Outlook 2020bc

Looking at the today’s imperative economical conditions it is obvious on the employer’s part to hire and retain every valuable and qualified employee and balance the turnover and return on investment. However to retain their business goals what time demands is the effective steps to hire people legally authorized to work in United States. A survey conducted by the Department of Homeland Security revealed that there are almost 7.2 million unauthorized workers employed only in America and certain steps need to be taken to lower this number. I-9 Employment verification process is the most accredited and strongly recommended procedure by the government to all the major especially mid cap and large business organizations within the country immediately after any hiring is processed.

In short, I-9 Employment Verification is a process or a voluntary program made available to all the employers operating within the boundaries of United States to know the legal eligibility and achieved certification of the hire employee. However, it is always against the US laws to hire an employee knowingly or unknowingly not licensed or authorized to work in United States and here are strict criminal and civil penalties prescribed for violating the I-9 verification laws.

For persons interested to achieve their authorized working status in United States you need to fill the I-9 Employment Verification form distributed at US department of Homeland Security and US citizenship and Immigration Services. Every employer trying to hire new candidate or an employee need to have a at least one I-9 Employment Verification form per employee and the employee needs to submit some original documents and correct documents to fill out the specified form. Please stay advised that I-9 Employment Verification form is a federal document to ensure the employer is hiring the individuals authorized legally to work in United States.

The law suggests that not only new hires but also current employees must comply with the restrictions stated under the I-9 Employment Verification laws and the same is true for every individual working in United States after November 6, 1986. The employer should keep the completed form secured for at least three years since the employees hiring and one year after termination. In addition, employer need not has to indulge any activities of submitting the completed form along with documents to any government agencies. In fact, whenever the authorized officials from the Department of Homeland Security, Department of Labor and the office of Special Counsel for the Immigration Related Unfair Employment Practices demands them for verification.

Tradable services represent an extremely diverse group of economic sectors. The following list features 10 groups of services that are either currently or
potentially tradable:[3]

• Education – ESL, primary, secondary, post-secondary (undergraduate and graduate degrees, professional diplomas, and training-trade certification);
• Health – consulting and selling health services and related biomedical technology innovations;
• F.I.R.E. (finance, insurance, and real estate);
• Architectural and engineering services, including mining, pulp and materials movement, and port development engineering;
• Information and communications technology (ICT) and new media;
• Producer services, including business consulting, marketing, management, accounting, and legal;
• Maritime services;
• Transportation and logistics;
• Government services; and
• Cultural industries.

Between 1997 and 2007, BC’s services sector grew by 37.9%, compared to a slower growth rate of 32.8% for the goods sector. The service areas that saw the most rapid growth rates were: wholesale trade (67.8%); retail trade (53%); information and cultural industries (69.1%); and professional, scientific, and technical services (50.6%).

Employment projections suggest that the importance of service industries to BC’s economy will continue to increase, and that they will account for the bulk of net job growth going forward, as indicated in the following chart:

Source: Canadian Occupational Projection System (COPS), Employment Outlook for British Columbia COPS BC Unique Scenario for 2005 to 2015 (Victoria, BC and Ottawa, ON: BC Stats and Statistics Canada), February 2007, page 5.

As noted, most of BC’s challenges with regard to developing a strong tradable services sector are self-inflicted, and can be traced to policy failures and a neglect of the export opportunities that are available. Accordingly, here are some specific policy ideas to support the growth and sustained prosperity of the tradable services sector:

1. We must explicitly acknowledge the importance of tradable services in BC’s present and future economies. With this in mind:
   1. Create tradable services advisory panels at both the provincial and regional levels.
   2. Develop better data collection for the broad tradable services sector, and use this data to assess the sector’s contributions to provincial and regional GDP.
   3. Have the Ministry of Technology, Trade, and Economic Development continuously maintain current and detailed information on service exports and imports to and from BC. The Ministry should also develop and implement an economic strategy to develop, promote, and sustain service exports across the entire province.
   4. Have the Ministry of Technology, Trade and Economic Development create “BC Services, Inc.,” based on the examples of “Montreal, Inc.” and “Quebec, Inc.”
2. Since tradable services largely exist in the province’s major urban regions—notably Metro Vancouver, Victoria, Nanaimo, the Okanagan, and the Prince George and NWC Region—it is essential that urban policies be enacted to attract, retain, and develop these services.

