Canada Ranked No.1 Place to Live for Quality of Life

In U.S. News and World Report's 2019 Best Countries Report, produced with the BAV Group and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, 20,300 respondents from 36 countries in the Americas, Europe, Middle East, Asia and Africa were asked to score 80 countries based on 65 attributes, Canada has been named as the #1 country in the world in 2019 for Quality of Life for the fourth year in a row.

The attributes were grouped under categories like adventure, citizenship, cultural influence, entrepreneurship, heritage, movers, open for business, power and quality of life. Overall, Canada also ranked as the third best country in the world for women, third for education, and second for corporate headquarters. 

Canada beat out Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, and Finland, which all finished in the Quality of Life top five. According to the study, Canada placed number one for its political stability, strong job market, safe environment, and its good education system.

Canadian Economy in October 2016 Adds 44,000 Job but....

The economy gained 44,000 jobs last month -- fueled entirely by part-time employment, which offset a loss in full-time positions -- Statistics Canada said Friday, raising concerns that Canadians are having trouble securing gainful work.

The result is further evidence that Canada is struggling to create "quality, high-paying jobs," said David Madani, senior Canada economist at Capital Economics.

"Even though headline employment is rising, overall income growth still appears to be slowing sharply," Madani wrote in a note to clients.

The overall increase in employment was driven by 67,000 additional part-time positions for the month, while the number of full-time jobs fell by 23,000. The unemployment rate held steady at 7.0 per cent as more people entered the labour market, looking for work.

Apple iPhone 4th-Quarter Sales Beat Estimates But Company's Revenue Falls

Apple says it sold 45.51 million iPhones in the three months ended Sept. 24, beating the average analysts' estimate of 44.8 million, according to research firm FactSet StreetAccount. (Josh Edelson/AFP/Getty Images)

Apple Inc. posted a third quarter in a row of declining iPhone sales on Tuesday, but beat Wall Street targets for its flagship product and forecast higher-than-expected revenue for the critical holiday shopping season.

Apple executives said demand for the new iPhone 7, the company's best hope to revive flagging sales, was strong, despite fiscal fourth-quarter revenue dips in China and the Americas, its two most important markets.

"We couldn't be more excited about the customer response to the iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus," Apple CEO Tim Cook said, according to CNBC.

Average Canadian sold houses climbs 9% to $439,144 in March

CBC reports that the average price of a Canadian home sold in March increased by nine per cent compared with the same month a year earlier, rising to almost $440,000. The average house price was $439,144, and actual home sales activity rose 9.5 per cent above March 2014 levels.

While the spring home buying season is off to a hot start, the two big markets of Toronto and Vancouver continue to skew the numbers higher, the Canadian Real Estate Association said Wednesday. If sales in those two markets are stripped out, the average price for Canadian resale homes drops to $332,711, with an annual increase of just 2.4 per cent.

Canada's unemployment rate stays at 6.8 per cent in March

The Canadian Press
Canada’s economy posted a surprise job gain in March as more people found part-time work.

Statistics Canada’s latest labour market survey says the country’s jobless rate remained at 6.8 per cent in March — unchanged from the previous month — and it registered a month-to-month net gain of nearly 29,000 jobs.

Women over 55 years old, in particular, were able to find new jobs in March.

The unemployment rate matched the consensus projection of economists, who also predicted no new jobs would be created for the month, according to Thomson Reuters.

“The bar was set pretty low for this employment release and it managed to clear it,” Bank of Montreal chief economist Douglas Porter said in a note to investors.

Japan population fell by a record 268,000 in 2014

Japan’s population fell by a record 268,000 people last year, new data show, with preliminary figures showing just above 1 million births in 2014, NPR.com reports.

The figures released by the country’s health ministry showed that the estimated number of people who died in 2014 was 1,269,000, about 1,000 above the previous year. The number of births was 1,001,000, down about 29,000 from 2013. The total population declined by a record 268,000.

The Kyodo news service adds that the number of births could slide below 1 million when new numbers are released in June.

Canada Household debt hits record high

Credit cards are displayed in Montreal on December 12, 2012. A sustained period of low interest rates has allowed Canadians to rack up record levels of debt which, along with tumbling oil prices, pose a threat to the country's financial stability, economists say. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz

Alexandra Posadzki CPA sustained period of low interest rates has allowed Canadians to rack up record levels of debt which, along with tumbling oil prices, pose a threat to the country’s financial stability, economists say.

The total amount of credit market debt — which includes mortgages, non-mortgage loans and consumer credit — held by Canadian households hit a record high in the third quarter, climbing to 162.6 per cent of disposable income from a revised 161.5 per cent in the second quarter.

