The last two paraghraphs use two different ways of expressing the exchange rate, which I can see as being confussing.

It should have read IMO that the 1957 rate was 1.0614 American dollars for a Canadian dollar and in 2002 it was 0.618, with todays rate of 1.04 just so that the reporting is consistant....

On a side note I've noticed savings of as much as 40% when buying on line from the states as opposed to local. Not sure when that gap will be narrowed, but the savings are hard to ignore.

Time for a trip to Hawaii!

It would be nice if the Canadian retailer would pass this on to the consumer. I know Walmart and Zellers are starting to. If you really want to get your blood boiling check out the prices of vehicles in Canada compared to the states. On average the exact same model will cost you about 6-8 thousand dollars more in Canada, with twice the shipping costs. We need to start being more vigilant.

There are duties to consider too .... I know of one item in particular which gets shipped to North America via the US. They pay a duty there ... and then they pay a duty when it crosses the border here.....

Go talk to those "FREE TRADE" guys .... there is no free trade.... is is a figment of people's imagination ..... it is only free if it is in favour of the USA.....

Owl, It is only 'free' when it comes to getting around labour, environmental, and product safety regulations. That is what 'free trade' is all about not the price you or me pay at the retailer across national and state lines. Once again corporate-'citizens' get all the benefits and we the real citizens are stuck paying the price.

Funny how nobody seemed to complain a number of years ago (when the dollar was so weak), that buying the same vehicle in the States would have cost thousands MORE than what we were paying in Canada once the exchange rate was factored in :)

The US dollar is weak because the US President is burning billions of dollars in the Middle East fire pit. Americans deserve the lessening respect for their country, given their confidence in the dypso half-wit who misrules them.

The US is also hard at work to bring about the NAU as soon as possible, meaning a North American Union comprised of Canada, the USA and Mexico.

There will be a new common currency and the dollar and peso replaced by it.

That would enable them to abandon their devalued dollar and allow us to share in their astronomical debts and difficulties by providing basic resources such as oil, minerals and water of which they will need all they can get in the future.

Mexico will be allowed to supply abundant cheap labour and, surprise!, its oil and natural gas resources.

Since whoever follows dypso is planning to pull the US troops out of Iraq to a neighbouring country the vacuum will have to be filled by troops from other countries, friendly to the concept.

Canada's newly refitted Armed Forces will be eyed by the US as a natural choice to fill in the gap.

Voila, another war that we can participate in!

It's called pulling someone else's burning chestnuts out of the fire.

This increase in our dollar against the United States dollar is really bad news for Canfor at a time when it has more than
enough problems to deal with, with the collapse in the U.S housing market (which is getting worse and is being exasperated by a big time credit crunch, and could very well last for many years), the pine beetle problem which makes processing this wood more difficult (and expensive), and the possibilty of losing the softwood lumber arbitration case (the results of which will be released next spring) which claims that Canada is not charging enough export taxes on the lumber it is shipping into the U.S.

Canfor last year received a cheque from the U.S for about 550 million (after tax) dollars for the duties it had paid the U.S. in recent years for selling its lumber there. In the first 6 months of this year Canfor has lost about 80 million dollars.

I would think that when Canfor reports its 3rd quarter results in a couple of weeks, it is going to report another fairly substantial loss.

I wonder how much longer Canfor is going to accept these kind of losses before it takes some kind of action to stem them.
It would not surprise me to see Canfor announce major sawmill closures in this area in the near future, and build one big super mill to replace them.

I think the aforementioned scenario is very possible, and if it does occur, it would cause a tremendous blow to the economy of Prince George.

It seems to me the private and public sectors are spending a lot of money in this town, and are ignoring the real risk that our economy is in for a big time hit.

It really puzzzles me why the general public and our local city council which both I think have a chicken today feathers tomorrow attitude, are spending so much money in recent years.

Maybe it is for a similar reason that Canfor will "invest" in a new plant, as you say, at a time when the market is down and will stay down for some time - to invest in future operations which will be less than before, but will, once more, have to be improved over older operations.

It is the nature of human ventures, things change, conditions change, and we change with them .... change takes "investment" to accommodate new conditions.

Those who react at the right time, not too early, not too late, are the ones who will be able to benefit the most from such change.