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[dolari]

Dollar briefly hits parity, highest level since '76
Updated Thu. Sep. 20 2007 8:44 PM ET

CTV.ca News Staff

Finance Minister Jim Flaherty said a weak U.S. dollar was the cause of the loonie briefly reaching parity with U.S. currency for the first time in 31 years.

"The real story here is the rather dramatic decline in the U.S. currency in recent days and as a result the Canadian dollar is up significantly," Flaherty told reporters. He said he'd just had a conversation with Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge, to discuss the implications of a Canadian dollar even in value to a U.S. dollar.

At 10:58 a.m. EDT, the loonie rose as high as $1.0004 US before closing at the end of the trading day at 99.87 cents US -- up 1.37 cents US from Wednesday.

It didn't do me any good when I went to Canada...but Emily's gonna be living like a princess when she comes down here. At least until our economy completely tanks and we all become lackeys of our Canuck Masters.

Comments

[angharads-house.livejournal.com]

Ah, the perfidious dollar. Last time it got this high was around the end of the Vietnam war, I think.

I went to the bank to buy greenback dollars for my upcoming lost weekend down in Seattle. With the fees and all, they charged me a dollar-ought-three.

Sad thing about this, is that my job pays me in US dollars, so I'm taking the hit with you. And the company is hurting, bad, because they sell to the States and their product price is set in US dollars, so the exchange rates aren't any good for any of us up here.

There was a story on the CBC radio this morning, about how the car dealers down in Victoria were wailing and crying about the loss of business to dealers over in Bellingham. Well, the reverse used to be true, too, back when our dollar was worth 62 cents.

I was paid in Canadian dollars then, dammit. Like the saying goes, "there ain't no justice".

Good luck,
-----> angharad, whose personal "buy-nothing day" just stretched out to be a "buy-nothing year".

Nice user-icon, by the way. I need to draw a decent one for myself, that fits in 100x100 pixels.

[jessie-c.livejournal.com]

...and we all become lackeys of our Canuck Masters.

Don't worry, we won't change much. You'll all be required to say "zed" and build Tim Hortons stores in place of Crispy Creme stores. The stars in your flags will have to be replaced by maple leaves and your money will be less boring. Otherwise nothing much will change. Oh, and you have to keep Bill Shatner. Sorry, that part's not negotiable.

[mundanecircus.livejournal.com]

I'd give anything foe a Timmies in Florida (Texas, too) -- they're hot chocolate is the best there is. Timmies is growing throughout the northeast and midwest, especially Michigan (Bay City, where some of my relatives live, has two).

As for the prices Canadian pays -- it seems that they're stuck on 2002 prices. One place to find such evidence is in the magazines -- many of these have US and Canadian prices. The cost of the October 2007 issue of "Shonen Jump" is US$4.99 / Can$7.99. And I think it's been like that ever since the magazine began in late 2002.

[jessie-c.livejournal.com]

Magazine prices are a legacy of Sheila Copps' crusade to preserve Canadina publishers by placing duties on imported magazines.

[mundanecircus.livejournal.com]

Though even when Copps was in office (and after she left), I did notice some US magazines priced at par with Canadian dollars, or with a slightly-higher Canadian price, but still cheaper after conversion to US dollars (at the time). And of course, you also have to account with the conversion rates at the time.

One example was Nickelodeon Magazine (yes, I was a Rugrats fan), and I noticed that it had a cover price of US$2.99 / Can$3.99. This was about around 2002 / 2003, when the Canadian dollar was at its lowest against the greenback, about US$.62 per Canadian dollar, meaning Nick Magazine was only US$2.48, when bought in Canada (not including sales taxes, of course). And going back to "Shonen Jump", around the close of 2002, its $7.99 cover price in the Great White North would equal to about US$4.95, almost the same as in the US.

[nightshadepyre.livejournal.com]

Awesome! Good thing I'm taking French in college! And people laughed at me...

Hey Jessie, we already have Tim Horton's up here in the Northeast! I'd rather keep Krispy Kreme, but I'll gladly give up Dunkin' Donuts!