That means Canadians owed about $1.63 for every dollar of disposable income, according to the latest figures from Statistics Canada.

“The Bank of Canada has a lot on its plate in terms of assessing risk to the Canadian economy,” Leslie Preston, an economist at TD Economics, said in a note.

Snapshot of Global Wage Report

Over 200,00 Attempted Suicide Recorded In Ontario Last Year

The Canadian Press
A new study from Canada's largest mental health and addiction research centre suggests more than 230,000 Ontario adults "seriously contemplated suicide" in 2013.

The Toronto-based Centre for Addiction and Mental Health says that amounted to 2.3 per cent of Ontario's adult population.

CAMH says its mental health survey, started in 1977, was based on responses from 3,021 Ontario adults who were asked specifically about suicide for the first time.

"We felt it was important to include a specific question about suicide so that we can better understand the scope of the issue," said Dr. Hayley Hamilton, CAMH scientist and co-principal investigator of the study.

The centre says the results also reveal a sharp increase in self-rated poor mental health, from 4.7 per cent in 2003 to 7.1 per cent in 2013, or 716,000 Ontario adults.

CAMH says the increase was especially evident during the past five years among those aged 18 to 29, rising from about three per cent in 2009 to 12 per cent in 2013.

Hamilton calls the rising rates among young adults a troubling trend.

"This could be an indication that young adults and youth transitioning to adulthood need more support from family, friends, and health professionals when it comes to their mental health and overall wellbeing."

The CAMH study also shows the rate of cannabis use among Ontario adults climbed to 14 per cent last year from 8.7 per cent in 1996. And, while 40 per cent of 2013 users report using cannabis less than once per month, the percentage reporting daily use was 19 per cent.

Homicide rate in Canada down to lowest level since 1966

Det. Todd Carefoot, a Toronto forensic officer, dusts for finger prints on Tuesday as police investigated a murder in a bus shelter at the corner of Victoria Park and Clydesale St. Torstar News Service

The country’s homicide rate fell last year to 1.44 victims for every 100,000 people, its lowest level since 1966, Statistics Canada reported Monday.

The agency said the 2013 rate was eight per cent lower than in 2012.

That follows reports that the overall crime rate also declined in 2013 compared with 2012, falling eight per cent to its lowest level since 1969. Statistics Canada said last summer that the crime rate was continuing a long-term, downward trend that began in the early 1990s.

But the drop in murders and a falling crime rate overall haven’t deflected the Harper government from its tough-on-crime agenda.

Ebola Toll In West Africa Death Hit the 16,000 Mark

A child suffering from the Ebola virus receives treatment in Makeni, Sierra Leone. Photograph: Tanya Bindra/AP

Chris Johnston  | Guardian
The number of people with Ebola in west Africa has risen above 16,000, with the death toll from the outbreak reaching almost 7,000, the World Health Organisation (WHO) says.

The number of deaths is more than 1,000 higher than the figure issued by the WHO just two days ago, but it is thought to include deaths that have gone unreported in the weeks or months since the outbreak began. Most of the new deaths were recorded in Liberia.

The WHO has warned that its figures could be a significant underestimation of the number of infections and deaths. Data from the outbreak has been patchy and the totals often rise considerably when backlogs of information are cleared. The latest confirmed data shows that almost half those known to have been infected with Ebola have died.

Meanwhile, two children tested for Ebola after arriving in Britain from Africa are not infected, Public Health England confirmed on Saturday. It said the overall risk to the public of the virus continued to be “very low”.

Ebola Death Toll In Sierra Leone Rebounds

A child, center, stands underneath a signboard reading 'Police order quarantined home unauthorised should keep off' as a family home is placed under quarantine due to the Ebola virus in Port Loko, Sierra Leone, Wednesday, Oct. 22, 2014. U.S. authorities said Wednesday that everyone traveling into the U.S. from Ebola-stricken nations will be monitored for symptoms for 21 days. That includes returning American aid workers, federal health employees and journalists, as well as West African travelers | AP

Reuters
The toll in the Ebola epidemic has risen to 5,420 deaths out of 15,145 cases in eight countries, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday, with transmission of the deadly virus still "intense and widespread" in Sierra Leone.

The figures, through Nov. 16, represent a jump of 243 deaths and 732 cases since those issued last Friday, and cases continue to be under-reported, the WHO said in its latest update.

Sierra Leone, a former British colony, confirmed 533 new cases in the week to Nov. 16, it said, accounting for much of the increase. It also reported 63 deaths since last Friday.

"Much of this was driven by intense transmission in the country's west and north," the WHO said.

