Sergeant at Arms David Richardson opened this week's meeting by acknowledging that Calgarians live, work and play in the traditional territories of the Treaty 7 First Nations and the Metis Nation.
George Brookman led the singing of O Canada, and this week's greeter Therese Tackacs delivered the invocation.
President Rick Erven thanked this week's volunteers Garry Moyes, Robert Lowther and Bill Gillott.
Club secretary Jennifer Lavier-Jankovic welcomed visiting Rotarian Deb Hymers from the Rotary Club of Calgary Sarcee. In addition to welcoming this week's guests, Jennifer announced four club members celebrating birthdays through the end of December.
Did you know that the 25th Teddy Bear Toss took place during the December 1st Western Hockey League game against the Red Deer Rebels at the Scotiabank Saddledome? After forward Carson Focht scored the Hitmen's first goal, the fans threw 25,025 stuffed animals onto the ice. Seventy social causes receive the toys collected from the ice surface, including our Christmas hamper program.
Originating with the Kamloops Blazers in 1993, the Teddy Bear Toss has spread to hockey leagues around the world. However, this tradition does not extend to the National Hockey League, which discourages fans from throwing objects onto the ice. The Teddy Bear Toss arrived in Australia in 2014 and Sweden in 2017. In 2014 the toss debuted in Italian basketball.
The Teddy Bear Toss requires a massive amount of coordination, beginning almost a year in advance with scheduling, game promotion and sponsorship plans. Five months before the game, the Hitmen canvas more than 70 organizations to determine how many bears they need.
The week in advance of the game is very busy as the logistics of the toss are sorted out. Organizers ready the Dodge truck to drive Santa and Mrs. Claus onto the ice, and a high school marching band completes its final practice before kicking off the event.
One hundred fifty volunteers collect, count, bag and distribute the bears. It can take up to 6 hours to count 25,000 toys, and the Saddledome provides tables under the stands for volunteers to do their work. Volunteers seal bears headed to sterile areas in the Children's Hospital in plastic bags on entry into the Saddledome. ENMAX volunteers and the Hitmen take 400 bears to the Alberta Children’s Hospital the morning after the event.
Announcements:
Thank you to everyone who pre-purchased their tickets for today's meeting. Knowing the planned attendance in advance helped the club and Palliser hotel in planning our luncheon.
Impark has advised us that it can no longer provide vouchers for discounted parking at the Palliser Parkade as they now have an over demand for those stalls. Club members using the service will receive their last invoice through ClubRunner in January.
President Rick removed the "red dot" from Garry Moyes' name tag. Congratulations on completing your new member initiation activities, Garry!
Terry McMahon presented an honorary Paul Harris Fellowship to Dr. Murray Young. Congratulations on receiving this well-deserved award, Murray!
Bruce Graham introduced our speaker Todd Hirsch, Vice-President and Chief Economist at ATB Financial. His presentation, A New Trajectory: Trends in the Alberta and Global Economies, provided an overview of our current economic situation. He began with a quotation by Yuval Noah Harari, "In a world deluged by irrelevant information, clarity is power."
The first part of his presentation considered the future of work in Alberta, particularly evolving relationships between employers and their workers. He began with an example in which the automation of a simple activity, such as going to a doctor to obtain prescriptions for routine medications, will transform radically in the next few years. In his scenario, a wearable monitor orders a personalized pill that replaces multiple drugs, such as a statin, and medicines for hypertension. Once ready, a robotic aircraft delivers the tablet directly to the patient at home. This automated process eliminates the pharmacist, doctor, nurse and receptionist in the doctor's office. Technological disruption does not mean the replacement of workers by robotics. Instead, it means process automation will render many traditional jobs unnecessary.
While this displacement might be inevitable, society must be aware it could create new problems of social isolation and social poverty.
Our speaker went on to describe how work has evolved from relatively fixed periods of education, productive work, and a brief retirement that was typical of the first half of the twentieth century to a more complicated picture. Tomorrow's workers can expect to encounter periods of paid employment mixed with periods where they are not working for pay, interspersed with periods of educating and skills updating. We can expect the lines between education, paid work and retirement to blur completely. This shift has profound implications for workers and employers. The key attributes required of future workers will be flexibility and adaptability. Similarly, employers will need to offer flexibility to workers as they move in and out of paid work to care for children and ageing parents.
Building on his early healthcare example, Mr. Hirsch told us that while process automation will eliminate large numbers of today's jobs, it will create many new ones, some of which are not obvious today. Our speaker believes we can already see the appearance of "green shoots" heralding the arrival of a new, diversified economy. He emphasized that this transformation will not lead to the immediate reversal of the job losses we have experienced in the energy sector and that high paying jobs in oil and gas likely will not return. That is, employment in the emerging market will offer lower wages. He also indicated that the energy sector will not disappear but will form the backbone of Alberta's future economy.
The second part of his presentation considered the future of the global economy. He suggested many situations at play in the world, some of which present risks for Canada and Alberta. Our primary macroeconomic risk is that we are heavily reliant on one trade partner, the United States. Over the past twenty years, the US has become more unpredictable because it feels more threatened than in the past, and protectionist sentiment has grown.
Alberta also faces microeconomic risks in that it falls to individual companies and industries to diversify trade. The federal government has done its part by negotiating several free trade agreements, including an updated NAFTA agreement with the US and Mexico, and a comprehensive trade agreement with the European Union, among others. However, beyond these agreements, developing trade with countries such as India and China is very complicated and time-consuming. While very worthwhile for Canada and Alberta, growing business is risky for the companies involved. This risk will lead to slower growth in the Canadian economy.
Mr. Hirsch wrapped up his presentation by predicting that the Alberta economy will grow at a rate of one percent in 2020, which will seem a disappointment to people when they reflect on the spectacular growth seen in the years before 2014.
Peter Giuffre thanked Mr. Hirsch for a most informative presentation, our last of 2019.
COG Staff - December 10th, 2019
Editor
Craig Henderson
Photography
Ralph Lundberg
Rotary Club of Calgary - Chartered April 1914 as Club #949
Suite 305, 105-12 Avenue SE, Calgary, Alberta, T2G 1A1
