Vancouver

Capital Gains Income

Income concepts in Canada generally only include regular income and in particular miss (taxable) capital gains. But capital gains makes up an important income source and we should pay more attention to it.

Jens von Bergmann

7 minute read

We have previously look at T1FF tax data which is an extremely rich annual administrative data source. The cansim tables have a range of variables to inform about incomes of individuals, families (sliced by number of children, including zero children), low income statistics, and just statistics about the number of taxfilers and dependants by age. It’s available on cansim for Canada overall, the provinces and CMAs/CAs. That’s great, but sometimes it’s nice to have finer geographic detail.

Vancouver's pandemic weather

The weather during the 2020 pandemic, especially the fall and winter, has felt worse than usual. How much of that is just perception and how much is real?

Jens von Bergmann

4 minute read

The pandemic changed our lives and behaviours. And our perceptions of things. With physical distancing, various degrees of restrictions and people avoiding the 3Cs: crowded places, close-contact settins, confined and enclosed spaces, people have been focusing on spending time outdoors whenever possible. I certainly pay a lot more attention to the weather than I used to, and Vancouver’s fall and winter has felt especially miserable so far. But has the weather actually been worse or is it just my warped perception?

Keeping the Leavers

Some people have a hard time making room for newcomers, but how about making room for people to stay?

Jens von Bergmann Nathan Lauster

6 minute read

(Joint with Nathan Lauster and cross-posted at HomeFreeSociology) Do people select cities from diverse alternatives? Or do cities select residents from diverse flows of people? The answer is pretty much: both. People can look around and consider where they want to end up. And cities, through municipal policies, can and do work to select their residents. EXCEPT cities can’t do this directly. At least across North America, cities generally aren’t allowed to establish and maintain their own immigration policies.

Projections and self-fulfilling prophecies

Housing and population growth are endogenous in high-demand areas. Which gives cities the tools to exclude people, but should they? Deciding how to grow is a values question, not a technocratic one.

Jens von Bergmann Nathan Lauster

13 minute read

(Joint with Nathan Lauster and cross-posted at HomeFreeSociology) When people want to live in your city, how many should you let in? On the one hand, this is a moral question. Do you have an obligation to people who don’t already live here? On the other hand, it’s a moot question. At least in Canada, cities don’t have the power to control migration. BUT WAIT! Cities DO have power over how many new dwellings to allow.

Overnight Visitors and Crude Travel Vectors

Checking in on Vancouver travel data. And the novel corona virus.

Jens von Bergmann

8 minute read

(Joint with Nathan Lauster and cross-posted at HomeFreeSociology) The spread of Coronavirus is reminding us of just how often people travel around, especially as various locations become quarantined and international travel corridors get shut down. So let’s take a look at some basic data on travel patterns here of relevance to us here in Vancouver. Then we’ll put them back in the context of Coronavirus. TLDR: travel data is really interesting, don’t be frightened of travellers, and there’s still a lot we don’t know about coronavirus