The capital Freetown, which accounted for 168 new confirmed cases, and nearby Port Loko were particularly hard-hit.

Wait For It! Black Friday By The Numbers

People carry shopping bags along Broadway on December 2, 2013 in New York City. Getty Images

When they sit down to carve their turkeys on Thursday, families across the U.S. have at least one reason to be thankful: Black Friday. The annual feast of discounts and credit card-swiping — which, increasingly, begins on Thanksgiving itself, if not sooner — pumps billions of dollars into the U.S. economy and prompts Americans to get a head start on holiday shopping. Here are the key figures behind the binge:

1966: The year Philadelphia police are thought to have coined the term “Black Friday,” referring to the tide of theft and traffic infractions they had to cope with on the first big day of Christmas shopping.

6 p.m.: The time that U.S. Target, Walmart, and Sears stores will open for Black Friday this year, but on Thanksgiving Thursday.

5 p.m.: The time that Best Buy stores will open on Thursday.

Canada's Inflation Rate Now The Highest In The Developed World

Daniel Tencer | Huff
Outside of Japan, which has seen prices spike due to a tax hike, Canada has the highest inflation rate among major industrialized nations.

That’s according to an analysis from Bank of Montreal chief economist Doug Porter, who took last Friday’s surprisingly strong inflation numbers from StatsCan and compared them to inflation rates around the globe.

Stripping away Japan’s one-time price hike, “Canada rules the roost” when it comes to price increases, Porter concluded.

Ebola Statistics: Death toll tops 5,000

Health workers carry the body of an Ebola virus victim in the Waterloo district of Freetown, Sierra Leone, October 21, 2014. CREDIT: REUTERS/JOSEPHUS OLU-MAMMA

The death toll from the Ebola outbreak in West Africa's three hardest-hit countries, Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, has risen to 5,147 out of 14,068 cases at the end of Nov. 9, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Wednesday.

A further 13 deaths and 30 cases have been recorded in five other countries - Nigeria, Senegal, Mali, Spain and the United States, the U.N. agency said.

"There is some evidence that case incidence is no longer increasing nationally in Guinea and Liberia, but steep increases persist in Sierra Leone," the WHO said in a statement. "Cases and deaths continue to be under-reported in this outbreak."

Some 421 new infections were reported in Sierra Leone in the week to Nov. 9, especially in the west and north, it said.

Ebola is still spreading intensely in Sierra Leone's capital of Freetown, with Koinadugu and Kambia northern regions now "emerging areas of concern", it added.

Infographic: How Internet Has Changed Our Lives In Recent Years

People Can Wait Up Till 291 Days For Common Surgery in Ontario

How Did Canada Fare On Global Competitiveness Ranking

 

Canada isn’t being innovative enough, and that’s costing the country its ranking on a global measure of competitiveness.

 

The World Economic Forum (WEF)’s competitiveness ranking for 2014 places Canada in 15th place, down one from last year. As recently as 2009, Canada had been in ninth place.

Compare that to the U.S., which as recently as 2012 ranked seventh, but this year took third place. Switzerland and Singapore retained their positions as the first and second most competitive economies, respectively.

The ranking measures countries according to 12 “pillars,” including the strength of its institutions, education, innovation and business sophistication.

Canada saw some of its lowest scores in the innovation category. It placed 27th on research and development and 52nd on foreign investment, out of 144 countries measured.

Canada is No.9 in World's Best Place To be Born Index

United Nations Reports More Than 3million Have Fled Syria

More than three million Syrians are now registered as refugees and the desperate crisis is only getting worse, the UN’s refugee agency says.

 

The UNHCR says Syria is now “the biggest humanitarian emergency of our era” with almost half of all Syrians forced to flee their homes.

 

The majority of refugees have fled to countries neighboring Syria, with most now seeking shelter in Lebanon.

 

More than 190,000 have been killed in Syria’s three-year civil war.

 

Opposition groups in Syria have been fighting forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad since his government violently suppressed protests against his rule in March 2011.

 

The situation has been worsened in recent months by the formation and advance of the Islamic State group, which now controls large swathes of Syria and Iraq.

 

The UNHCR says one in every eight Syrians has fled across the border and a further 6.5 million are displaced within Syria. It says more than half of those uprooted are children.

 

The number of registered Syrian refugees has soared from two million just under a year ago.

 

Families arriving at refugee camps in neighboring countries are exhausted and scared, with some having spent a year or more fleeing from village to village inside Syria.

 

The UN agency says the journey out of Syria is also becoming tougher, with many people forced to pay bribes to armed gangs.