   Urban and regional governments should cooperate and make positive efforts that facilitate and attract households, businesses, and other organizations to locate within their borders or within their region, and the regulatory environment should be competitive and accepting of land use and development, while still protecting the broad public interest.

   Specifically, the following policies could boost the tradable services sector in Vancouver, Metro Vancouver, and elsewhere in BC:

   1. Establish proper zoning and density for hotels, offices, and housing to accommodate and promote the growth of tradable services, their employees, and their customers. The only way to ensure a continuing supply of appropriate and affordable space is to have higher densities.
   2. Cut the regulatory delays, fees, and processes associated with rezoning, development permit applications, and demolition and construction permits.
   3. Link economic development strategies with land use and land development strategies, processes, and regulations so that land use and development processes facilitate and reinforce economic strategies and prosperity.
   4. Provide first-rate transportation, especially public transportation, to keep travel times and costs to a minimum, ensure that movement within the urban regions is fast and efficient, and allow service firms in the region to function efficiently and at low costs.
   5. Integrate transportation and land use planning and development closely, especially in the City of Vancouver. To develop this needed integration, the following polices should be implemented quickly:
      1. Give TransLink clear land use and density powers for land within 300-500 metres of Rapid Transit stops and intersections where three or more bus routes intersect;
      2. Give TransLink the power to contract with developers vis-à-vis land use, density, and development fees; and
      3. Extend the foregoing suggested TransLink governance models and powers to the Capital Region and the Okanagan Region so they too can integrate transportation and land use planning and development to cut congestion, improve mobility within their respective regions, and ensure the economic viability of transportation planning and longer-term operations.
   6. Develop and implement clear and integrated regional economic development strategies to attract, retain, and build these tradable services. Among these strategies:
      1. Create provincially mandated and appointed regional tradable services advisory committees for: the Greater Okanagan Region, the Greater Vancouver Region, the Capital Region, the Central Vancouver Island Region, and the Prince George and NWC Region.
      2. Provide these committees with broad governance responsibilities and core provincial funding, to be matched regionally.
3. Create a tradable services branch within the Ministry of Technology, Trade and Economic Development to foster the development of the tradable services sector across the province, as noted above, and to work with each of the regions to facilitate the most robust and effective regional economic development plans needed to promote and sustain the broad tradable services sector.
4. Authorize and fund BC Stats, in conjunction with the Ministry of Technology, Trade and Economic Development, as noted above, to gather data annually on tradable services employment, exports and imports, and contributions to provincial and regional GDP.

Given the urban location of the bulk of our service sectors, significant possibilities exist to broaden the tradable services sector further and move it into the export sphere, adding significantly to our provincial export base in the process. Combined with the linkages to other services and to the goods exporting sectors, there are major opportunities to increase the exports of services and the manufactured goods to which these services are linked.

The diverse tradable services sector has key roles to play in the future prosperity of BC and in its major urban regions. These roles include expanding and diversifying the provincial and regional export bases, and facilitating the province’s ability to tap into growing global trade in these services. This growth in global trade has resulted in a service trade boom, which complements burgeoning trade in goods and natural resources and resource-based products. By getting into the mainstream of global service trade, the province could benefit from this fast-growing sector by diversifying not just its export sectors, but also the regions to and from which it exports—essentially doubling diversification by fostering the tradable services sector.

In view of the recent global financial and economic downturn, especially in terms of resource products, it is particularly urgent that strategies be developed for the tradable services sector to help diversify the provincial economy and enable it to compete more broadly in the global service economy. Times of economic hardship are often the very best times to build capacity to compete in new sectors; at such times, attention is overwhelmingly directed at protecting or bolstering existing activities—as a result, new opportunities are not considered, leaving potential gaps that could be filled by creative and energetic economies.

One of the great attractions of tradable service exports is that they are not rigidly tied to location criteria. A number of examples illustrate this point. Thompson Rivers University highlights this portability, as does the success of the University of Northern BC in attracting international students and building a global reputation for excellence in aboriginal and northern health care. Prince Rupert is developing a powerful transportation and logistics hub that links Asia with North America, along with the added capacity to attract and serve tourists through its cruise ship facilities. The Okanagan is becoming a centre for viticulture and specialized tree fruit agriculture, where the underlying knowledge and expertise can be exported profitably, along with the wines and fruits themselves. Valemont (with its population of only 1,200) is a pioneer in tourism and related services at the community level, while Nelson has long been exporting both education and tourism services.

These diverse communities and service exports highlight the assertion that tradable service exports represent a key opportunity for communities across the province.

