On this week’s episode of Free Lunch by The Peak, we sat down with Brendon Bedard, Senior Economist at Indeed, to talk about the weakening labour market, and what it means.

If you were kicking yourself last year for not getting in on the NFT craze, we’ve got good news... but if you have a stockpile of Bored Apes collecting digital dust, maybe skip to the Saturday crossword. 

Driving the news: A new report from crypto company dappGambl found that ~95% of all NFTs are now essentially worthless, with ~23 million people holding onto these “assets.”

Do NOT show your HR manager this: In China, companies are adding “helping you find your one true love” to their benefits packages, alongside dental coverage and vacation time.  

Driving the news: Forbes unveiled that TikTok parent company ByteDance has an internal channel on its shared work tool called Meet Cute. It lets employees post photos of friends, family, and acquaintances and advertise them as potential romantic partners to co-workers.

Like Zayn Malik leaving One Direction, Alberta wants to break away from Canada’s national pension plan.

What happened: Alberta is looking to leave the Canadian Pension Plan (CPP) and establish its own provincial pension fund after a long-awaited report claimed the province would be entitled to a $334 billion asset transfer if it left in 2027 — over half of the CPP’s entire assets.

While you were asleep, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky landed in Canada. 

What happened: After hitting up a UN Security Council meeting in New York City this week, Zelenskyy is set to deliver an address to Parliament today, aiming to bring attention back to the war in Ukraine. He’ll then head to Toronto, home to 11% of all Ukrainian-Canadians.

Young people hoping to start a family in Canada are taking one look at their grocery bill and saying “maaaaybe a dog?”

Driving the news: The rising cost of living in Canada has created a quality of life crisis for young people, leading many of them to not have kids, per a new StatCan report. Over a third of young adults don’t think they can afford to have a child in the next three years.

Physical passports and boarding passes could go the way of smoking sections on airplanes thanks to biometric technology. 

What happened: Next year, Singapore’s Changi Airport — ranked among the world’s best — will roll out a biometric system that lets travellers take off without having to flash their passports. The change will streamline operations as the airport welcomes more jet setters.