It's not just a Canadian problem, though it has likely cost some Canadians their lives. Staff answering 911 calls in centres the world over are overworked, stressed and sometimes ... there just aren't enough of them. As a result, callers are sometimes left on hold in the most awful circumstances possible. Money has been spent on recruitment, but talent is tough to come by. Enter Hyper.

A Canadian startup that was just acquired by Motorola, Hyper is already helping 911 operators in several cities—but not in the way you might imagine. Not yet, anyway...

Award-winning reporter Katherine Hayward joing the show to discuss her piece on Hyper, which was written for a brand new Canadian publication called Be Giant, which aims to report on the people, places, ideas and breakthroughs shaping Canada's future.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: hello.cancon@gmail.com.

Would you call Walmart Canada a "Canadian" company? It's a much more complex question than it appears—but I think most of us would agree on the general answer. It's a Canadian subsidiary of a giant US retail behemoth. But when it comes to procurement spending from the federal government, often these are kinds of companies that can meet qualifications to describe themselves as "Canadian" and earn an edge over their competitors.

It shouldn't be a surprise that government spending can get complicated, but it does raise a fascinating question: For the past year many of us have learned a lot about what makes a food item or a retail product Canadian—but what about a company?

Vass Bednar, managing director of the Canadian Shield Institute, joins Jordan to puzzle through that question, and how our tax dollars are spent because of it.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: hello.cancon@gmail.com.

When the World Happiness Report first began scoring countries on their self-reported levels of happiness in 2012, Canada was consistently in the top 10. It felt right, we were pretty happy. Over the past several years, things have been changing, first slowly and now rapidly. In the recently published edition of the report, Canadians' happiness levels ranked 25th in the world, by far a new low. And that precipitous drop has been driven predominantly by one demographic...

UBC Professor Emeritus and co-creator and editor of the World Happiness Report John Helliwell joins us to discuss what's changed, who's unhappy and what we know about how to generate happiness in our own lives from two decades of scientific research.

Feedback from listeners is so, so welcome. If you have something to say, email us: hello.cancon@gmail.com.