Ask HN: Should Canada (peacefully) merge with US to create largest country?
What would the benefits of doing this be?
12 comments
Ideologically Canada and their belief system is much different than the United states. I know it can appear similar from the outside but fundamentally there are a few things that many people in the United States would refuse to give up and many people in Canada would also refuse to give up or refuse to adopt the United States methodologies.
I can't think of any benefit for the two countries to become one that can't also be achieved through treaties and trade negotiations. Using those methods would allow each country to keep their ideological differences because those differences work well in each country. The Western portion of Canada probably has more in common ideologically with the Western and Southern portion of the United States, whereas the Eastern portion of Canada is much more aligned with northeastern United States values.
The one thing a Canada does have is a better name for a country. Because it's just Canada that's it it's just a simple name. The United States of America has one of the lamest country names there is. It's not really a name of a country it's a description that's been adopted into a name, because we're so disagreeable we couldn't even agree on a name. Columbia would have been a good name but we missed out on that one didn't we.
I can't think of any benefit for the two countries to become one that can't also be achieved through treaties and trade negotiations. Using those methods would allow each country to keep their ideological differences because those differences work well in each country. The Western portion of Canada probably has more in common ideologically with the Western and Southern portion of the United States, whereas the Eastern portion of Canada is much more aligned with northeastern United States values.
The one thing a Canada does have is a better name for a country. Because it's just Canada that's it it's just a simple name. The United States of America has one of the lamest country names there is. It's not really a name of a country it's a description that's been adopted into a name, because we're so disagreeable we couldn't even agree on a name. Columbia would have been a good name but we missed out on that one didn't we.
Canada has a better national anthem too.
What we really need is an EU-style common market for North America. Free trade, free movement of people, single currency, single regulatory environment.
Such an entity could compete with any country on earth, from competing for cheap manufacturing wages and costs, (as Mexico is doing quite successfully right now) to competing on quality.
English, Spanish, and French are three of the most widely-spoken languages, So most people on earth could find someplace which felt at home for them linguistically, or even if they didn't emigrate here, they would find vendors and customer service people who spoke their language.
It would be phenomenally defensible: protected by two oceans and the arctic, it would have no hostile nations on any border, like India, China, Russia, and the EU do. And therefore it would be a region where people feel safe to invest their money.
And its currency would be the world's reserve currency. It would have by far the best natural advantages of any economic union in history. If only we could persuade our fellow Americans that Mexicans aren't our enemies, and that we won't all just drop dead if we adopt single-payer health care system.
Such an entity could compete with any country on earth, from competing for cheap manufacturing wages and costs, (as Mexico is doing quite successfully right now) to competing on quality.
English, Spanish, and French are three of the most widely-spoken languages, So most people on earth could find someplace which felt at home for them linguistically, or even if they didn't emigrate here, they would find vendors and customer service people who spoke their language.
It would be phenomenally defensible: protected by two oceans and the arctic, it would have no hostile nations on any border, like India, China, Russia, and the EU do. And therefore it would be a region where people feel safe to invest their money.
And its currency would be the world's reserve currency. It would have by far the best natural advantages of any economic union in history. If only we could persuade our fellow Americans that Mexicans aren't our enemies, and that we won't all just drop dead if we adopt single-payer health care system.
It would work for US and Canada since they’re both fairly rich countries with modern economies.
Would be a hard sell for US and Mexico.
Many parts of Mexico are still controlled by drug cartels.
Would be a hard sell for US and Mexico.
Many parts of Mexico are still controlled by drug cartels.
The GDP of Mexico and Canada are comparable so I don't see an issue economy-wise.
You're right about the cartels, though.
You're right about the cartels, though.
Wouldn't be easy, but the EU has integrated very poor countries, like East Germany and Greece.
> Many parts Mexico are still controlled by drug cartels
Alas, many parts of the U.S. are controlled by people who think that vaccines are toxic and surgical masks are ineffective against airborne respiratory illness....
Yeah, it wouldn't be easy, but then again, nothing worthwhile is.
> Many parts Mexico are still controlled by drug cartels
Alas, many parts of the U.S. are controlled by people who think that vaccines are toxic and surgical masks are ineffective against airborne respiratory illness....
Yeah, it wouldn't be easy, but then again, nothing worthwhile is.
The eu started as several unions that wanted to improve trade and to ease that implement standards, so that i can sell a phone without worrying about the standards in france or germany.
Euratom for easying the trade of niclear material and monitoring the radiation in the membercountries.
Ecsc similar to euratom for coal and steel. They also brought an democratic legitimated supranational court that is now the ecj
And last but not least ec and eec, the brought free trade and some of the standards, like minimum size of apples.
Euratom for easying the trade of niclear material and monitoring the radiation in the membercountries.
Ecsc similar to euratom for coal and steel. They also brought an democratic legitimated supranational court that is now the ecj
And last but not least ec and eec, the brought free trade and some of the standards, like minimum size of apples.
We have the longest unguarded border in the world and, if the two countries diverge enough culturally, that will become a real problem. Can you imagine if we had the problems on the northern border that we have on the southern border with Mexico?
Most Canadians live on their southern border, if they became Americans, they'd likely move south ASAP. The cold is really the #1 thing holding them back. The second thing is they just simply lack population.
40M isn’t a small population. Canada is mostly inhabitable and they don’t have great infrastructure.
So Canada essentially is small pockets of densely populated cities.
So Canada essentially is small pockets of densely populated cities.
Canada has a version of universal healthcare and strong gun control laws.
They trade with US. Being a Neighbour of US, they get protection.
Canada gets to have the good parts of US without being US.
It would be a stupid move for Canadians.
They trade with US. Being a Neighbour of US, they get protection.
Canada gets to have the good parts of US without being US.
It would be a stupid move for Canadians.
Of course not. The modern trend has been for regions to divide into their own independent ideological and physical domains.