Traditionally, we haven’t put much thought into the value of exporting our services. Instead, we’ve focused on exporting our natural resources and the products made from them. However, the tradable services sector comprises a broad and exciting range of economic activities that provide major opportunities for BC and its principle urban regions. Service exports can be of very high value and could help to diversify the BC export base—both in terms of the mix of products and services we export and the diversity of markets into which we sell.

These services could be very valuable to our 2020 economy and its export base if we acknowledge their potential and develop suitable provincial and regional policies to foster their growth and long-term viability. In addition, service exports are environmentally sustainable and can be organized with a minimal ecological footprint.

The discussion in this paper has sought to raise awareness about tradable services, their diversity, and the opportunities that exist for BC to trade them nationally and internationally. We are already highly successful in selling many of these services across Canada and globally. Now we need to broaden the range of the services we sell, while also developing better data sources so we can measure our progress in seizing these opportunities.

Michael A. Goldberg is an emeritus professor and former dean of the Sauder School of Business at UBC. Kerri Brkich is the manager of Public Affairs for the ICABC.

Advantages

BC and its urban regions all have strengths and advantages in several or more of the tradable services discussed. Metro Vancouver is strong in virtually all of the sectors, while the Northern Prince George and Northwest Corridor (NWC) Region is particularly strong in terms of transportation and logistics, maritime services, education, and Aboriginal and northern health issues.

In addition, high-quality education, health, and public services are advantages generally possessed across the province, as are high-quality, diverse living environments. Finally, excellent connectivity by air, sea, and, increasingly, by road, typify all regions of the province—especially Metro Vancouver and Southwest BC—with easy access to YVR and the Lower Mainland ports. ICT connectivity is also extremely high in BC, with some regions like Kamloops enjoying a uniquely high-quality supply of Internet bandwidth.

Disadvantages

At the same time, there are significant barriers to the growth of the tradable services sector in BC. Chief among them is a clear lack of focus on the tradable services sector and a continuing emphasis on the export of goods—especially natural resource-based products. This failure to recognize the contribution services could make to BC’s export earnings limits the provincial trade base, making it less diverse and more volatile, and reduces the opportunities for export growth. By largely overlooking the opportunities for trade in services, there has been a failure to develop and implement innovative and viable strategies to promote tradable services development and sustain its growth.

Given that many tradable services are urban-based, sound urban economic strategy and policy development are crucial at both the urban and regional levels. Fragmented and ineffective economic development strategies at the local level—in Metro Vancouver especially—have greatly hurt the region’s ability to attract and retain tradable services, and have impaired the city’s ability to attract head offices and major employers.

Clearly, the tradable services sector is not really a single sector, but rather a very diverse set of sectors within the province and the Vancouver region. As such, it’s difficult to characterize a single set of factors that shape the outlook for this bundle of tradable services. However, there are some commonalities among the sectors, and we can generalize the factors that affect them as a group. We can also identify the conditions that are centrally important in creating a robust tradable services economy.

Connectivity

Connectivity is critically important to the success of the tradable services sector. Many services can be delivered electronically via the Internet, phone, fax, and video, as well as by courier and postal services. Thus, access to high-quality ICT connections, bandwidth, and infrastructure is vital.

For many other services, however, it is necessary to put providers physically in front of customers (musicians and other performers, for example, and also consultants and management service providers). Therefore, having excellent road, air, and maritime services and infrastructure is necessary so that service providers can travel conveniently, economically, and comfortably to their customers and vice versa.

High quality of life

Since the most important inputs to tradable services are human inputs, having the best employees is imperative to competing globally. A high quality of life is a central consideration in attracting and retaining high-quality employees—in particular the talented professionals and support staff at the core of tradable services.

Education

Education is a powerful success factor for a number of reasons: Access to high-quality education is key to quality of life; educational institutions produce the high-quality knowledge workers and support staff who function at the heart of service industries; education is needed to continually retrain and renew human resources; and educational institutions, notably tertiary institutions, create valuable and valued knowledge through their research efforts. Given the centrality of knowledge in a knowledge-based service economy, this knowledge-creating and modifying research capacity is vitally important to sustain tradable services.

Health services

Excellent health services are not only tradable in their own right—they are essential to a high quality of life. They also support vibrant health education and knowledge creation. Accordingly, an excellent health care system is also key to success in creating and sustaining a strong tradable services sector.

