![]() Employees working from home, emptying the roads. “I’m done,” he says.Īdd in climate change and the political pressure mounts to never return to the way things were ‘way back when – in February. Now he has seven years left on a lease costing him $11,000 every four weeks. ![]() All cash flow went to employees, overhead and debt repayment. He opened a hair/spa business in Vancouver a couple of years ago, and told me this week that revenues fell from forty grand a month to zero. Estimates are that tens of thousands of them will never open again. Never happened before, so deep, so fast.Īs of this week, 80% of all small and medium-sized business in Canada are shut, or barely operational. There are now 26 million Americans collecting jobless pay and seven million Canadians are on the dole. Economies hobbled by the virus have cut energy consumption by a third in just a month. Now Airbnb is essentially kaput, putting added downward pressure on real estate values. But when Tom isn’t flying, when the hotels are closed and the highways are empty, demand collapses. Transportation consumes 60% of the world’s crude, and oil has been our nation’s largest export. This is why a barrel of oil became worthless on Monday, and remains in the dumps. ![]() We need to think about such things, in case they portend an altered future. So is the Chateau Laurier, perched elegantly beside the Parliament buildings. Hotels in Halifax, the cruise ship capital of Canada, are closed. The flagship Royal York Hotel is collecting food donations for its furloughed staff. Everybody, from the uniformed doorman unloading limos to the kitchen staff and lowly room cleaners is laid off. ![]() ![]() In downtown Toronto the upscale King Edward Hotel, owned by Omni, was running at 100% occupancy six months ago with rooms starting about $700 a night. The new owner, Onex, says it has enough cash to keep its 36 businesses afloat through the pandemic, but many people (Tom’s one of them) doubt if normal will ever return. The airline laid off most of two thousand pilots a few days ago, as it sinks deeper into the abyss. So now they’re both out of a job, despite Ottawa’s payroll subsidy plan. He married April, whom he met at the Calgary airport six years ago. ![]()
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