PJ The Belt - August 30, 2025


Canada COLLAPSES: Trump Tariffs Trigger RECESSION!


Episode Stats

Length

8 minutes

Words per Minute

154.40906

Word Count

1,259

Sentence Count

97

Hate Speech Sentences

5


Summary

The Canadian economy has officially entered a recession. Gross domestic product fell 1.6% in the second quarter, the biggest drop since the Pandemic of the 1980s. Is it the result of the trade war with the United States? Or is it the start of a full-on recession?


Transcript

00:00:00.000 As you're considering military force to acquire Panama and Greenland, are you also considering
00:00:06.540 military force to annex and acquire Panama? No. Economic force. Because Canada and the United
00:00:13.280 States, that would really be something. You get rid of that artificially drawn line and you take
00:00:20.320 a look at what that looks like. It is the biggest GDP drop since the pandemic. Gross domestic product
00:00:26.060 fell at a 1.6% annualized pace for the second quarter of the year. Economic force. The Canadian
00:00:32.360 recession has already begun, so says Canada's National Post, with economists now expecting
00:00:37.840 Canada's output to fall in the next two quarters, the definition of a recession, as exports stumble
00:00:43.900 in the trade war with Trump. Economic force. We also agreed that we need to proceed carefully
00:00:49.160 with particular attention to the risks and uncertainties facing the Canadian economy.
00:00:54.360 If a weakening economy puts further downward pressure on inflation, and the upward price
00:01:00.780 pressures from trade disruption are contained, there may be a need for a reduction in the
00:01:06.840 policy interest rate. Economic force.
00:01:14.780 All right, so Canada's economy has finally stumbled headfirst into recession. Not exactly a shocker
00:01:22.800 to anyone paying attention. Well, maybe except for the elbows up crowd and the professional
00:01:27.880 denialist on the left. But today, the federal government had no choice but to release the
00:01:33.620 ugly numbers. And let's just say they don't paint a pretty picture. Canada is sliding further
00:01:39.280 into third world status, while south of the border, the US economy is booming. And Trump?
00:01:45.540 He's not shy about it. He's flat out declared previously that he'll take Canada economically,
00:01:51.620 not militarily. Bold words, and honestly, can you blame him? Let's dive in.
00:01:57.340 If you support these videos, please like and subscribe. I appreciate it.
00:02:02.420 It is the biggest GDP drop since the pandemic. Gross domestic product fell at a 1.6% annualized
00:02:10.060 pace for the second quarter of the year. Let's go to Sal Guterri on this, Director of Senior
00:02:14.620 Economist at BMO Capital Markets, to talk about it. Thanks for joining us today.
00:02:19.420 You're welcome.
00:02:20.500 So is this all tariff-related?
00:02:22.080 I'd say pretty well that is the case, yeah. And that's why Canada's economy was basically
00:02:29.380 the biggest global casualty of this trade war. You had exports collapsing 27% at an annualized
00:02:38.120 rate in the quarter, and business spending, machinery and equipment, plunged even more.
00:02:43.800 Those are pandemic-like declines in activity. No mystery why the tariffs on motor vehicles,
00:02:50.680 steel, aluminum, those were the real weak spots for exports. And Canadian businesses, because
00:02:57.340 of all the uncertainty about trade policies, when things get worse, when they get better,
00:03:02.720 really just put plans to invest on hold. And so we saw a big collapse in business investment
00:03:09.280 as well.
00:03:10.880 Economically, we have such power over Canada. I'd rather not use it, but they did something
00:03:17.080 with our tech companies today, trying to copy Europe. They copied Europe. It's not going
00:03:21.780 to work out well for Europe either. And it's not going to work out well for Canada. They
00:03:26.340 were foolish to do it. And so I said, we're going to stop all negotiations with Canada right
00:03:31.400 now until they straighten out their act.
00:03:34.080 The only people who thought Canada could stand a chance going toe-to-toe with an economy over
00:03:40.280 10 times its size were the willfully blind or the poor souls watching government-paid media
00:03:46.200 and believe in them.
00:03:48.440 The truth is, the United States doesn't even want to cause damage to Canada. They just want
