Pretty quite!Where is everyone today? Haven't heard yet what Premiere Wynne said in Timmins today about her meeting with Harper yesterday but I do konw her flight got in later then expected.
I was reading the cbc article about her meeting with Harper yesterday and this quote kinda caught my attention and I was looking for your thoughts. I know you guys think I'm a basher but I'm not. I am realist.
It's from this article
https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/harper-wynne-agree-ring-of-fire-funding-must-be-of-public-benefit-1.2452230
"The Ontario government has estimated the total capital investment for infrastructure in the range of $800 million to $1 billion, with the estimated costs of connecting the Ring of Fire communities to all-season access roads at $1.25 billion"
And I started thinking about it... We all know the price different between building a road vs rail and the huge difference in profits thereafter. Rail is more expensive up front but will prove to be more profitable in the long run, costing less to ship ore out of the ROF. But the government doesn't care about private companies margins. They care about job creation. So the Wynne government has commited a certain amount of tax dollars to infrustucture and are pressuring the Feds to step up with some funding... They are only going to pay for a road, not rail.
The road is clearly cheaper for them and they will create so many more long term jobs vs a rail. They can't sell tax payers the rail option. It's $500m more and the end result is less jobs being created. (Amount of truckers, maintenance crews, plow opertators... vs rail opertators) They don't (and shouldn't) care about a private company's profits. They should only care about jobs and for them the road is going to create way more jobs. Again we can argue that it will be difficult to fill those jobs...