Wednesday, October 4th 2023

The Canada Pension Plan is a world-renowned fund that controls hundreds of billions of dollars earmarked for our retirements. Alberta premier Danielle Smith, unhappy that Alberta contributes more to the fund than its citizens receive, has plans to leave the fund and start the Alberta Pension Plan—while taking more than half the CPP's money on the way out the door.

Can she actually do this? How much money would Alberta get? Why would the province want to go it alone as opposed to staying in one of the world's best plans? And what happens to the CPP if Alberta leaves, even is most of the money stays?

GUEST: Graham Thomson, political columnist and commentator

We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:

Through email at [email protected] 

Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

Tuesday, October 3rd 2023

This is the first generation of kids to grow up entirely with smartphones in hand. Most of the time, even during school hours. Schools who have tried to ban or regulate their use have mostly failed—with a few notable exceptions. And when teachers have tried to enforce these rules on the ground in their classrooms, it can get ugly.

Just how addicted are students to their phones? What are they being used for in class? Is there a way to incorporate them into learning that doesn't enable their detrimental effects? And what do we know about the long-term impact of these devices on kids who should be focusing on their studies?

GUEST: Naomi Buck, writing in The Globe and Mail

We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:

Through email at [email protected] 

Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

Friday, September 29th 2023

You and a friend might be given two different prices by the same website for the same item. Heck, you might be given two different prices yourself depending on where you are when you're browsing the site. It's a phenomenon that began as dynamic pricing—a computer balancing supply and demand to ensure everything was sold at a price the market was prepared to pay—but it's now gone well beyond that.

As algorithms become smarter and more advanced, and as we voluntarily offer our devices and the companies we do business with more of our information, the prices you see may take into account things like where you are, what device you're on, your shopping history and... well, everything the machine knows about you. Is this the kind of shopping experience we want? If not, what do we do about it?

GUEST: Colin Horgan, writing in The Walrus

We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:

Through email at [email protected] 

Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

Thursday, September 28th 2023

Somehow, nobody involved in the now-infamous affair clued into the fact that a man who was fighting against the Russians in 1943 would have been fighting ... with the Nazis. That's at the core of last week's House of Commons' screwup that has made international waves, become a hyperpartisan blame game in Ottawa and has many people speedrunning the history of the Second World War.

But who's really to blame for this failure? Why will the blame land at the feet of the Liberals and Justin Trudeau regardless of the answer? And what do these frequent missteps signal about a government that seems to be getting tired, or at least giving observers that perception?

GUEST: David Moscrop, author, podcaster and political commentator

We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:

Through email at [email protected] 

Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter

Wednesday, September 27th 2023

Yup, the government body overseeing the economy has been hoping for a while now that some of the low unemployment rates that have been driving up salaries and opportunities for workers will vanish. It's a key pillar of their plan to steer the country away from a recession. That, and higher interest rates. All good, right?

Right now a surprising amount of our economic future is being determined because, according to contemporary economic thought, things were going too well. So now we're paying for it, and hoping we don't end up paying even more. Here's how we got here, what the BoC hopes will happen, and what we can expect those forces to do to, you know, us.

GUEST: Jim Stanford, economist, director of the Centre for Future Work

We love feedback at The Big Story, as well as suggestions for future episodes. You can find us:

Through email at [email protected] 

Or @thebigstoryfpn on Twitter