The Frontier Centre for Public Policy today released policy series paper Fiscal Imbalance in Canada: A Look at the Opportunity Costs of Equalization. The author, Eric Merkley, is a research associate with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. The report highlights...
Equalization
Equalization Status Quo is Unacceptable
Canada’s equalization program has been controversial since its adoption in 1957. Equalization is a system of transfer payments designed to address fiscal disparities between provinces with the goal of allowing less-prosperous provinces to provide comparable levels of...
Atlantic Canada Subsidized Using More than Equalization
Prince Edward Island is Canada’s smallest province, but people who live there receive three times as much as they contribute in premiums, when they collect Employment Insurance. EI benefits in all of Atlantic Canada greatly outweigh the premiums paid. The difference...
Islanders should take less, contribute more to EI, other programs
Souris Mayor Dave MacDonald recently told the Premiers’ Council on EI that recent changes to the federal EI program are killing his town. Unfortunately, Mr. MacDonald did not note that Islanders receive three times as much as they contribute to the EI program. This...
Featured News
Canada in 2073—Will There Be One?
“Ahead, Thar Be Dragons.” The world of 2023 is a scary place. One major war is raging, with others probably on the way. The Pax Americana that has given us freedom of the seas and allowed global trade to flourish might be breaking down. International piracy,...
World Cries out for Canadian LNG, “No Business Case” Feds have Totally Failed Us
Today, Canada’s natural gas sector is seeing its decade of darkness due to federal policy. And it’s not because the opportunity wasn’t there. It was because our government allowed its ideology, and that of its anti-oil and gas friends (also known as protestors) to...
EI Reform – Please Let Me Opt Out
Down in Ottawa, the concept of EI reform is heating up. One reform I would like to see is allowing people to opt out of EI coverage and self insure. As both a farmer and a self employed business person, I strongly object to paying into that fund when it does not...
New Brunswick Needs Financial Reality and Leadership
Rather than focus on old, discredited explanations for New Brunswick’s poor economic performance, leaders must acknowledge the role that excessive federal subsidies play in underperformance.
Media Release – National Coalition on Federal Transfers Launched
An informal coalition of six not-for-profit and think tank organizations have agreed the issue of federal transfers to the provinces needs to be placed firmly on the national agenda.
Carr on the Wrong Road
The Business Council of Manitoba has proposed a one per cent increase in the provincial sales tax dedicated to infrastructure.
Financial Reality is Needed in Maritime Canada: David Mackinnon addresses the Charlottetown Rotary Club, April 2, 2012 in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island
I’d like to start my presentation with a warning. The warning is that I’m going to speak very frankly about difficult issues. I will be taking fundamental issue with the approach the federal government, P.E.I., Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec and Manitoba have been taking in relation to the many subsidies the Government of Canada provides to regions.
Quebec Students Need Lesson on Equalization
It would appear Quebec university students need to learn a lesson on equalization, fairness and pulling their own weight. Frankly, so does Premier Jean Charest and the rest of the province as well.
The Coming War of the ‘Have-Nots’: The system is deeply biased against Ontario
Caterpillar’s closure of t he Electro-motive Diesel plant in London, Ont., is troubling, not just because of the loss of 465 wellpaid jobs, but also for what it says about Ontario’s ability to compete for manufacturing jobs.
Canadians Vote With Their Feet: Subsidizing poorly performing parts of the country can’t substitute for the policy choices that foster prosperity, writes Brian Lee Crowley
No man is an island. What is true of individuals is doubly true of societies. When even in authoritarian societies such as Iran and China, YouTube videos from Tunisia, Britain or Argentina can be viewed the instant they are posted, even the humble and the oppressed know what life is like elsewhere.
A Flawed Formula: In allotting equalization, no thought is given to how much it actually costs to provide basic public services
Ottawa’s equalization scheme, under which the federal government gives money to “havenot” provinces so that they can provide roughly comparable levels of public services as found in “have” provinces at roughly comparable levels of taxation, is a little more than 50 years old.