The Sandor Report

A recent interview with Australian millionaire Tim Gurner has gained traction – particularly on social media – after TIME reported his comments that millennials cannot afford to buy homes because they insist on buying “smashed avocado for $19 and four coffees at $4 each”.  Obviously this is hyperbole and the point he is using food spending to make an argument that millennials are spending too much money on frivolous purchases.  I don’t know about you, but I’m bored with inflammatory rhetoric – I want data.  I went looking to see how much validity is behind his argument.  After an evening on the Statistics Canada website I’ve crunched the numbers. Full disclosure, I am a millennial; I can’t afford to buy a house; I don’t like avocado; and I believe that –  perhaps – the discrepancy between millennial budgets and housing prices results from a combination of complex economic factors – not avocado toast spending. Food Spending [i] [ii] We should start w...

Recently,   local policy group, The London Institute published an excellent piece advocating the need for local employers and post-secondary institutions to work together to create more opportunities for co-op placements and internships.   This article argued – rightfully so – that internships provide opportunities for new professionals to establish the skills and networks needed to pursue meaningful employment in London rather than leaving the local economy.   The London Institute piece includes the argument that “firm, visible, internship programs… give students practical work experience, allowing them to apply their knowledge to real-world and local problems”.   While this is certainly the intention of a good internship placement, all internships are not created equal – that being said, not all interns are created equal either (I’ll write more on this in a future post).   When providing any kind of opportunity for new professionals, be it an internship...

Once a month Statistics Canada releases the Labour Force Survey .  This is a report designed to provide insight into the labour market across Canada and includes a breakdown by province and various census divisions and subdivisions showing the size of the labour force as well as the number of people who are employed and unemployed.  For most people, the Labour Force Survey is a way to keep track of how many people do and do not have jobs.  What this means in practical terms is that the media reports a limited subset of the data in the report and that is all that the average citizen has to go on.  While the media does report increases or decreases to the overall number of jobs, the most common number that people pay attention to is the unemployment rate.  Unfortunately this is the statistic included in the Labour Force Survey that has the least value and is misused more than any other figure. A Mark Twain quote about how numbers can be misleading comes to mi...

Just before Christmas, the George Morris Centre published a report that revolved around on the closings of the Heinz Leamington and Kellogg’s London plants as indicators of a transition in food manufacturing.  A number of points that the report raises seem to resonate well beyond the food industry.  A close look at the report suggests that cities in southwestern Ontario such as London need to fundamentally rethink the way they approach economic development.  The days of large plants employing many workers are on the way out and there is no going back.  Instead, the future of economic success lies in attracting many small firms producing speciality goods and employing fewer than 50 workers.  The George Morris report does not even make it past the introduction before pointing out that the food industry is in a state of transition and although we are seeing multiple plant closures, the industry is ripe with opportunity for investment for those willing to acc...