00:03:54.160 a fair trade deal and for Ottawa to finally control its leaky northern border and drug pipelines.
00:03:59.800 Here's the kicker though. Even the government-funded media, you know, the same folks who usually
00:04:06.160 gaslight the public to protect their liberal buddies, they're now forced to admit the truth.
00:04:11.920 And watching them eat crow on live television is priceless.
00:04:16.580 If you look at GDP, the Canadian economy doesn't appear to be doing all that bad. Heck, we're
00:04:21.880 not even in a recession. As of last count, Canadian GDP growth was just keeping its head above water,
00:04:26.880 so the economy is technically still growing. But the numbers change considerably when you
00:04:31.920 look at measures of worker productivity. They keep dropping. And they're projected to
00:04:38.400 keep dropping for the next 40 years. Canadians are going to work, they're clocking in their
00:04:42.820 eight hours, but on average, they're producing less than they used to. It's gotten to the point
00:04:48.320 where Ontario, Canada's largest province, now has a per capita GDP roughly on par with Alabama,
00:04:53.280 one of the poorest states in the U.S. And this is affecting our standard of living.
00:04:58.320 University of Calgary economist Trevor Toome crunched the numbers and figured out that if
00:05:02.240 Canadian labour productivity had instead spent the last six years keeping pace with the U.S.,
00:05:07.000 you know, instead of remaining stagnant, we'd all be making an extra $5,500.
00:05:13.840 Negative winds are blowing with youth unemployment worse than we thought. According to a new report,
00:05:19.620 it's at recessionary levels. That's not good. And it means that those between the ages of 15 and 24
00:05:26.260 are really having a tough time finding work. We sent CTV's Adrienne Gobriel to check out whether this
00:05:32.180 is just a blip or here to stay. Adrienne?
00:05:36.980 Sandy, I'm here inside a youth employment services office where the CEO tells me people are arriving in
00:05:41.860 droves desperate for work. And now one of Canada's largest banks says the increase in youth unemployment
00:05:48.980 has surpassed levels we normally see during a recession and the troubling trend could linger.
00:05:55.620 And here's the part that bothers me the most. The ones paying the price for all this incompetence
00:06:01.060 aren't the well-connected or the elites. It's Canada's youth. Right now, young Canadians can't even
00:06:06.580 land a basic entry-level job in their own country, while cheap foreign workers keep coming in thanks
00:06:12.980 to disastrous immigration policies. But don't expect the liberal crowd to care. Their kids are
00:06:21.060 already set up for life. It's regular folks like you and I that get stuck holding the bag. And that's
00:06:27.620 the ugly reality. For years, Canada's Temporary Foreign Worker Program called TFWP has been a
00:06:34.260 festering mess under the Liberal government fueling a black market in migrant permits while sidelining
00:06:40.180 Canadian workers. A June Labor Department briefing note titled Labor Market Impact Assessment Misuse
00:06:46.260 Exposed by Blacklocks confirms what critics long suspected. Permits are being traded like commodities
00:06:52.180 enriching shady domestic and international operators. Now just to point out here that LMIAs
00:06:57.300 are labor market impact assessments. They're documents required by Canadian employers to hire
00:07:02.980 foreign workers. A positive or approved LMIA confirms that there was no Canadian citizen or
00:07:08.660 permanent resident available for the jobs. This flood of cheap labor has suppressed wages
00:07:13.860 and strained housing and health care. All well, Ottawa, look the other way.
00:07:18.420 CIBC Capital Markets has shared that unemployment for those aged 15 to 24 has
00:07:23.140 increased by more than 5.5 percent since 2022. The average uptick in youth unemployment during a
00:07:29.620 recession typically has been around 4 percent. It is unusual to see this level of youth unemployment when
00:07:36.020 the economy is not in an outright recession. Hey, if you've made it this far, thank you so much for
00:07:41.780 watching. If you'd like to be notified every time a new video is published, hit the subscribe button and
00:07:46.740 activate the notifications bell. It's completely free and it helps our channel grow. A heartfelt thank you
00:07:52.420 to all our channel members. I really appreciate your support. See you all in the next one. Peace.