Nah, they way things are, if the canadian housing market falls, the whole economy will shit the bed. The GDP is currently driven by the housing market, the nations finances are literally built on a house of cards.
10 to one they weren't, look how oddly this article is phrased. I'd guess there was a rule government offices had to accept floppy discs, have the equipment to read them, but the clients weren't actually submitting that way anymore.
"Third world" just meant Africa, but picked up the "poor" connotation from those ads in the 80s with the starving african children, a "Nimrod" affect.