TORONTO — Business leaders see the housing crisis as the biggest risk to the economy, a new survey from KPMG Canada shows.
“What we're seeing in the survey is that the businesses are needing to pay more to enable their workers to absorb these higher costs of living,” said Caroline Charest, an economist and Montreal-based partner at KPMG.The need to pay more not only directly affects business finances, but is also making it harder to tamp down the inflation that is keeping interest rates high, said Charest.
Higher housing costs are themselves a big contributor to inflation, also making it harder to get the measure down to allow for lower rates ahead, she said.A report out last year from the Ontario Chamber of Commerce also emphasized how much the housing crisis is affecting how well businesses can attract talent.
The vast majority of respondents to the KPMG survey supported tax measures to make housing payments more affordable, such as making mortgage interest tax deductible, but also want to maintain the capital gains tax exemption for a primary residence. The Grapevine, Texas-based company also said late on Tuesday that it had cut an unspecified number of jobs, joining Japan's Sony and Electronic Arts in a bid to reduce costs as economic uncertainty hits discretionary spending. GameStop is set to lose more than $900 million in its market capitalization if the premarket losses hold.
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