Public services

Efficiently provided, high-quality health care, education, workers’ compensation, water and sewage, public safety, transportation, and public park and recreations services all make the business and living environments attractive—lowering the costs of doing business, and raising liveability and global
competitiveness.

Vancouver International Airport (YVR) is another key element in the transportation and logistics sector. It is the second busiest trans-Pacific airport in the Americas (second only to LAX in Los Angeles), and is a powerful global player in airport management through its highly successful subsidiary, YVR Air Services.

YVR spawned the now-independent InterVISTAS consulting group, which has become one of the world’s leading aviation management consulting firms, with a head office in Vancouver and offices in Washington, Chicago, Ottawa, Winnipeg, Toronto, Montreal, the United Kingdom, and Puerto Rico.

The creation of Port Metro Vancouver has secured the region’s primacy as a trans-Pacific freight gateway, which is strengthened considerably by the parallel development of the Port of Prince Rupert, which is served by the Canadian National Railway.

BC provides unique strengths to attract trans-Pacific cargo. The province can distribute goods efficiently by rail across Canada, down the Pacific Coast, and to the US Midwest and the entire Mississippi Valley. By road, the Trans-Canada Highway connects Vancouver to the rest of Canada. In addition, provincial highways connect the region to the US and its interstate highway system.

This abundance of local and international transportation resources has made Vancouver a major Pacific gateway by air and sea, as recognized by both the federal and provincial gateway projects. A full array of supporting logistics services has evolved to bolster these gateway and related transportation functions, including the celebrated Transportation and Logistics Program and related research centres at the Sauder School of Business at UBC.

In 2009, the Business Council of British Columbia launched Outlook 2020: Shaping BC’s Economic Future, a four-part summit series designed to generate discussion about the future prosperity of the provincial economy. Outlook 2020 was organized into four chapters, three of which were presented last year. Chapter one looked at the province’s small, open economy from an international perspective; chapter two dealt with innovation and human capital; and chapter three explored the commercial and industrial opportunities that exist for the new economy. Chapter four, which is being presented April 23, 2010, will focus on the options and opportunities for shaping BC’s economic future.

As part of this summit series, the Business Council commissioned 28 discussion papers[1] on a wide variety of topics crucial to the BC economy. The papers were sponsored by businesses and other organizations, including the ICABC.

We took part in this initiative because, like the Business Council, the Institute is an active provincial stakeholder. We participate annually in the formation of government policy by making submissions to the Select Standing Committee on Government Finance as part of the budget consultation process, and we provide economic commentary through our regional and provincial BC Check-Up reports. Our diverse membership reaches into every sector of the provincial economy, giving our profession, and the Institute, a unique perspective on business. In addition, chartered accounting services and the export of those services—especially in relation to the resource sector—have the potential to contribute a great deal to BC’s GDP.

For these reasons, the Institute chose to sponsor the paper “Building the Economic Base: Tradable Services,” by Michael A. Goldberg, which was incorporated into chapter 3 of the summit series.[2] In his paper, Goldberg provides an overview of the tradable service sector and explains the importance of this sector to BC’s export economy. He also examines the opportunities for growth in the services sector, and discusses how policy can assist in this growth over the long-term.

What follows is a summary of the paper.

The economic importance of the service sector is often downplayed in developed economies. Yet, the wealth of many of the world’s leading regions is based on the export of services—not on the export of resources or manufactured goods.

British Columbia is a prime example: BC’s goods sector comprises 75% of our total exports, but the provincial economy is actually highly service based; in fact, three-quarters of the provincial GDP is comprised of services. Accordingly, services should play an important role in our export economy—both over the medium-term and the long-term.

Chapter Four

Outlook 2020: Shaping BC’s Economic Future

Date: Friday, April 23, 2010
Time: 8:00am – 2:00pm; 7:30am Registration
Location: The Fairmont Hotel Vancouver

By any measure, 2009 was a turbulent and challenging year for businesses and economies at home and abroad. The size, scope and reach of the worldwide recession are reminders that we’re living in a truly global marketplace, complete with ties that bind in more ways than one.

For British Columbia, a small, open economy that depends on international trade, tourism and investment to drive its prosperity, 2009 reinforced the importance of building a strong, competitive and diverse economy, one capable of carving out markets and opportunities in the years ahead.

In the fourth and final chapter of Outlook 2020, the Business Council of British Columbia highlights key elements from the first three chapters and the 28 research papers commissioned as part of the 2020 project, and presents options and opportunities for building British Columbia’s economy in the coming decade.

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