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Hard Numbers: Chow wins Toronto, Mexico gets corny, Ford cuts staff, Canada Bread gets baked for price-fixing, inflation slows
Toronto's new mayor Olivia Chow.
37: Progressive candidate Olivia Chow won the Toronto mayoral election, taking 37% of the vote in a field of more than 100 candidates. The Hong Kong-born Chow is the first Chinese-Canadian mayor of Canada’s largest city and the first from the left wing in a decade. Expect fireworks with conservative Ontario Premier Doug Ford, who has called her “an unmitigated disaster.”
50: Mexico has imposed a 50% tariff on imported white corn in a bid to boost domestic production. The move, which violates US-Mexico-Canada trade agreements, comes as Mexico is locked in a wider dispute with its North American partners about imports of genetically modified corn and other crops.
1,000: Ford Motor Company on Tuesday began laying off at least 1,000 employees in the US and Canada as it streamlines operations to focus more on electric vehicles and digital services.
50 million: Canada Bread, one of the country’s largest producers, must pay a fine of CA$50 million for conspiring with a competitor to raise wholesale bread prices in Canada between 2007 and 2011. If that sounds like a lot of bread, it is: It’s the largest price-fixing penalty in Canada’s history.
3.4: Speaking of prices, some good news from the bean counters! Canada’s annual inflation rate fell by a full point to 3.4% in May, the slowest pace in two years. This may make it possible for the Bank of Canada to pause on any more rate increases, after setting them at their highest level in more than two decades earlier this month.