On Thursday July 14, 2022, the Governor of the Bank of Canada, Tiff Macklem joined CFIB on a live webinar with our members to discuss inflation and small business recovery. This is the first time that the Governor of the Bank of Canada has spoken to our members, and he clearly valued the data we provided from the surveys you fill out as well as the opportunity to have a more direct exchange.
Due to some technical issues, the session was not recorded, however, we were able to get a transcript of the session together and the full webinar discussion follows below.
Key points raised by the Governor:
The Governor highlighted two key takeaways. First, high inflation is NOT here to stay and second, controlling inflation involves some short-term pain for long term gain. Here are some other highlights from his comments:
- Inflation is too high and getting to more predictable and stable price increases is paramount.
- Demand needs to slow in order to let supply catch up.
- The Bank’s target is 2% inflation and its base case contains a soft economic landing. The best path to a soft landing is through front-loaded interest rate increases but there are some risks to that outcome: “the path to a soft landing has narrowed.”
- Inflation is currently running at around 8%, the Bank expects it to remain high in the very short term, be closer to 3% next year, and back to 2% in 2024.
- The Bank remains confident that given the high number of job vacancies their plan will not have a negative impact on employment.
To see the full transcript of the conversation, please click here.
*Note - This session was hosted in English but questions were taken in both official languages*