Canada

Canada (its capital Ottawa) and neighboring states

Wealth and National Well-Being

Country Comparisons:
2010: see chart
2010: debt and reserves chart

Canada collects much more revenue as a percentage of GDP than does the United States, and it has expenditures more than twice as high in percentage of GDP. Explaining this would be to explain at least in part why Canada does not the debt problem that the U.S. has, and it might explain Canada's better life expectancy and infant mortality figures.

Canada's government is led by Stephen Harper of the Conservative Party, prime minister since 2006. He has NOT moved to privatize the nation's publicly funded health care system -- which offers universal coverage "for medically necessary health care services provided on the basis of need, rather than the ability to pay."

Unemployment rate
2010: 8%
2009: 8.5%
2008: 6.2%

Oil production and consumption:
2009: chart

Taxes
2005: Mean (average) personal income taxes are around 32% compared to around 29% for the United States. Corporate taxes are around 36% compared to around 39% for the United States.

Value Added Tax rate
2009: 5%

Import/export
Unlike the United States, Canada has been enjoying exports higher in cash value than imports. 2005: $364.8 million in exports, 317.7 million in imports. For 2010 the two were closely balanced: $406.4 billion in imports and 406.8 billion in exports.

Military expenditures as percentage of GDP
2005: 1.1

People

Living in an urban area
2008: 80%

Gender Gap
The World Economic Forum lists Canada as seventh in the elimination of a gender gap. This is ahead of the United States, which is not among the top ten

Ethnicity
British Isles origin 28%, French origin 23%, other European 15%, Amerindian 2%, other, mostly Asian, African, Arab 6%, mixed background 26%

Religions
2001 census: Roman Catholic 42.6%, Protestant 23.3% (including United Church 9.5%, Anglican 6.8%, Baptist 2.4%, Lutheran 2%), other Christian 4.4%, Muslim 1.9%, other and unspecified 11.8%, none 16%

Migrations
2010: More arriving than leaving. A net gain of 5.64 persons per 1,000 population
2009: More arriving than leaving. A net gain of 5.63 persons per 1,000 population.

Geography

North of the United States. Canada has the second largest land mass, 9,984,670 square kilometers, after Russia with 17,075,200 square kilometers.

Government

Parliamentary democracy, a federation, and a constitutional monarchy. Capital: Ottawa.