Timing & trends

Vancouver restaurant, facing staff shortage, offers $50,000 salary for a dishwasher

Posted by Morgan Leet, narcity.com

on Friday, 22 October 2021 9:49

A job posting for a dishwasher at a Vancouver restaurant is gaining plenty of attention for its pay — $50,000 a year to be exact.

The Indeed job posting is for a dishwasher at Handi Grill. The posting said: “Pay per hour will be $25.00 for 40 hours per week. This is a permanent full-time position. No Experience or education is required, and training will be provided to the eligible candidate.”

Starting date? As soon as possible.

Filling the position quickly has become even more urgent as the province has said it will lift some of the last restaurant restrictions on Oct. 25 for most regions of British Columbia…read more.

International Energy Agency Says Canada’s Oil Industry Is Facing Resistance On All Fronts

Posted by Felicity Bradstock, oilprice.com

on Friday, 22 October 2021 9:27

According to the International Energy Agency (IEA), Canadian oil is set to decline within the next decade. That has not stopped funding from flooring into new projects however as producers aim to milk the country’s oil reserves for all they’re worth before that. The IEA foresaw this, predicting that Canada could be producing an additional 700,000 bpd of oil equivalent by 2030, before the eventual decline in demand and output.

The decline of Canadian oil should not come as a surprise for a country whose leader announced a net-zero carbon emissions target by 2050 in line with Paris Agreement aims at the end of 2020. Canada’s openness to green policy and the push for an electric vehicle (EV) revolution across the country means Canada will soon decrease its domestic reliance on fossil fuels.

Yet, the pessimistic outlook has not stopped the government and Canada’s private oil and gas companies from planning huge developments to ensure the industry remains resilient for as long as demand is high…read more.

Alberta inquiry finds no wrongdoing in anti-oilsands campaign despite foreign funds

Posted by Bob Weber, The Canadian Press

on Thursday, 21 October 2021 11:08

Canadian environmental groups did nothing wrong when they accepted foreign funding for campaigns opposing oilsands development, a public inquiry has reported.

In his much-delayed report released Thursday, Steve Allan, commissioner of the Inquiry into Anti-Alberta Energy Campaigns, says the groups were exercising their rights to free speech.

“I have not found any suggestions of wrongdoing on the part of any individual or organization,” Allan writes.

“No individual or organization, in my view, has done anything illegal. Indeed, they have exercised their rights of free speech.”

Allan also says the campaigns have not spread misinformation.

While he finds that at least $1.28 billion has flowed into Canadian environmental charities from the U.S. between 2003 and 2019, only a small portion of that has been directed against the oilsands. Auditors Deloitte Forensic Inc. estimate that money at between $37.5 million and $58.9 million over that period. That averages to $3.5 million a year at most.

Alberta’s United Conservative government funds its so-called “war room,” an arm’s-length agency instituted to counter environmental groups, at up to $30 million a year…read more.

Venezuelans Break Off Flakes of Gold to Pay for Meals and Haircuts

Posted by Alex Vasquez and Ezra Fieser, Bloomberg News

on Thursday, 21 October 2021 9:59

To fathom the magnitude of Venezuela’s financial collapse, travel southeast from Caracas, past the oil fields and over the Orinoco River, and head deep into the savanna that blankets one of the remotest corners of the country.

There, in the barber shops and restaurants and hotels that constitute the main strip of one dusty little outpost after another, you’ll find prices displayed in grams of gold.

A one-night stay at a hotel? That’ll be half a gram. Lunch for two at a Chinese restaurant? A quarter of a gram. A haircut? An eighth of a gram, please. Jorge Pena, 20, figured that eighth came to three small flakes — the equivalent of $5. After getting a trim one recent weekday in the town of Tumeremo, he handed them over to his barber, who, satisfied with Pena’s calculation, quickly pocketed them. “You can pay for everything with gold,” Pena says.

In the high-tech global economy of the 21st century, where tap-and-go transactions are the rage, this is about as low tech as it gets.

Most of the world moved on from gold as a medium of exchange over a century ago. Its resurfacing in Venezuela today is the most extreme manifestation of the repudiation of the local currency, the bolivar, that has swept the country. It’s been rendered almost worthless by hyperinflation. (Nicolas Maduro’s regime just lopped another six zeroes off it.)…read more.

Canadian racing driver and Instagram influencer accused of ‘massive fraudulent’ scheme that defrauded investors of millions

Posted by Glen McGregor, ctvnews.ca

on Thursday, 21 October 2021 9:59

Canadian race car driver Josh Cartu strikes a glamorous posture on social media: surrounded by expensive sports cars, hobnobbing with movie stars and fashion models, and travelling on his private jet to European party hotspots such as Ibiza and Cannes.

Cartu, who grew up in St. Catharines, Ont., boasts more than 700,000 followers on an Instagram account (@jcartu) that documents his exploits racing Ferraris, attending Milan Fashion Week and taking a ride in a Russian MiG fighter jet to the edge of the stratosphere.

Among those following closely are securities regulators in Ontario and the United States, who accuse Cartu and his two younger brothers of enriching themselves through an illegal online stock trading scheme run from an office in Israel.

U.S. officials allege the Cartus ran a “massive fraudulent” trading operation between 2013 and 2017 that appears to have helped fund Cartu’s lavish lifestyle through multi-million-dollar transfers to off-shore bank accounts in the Caribbean…read more.