I confess that I think that the NBER paper that Doug brought to our attention might be on to something. I remember a time almost 20 years ago that I visited Toronto for the first time. I did not see much poverty. The city seemed very well run. Maybe I was naive, but it seemed a stark contrast from the US. I recall reading some papers around that time about the kind of concentrated ownership that Canada had. It seemed that the Canadian capitalists were far more enlightened that the U.S. capitalists. Canada seemed to evoke the Business Week version of capitalism rather than the more Hobbesian Wall Street Journal version. Since then, Canada has fallen under the sway of a more U.S. verion of capital and is paying the price -- at least some are. -- Michael Perelman Economics Department California State University Chico, CA 95929 Tel. 530-898-5321 E-Mail [EMAIL PROTECTED]