of intrusive government that flowed through most of the twentieth
century? Or have we gone too far by giving some things to the market
that governments could do better? These questions lie at the heart of one
of the great social debates of our time.
In general, the cases we have made for the costs and benefits of
government intervention are both valid, depending on time, place, and
the values that are brought to bear. At this point, we turn to the issue of
what government actually does, something that will perhaps illuminate
the question of what it could do better. In Chapter 12 , we discussed
government action that is designed to affect monopoly and competition.
In the next two chapters, we discuss in some detail three other important
types of intervention in the Canadian economy today: environmental
regulation, taxation, and public spending.