins

Claire Porter Robbins is a freelance journalist. She founded Btchcoin News, a financial and economics newsletter, and has written for a variety of publications including The Atlantic, the New Yorker, and The Globe and Mail.