Darrell Bricker – författare

The anonymity of a phone line is the secret to the success for Darrell Bricker and John Wright of Ipsos Reid, the largest market research company in Canada. Ipsos'' accuracy in gathering people''s thoughts and predicting trends makes them the go-to source for major companies seeking answers to unusual questions, such as: What would your ideal lover look like? Would you rather touch the Stanley Cup or Dorothy''s ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz? And, do you believe in ghosts?

In Canuckology, Wright and Bricker, the bestselling authors of What Canadians Think about Almost Everything, share with us the wealth of their thousands of polls, drawn from conversations with some unlikely characters, including the retired man who still believes in Santa Claus, the non-parent who freaks out about toy safety, and the woman who would rather take her dad to a movie premiere than George Clooney.

Filled with hilarious insights from every province and territory, as well as from people of every age, gender and economic standing -- and peppered with fun factoids and quizzes -- Canuckology is compulsive, must-have reading for any Canadian.

For almost its entire history, Canada has been run by the political, media and business elites of Toronto, Ottawa and Montreal. But in the past few years, these groups have lost their power—and most of them still do not realize it’s gone. The Laurentian Consensus, the term John Ibbitson has coined for the dusty liberal elite, has been replaced by a new, powerful coalition based in the West and supported by immigrant voters in Ontario. How did this happen?

Most people are unaware that the keystone economic and political drivers of this country are now Western Canada and immigrants from China, India and other Asian countries. Politicians and businesspeople have underestimated how conservative these newcomers are making our country. Canada, with its ever-evolving economy and fluid demographic base, has become divorced from the traditions of its past and is moving in an entirely new direction.

In The Big Shift, Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson argue that one of the world’s most consensual countries is becoming polarized, exhibiting stark differences between East and West, cities and suburbs, Canadianborn citizens and immigrants. The winners—in both politics and business— will be those who can capitalize on the tremendous changes that the Big Shift will bring.

Where will the world go after COVID-19? CEO of Ipsos Public Affairs Darrell Bricker''s prescient and timely new book has the insights and the data to understand what we are going through and why, and who we still are despite the disruption. While the world around us has changed, Bricker''s extensive research and analysis resonate for the future.

In this groundbreaking new book, Bricker, a Canadian expert in what Canadians will want and need, distills the trends based on real and extensive demographic data and dares to forecast what will come next. Why is Harley-Davidson making smaller motorcycles and changing the way they sell their bikes? Should restaurateurs be focusing on vibrant, frenetic restaurants offering the latest food fashion or on open, quieter restaurants that focus on tasty standard fare? What’s the fastest-growing sector in the housing market? Where should companies plan on setting up shop? Why do we face a population crisis? Which provinces will become the haves and which the have-nots? Where will Canadians be emigrating from, and where will they live? Should we be building more hockey arenas or basketball courts, or even cricket pitches?

Next is the first book in decades that offers an honest, often provocative prescription for where we will live, what we’ll be buying and who our leaders will be in the decades to come. Filled with stories of Canadians making critical decisions for their businesses and their personal lives, Next will appeal to a wide audience: anyone who is wondering where they should look for their next job or where they might plan on living in retirement—even how they will live in Canada’s ever-changing future.

**A SUNDAY TIMES MUST-READ**''Riveting and vitally important'' - Steven Pinker''A gripping narrative of a world on the cusp of profound change'' - Anjana Ahuja, New StatesmanEmpty Planet offers a radical, provocative argument that the global population will soon begin to decline, dramatically reshaping the social, political and economic landscape.For half a century, statisticians, pundits and politicians have warned that a burgeoning planetary population will soon overwhelm the earth''s resources. But a growing number of experts are sounding a different kind of alarm. Rather than growing exponentially, they argue, the global population is headed for a steep decline. Throughout history, depopulation was the product of catastrophe: ice ages, plagues, the collapse of civilizations. This time, however, we''re thinning ourselves deliberately, by choosing to have fewer babies than we need to replace ourselves. In much of the developed and developing world, that decline is already underway, as urbanisation, women''s empowerment, and waning religiosity lead to smaller and smaller families. In Empty Planet, Ibbitson and Bricker travel from South Florida to Sao Paulo, Seoul to Nairobi, Brussels to Delhi to Beijing, drawing on a wealth of research and firsthand reporting to illustrate the dramatic consequences of this population decline - and to show us why the rest of the developing world will soon join in. They find that a smaller global population will bring with it a number of benefits: fewer workers will command higher wages; good jobs will prompt innovation; the environment will improve; the risk of famine will wane; and falling birthrates in the developing world will bring greater affluence and autonomy for women. But enormous disruption lies ahead, too. We can already see the effects in Europe and parts of Asia, as aging populations and worker shortages weaken the economy and impose crippling demands on healthcare and vital social services. There may be earth-shaking implications on a geopolitical scale as well. Empty Planet is a hugely important book for our times. Captivating and persuasive, it is a story about urbanisation, access to education and the empowerment of women to choose their own destinies. It is about the secularisation of societies and the vital role that immigration has to play in our futures.Rigorously researched and deeply compelling, Empty Planet offers a vision of a future that we can no longer prevent - but that we can shape, if we choose to.