Why the Netflix "deal" with Canada is not a deal at all.

As the owner of company that makes content and is located in Canada I was interested in this Netflix deal with the Canadian government. However, what was touted as a "$500,000,000 investment" was real quite comical when you look at it and amounts to Netflix giving away nothing to get something in return.

First it was advertised as a "Five hundred million dollar investment" but actually it is only a one-hundred million dollar investment per year. Then, it is in Canadian dollars not even US dollars so that is really an eighty-one million dollar investment. Best of all last year Netflix boasted to the Minister of Culture, "In 2016 alone, we've commissioned hundreds of millions of dollars of original programming produced in Canada."

At this point you might be confused? Does this mean Netflix is going to spend even less money in Canada, because they are already spending more than that amount now? Only the Canadian government could shout about the "great deal" they have when the actual terms of the deal leave it open to reduce spending in return for the government not taxing them.

What this "deal" does is create a high quality new political genre called "political-reality TV." Kudos to Netflix for developing a new format of comedy where the comedic content is generated by none other than the Canadian Government who gives it away for free yet demands only a writing credit! In Hollywood terms this deal is "Canadian House of Cards meets The Office." Apparently it will be playing for a minimum of five seasons.