Frank Stronach

Unleash small business by exempting them from corporate taxes

May 2, 2023

Small businesses are often described as the backbone of our economy — and that’s because they are. They develop new products and technologies that drive economic growth and create new jobs. But if small businesses are so important, why aren’t we doing more to support their success and foster even greater growth? Small businesses bore the brunt of the economic fallout during the pandemic. The on-again, off-again lockdowns dried up revenue, drove away customers and made employee retention very difficult. I often wonder how many of the small businesses that went under during the pandemic could have become another Magna International? Legendary entrepreneur Richard Branson famously said that all big businesses start small. When I started Magna, I opened up

High interest rates and inflation has put Canadians on a financial precipice

August 23, 2023

Canadians are worried about runaway inflation, rising interest rates and their personal finances. Many are burdened with a lot of debt. And a growing number of Canadians are living paycheque to paycheque and just scraping by. A study published last month by MNP, Canada’s largest consumer insolvency firm, showed that more than 50 per cent of Canadians say they are only $200 away from being unable to meet their financial obligations. What’s more, according to MNP, two-thirds of Canadians are concerned about their ability to pay their debts due to rising interest rates, and approximately three in five Canadians say they’ll be in financial difficulty if interest rates go much higher. That sort of stress and economic worry is putting

A new political movement to fix our ailing country

April 18, 2023

Whether in business, in society or in your own personal life, if something doesn’t function properly, you should know that you’ve got a problem. And if you don’t know that you’ve got a problem, then you’ve really got a problem. Problems are like cancer: they don’t go away by themselves and, if left untreated, they will grow. In Canada today, it seems as though we don’t know — or don’t want to know — what our problems are. Whether its our mushrooming national debt or the out-of-control growth in government bureaucracy or our slowly eroding living standards, we’re simply not tackling the major issues facing our country head-on. So who can Canadians turn to in order to restore fiscal discipline

The national debt — a ticking time bomb for future generations

June 20, 2023

Canada keeps digging itself deeper and deeper into debt thanks to out-of-control government spending and the increased interest we have to pay on that ballooning debt. Warren Buffett once said that, “The most important thing to do if you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging.” But most Canadian governments have not heeded that sound advice. They just keep on digging. According to the International Monetary Fund, the ratio between Canada’s public debt and its gross domestic product is 105 per cent. In plain English, this means that as a country, we now owe more money than the total value of all the goods and services we produce in a year. If Canada were a person or a

Who’s looking out for our small businesses?

January 17, 2023

Many Canadians have bought some lumber or kitchen and bathroom accessories at Home Depot over the years. The company, which opened its first stores just outside of Atlanta, Georgia in 1978, has grown into what is today the world’s largest improvement retailer with approximately 2,300 stores throughout North America. A few weeks ago, one of the co-founders of Home Depot said that if he were to start his company all over again in today’s suffocating business environment, he doubts whether it could have ever grown any larger in size than around 15 stores. I’ve often wondered myself if I were to start Magna all over again today, instead of more than 50 years ago, would I have been able to

Is Canada still a business-friendly country?

December 13, 2022

When it comes to doing business, Canada may not be as friendly as it once was. Thirty or forty years ago, whenever my company opened a new manufacturing facility or R&D centre in southern Ontario, municipalities would bend over backwards to help us — offering everything from widening the road to installing new traffic lights. In the U.S., job-hungry local and state governments would go even further, promising major tax incentives and free land if we chose to locate there. But the business-friendly environment that existed in Canada years ago has largely vanished. Instead, businesses looking to open a store or factory get slapped with piles of paperwork and never-ending fees. I’ve been trying to get a business operation up