I’ve been thinking about this for a while. If you looks at our major industries that aren’t controlled by Canadian oligopolies, we let the US take over and continue to support them. For example, streaming services (Netflix, Spotify, Paramount, HBO, Disney, YouTube, etc…), fast food (McDonald’s, Starbucks, Wendy’s, Five Guys, Timmies, etc…), home improvement (Home Depot, Lowe’s, Rona), retail (Wal-Mart, Amazon, Costco), tech (Google, Apple, Microsoft), credit payments (Visa, Mastercard), food brands (Coca-Cola, Johnson & Johnson, print media (Postmedia Network, which controls over 130 newspapers across the country), social media (Insta, Snap, TikTok, Facebook, WhatsApp), retail gas (Esso, Ultramar, Chevron, Pioneer) are all US companies. I can keep going on (pharmaceuticals, oil and gas operations in Alberta, and entertainment).
It’s ironic when I see Canadians hating on immigrants for not being “Canadian”, yet those Canadians copy Americans like no tomorrow. And now we have separatists in Alberta simping for the US and politicians that vocally support Trump (Doug Ford, Danielle Smith, and PP). Wtf is going on?
Because Canada is more of a suburb of the United States than you’d like to admit. While Canada claims more square footage, the US has the better slice of the continent. The US is the richest nation on earth, home to 340 million people to Canada’s 40 million, most of whom live within 100 miles of our border. To all those American businesses you listed, Canada is a sidequest. We might as well also sell shit to you while we’re at it. We do the same to most of the rest of the world, compared to them you’re small potatoes but you’re a closer drive. Hell, more than half of you live south of Seattle.
It got that way because our politicians let it. We could have kept certain companies nationalized and made restrictions on corporations selling out to other Countries, or at least tax the hell out of it. But instead we got “free market” solutions. And its not just the US. Any country that wants a slice can have some. Tim Hortons and some other chain brands are owned by a Brazilian conglomerate, some major mining companies are owned by brazil as well.