The Alberta Treasury Branch (ATB Financial) may be sold to private ownership to subsidize Alberta’s growing deficit, netting an approximate $4 billion dollars in fiscal influx to cover government expenditure.
Taxation
How to Waste Tax Money: Buy Canadian
The way we buy equipment for our military is badly broken. Ottawa’s latest report on how to fix it proposes making it even worse.
Obama’s Reactionary Jobs Plan: The president’s State of the Union speech lays out a misguided economic agenda.
Does it bother anyone else that the president of the United States seems to believe that our collective future entails assembling battery parts in a government-subsidized factory for $9 an hour? Is that really what Americans envision for their kids — an assembly line? Because when you look past Barack Obama’s mesmerizingly hollow rhetoric, what he’s proposing is a return of jobs that progress and prosperity have left behind.
2013 Alberta Economic Summit
Last week’s Alberta Economic Summit was an interesting exercise. The panels of experts presented some sound economic ideas and generated some lively discussion. The interventions from state clients were less interesting because they had not much to say about how to resolve the current problems and because they were unabashedly self-serving. The public sector union reps and heads of public-funded charities predictably wanted more spending and more hiring. One of them, a woman representing the Boys and Girls Club, was shamefully unprepared, quoting wrong facts and making pronouncements without much of an idea of the historical record. Case in point, she claimed that the non-profit sector didn’t exist a century ago. You would think that someone high up in the non-profit sector would know a little of the history of voluntary organizations such as the Salvation Army or the Boys Scouts.
![Alberta's Premier Alison Redford addresses the audience at the First Annual Alberta Economic Summit on 9 February 2013 at Mount Royal University in Calgary.](http://fcpp.org/files/wpuploads/2013/02/IMG-20130209-00596-e1360622681859-225x300.jpg)
Alberta’s Premier Alison Redford addresses the audience at the First Annual Alberta Economic Summit on 9 February 2013 at Mount Royal University in Calgary.
As an exercise, in and of itself, the Summit was a good thing. As a political tool, it may have bought the premier the room that she needs to convey to Albertans the impression that she is doing something about the economy. Whether the Summit will have any practical benefit remains to be seen. Touted as the First Annual Alberta Economic Summit, it opens the probability that there may be more of them. And if so, their institutionalization can result in creating a specific place for discussing policy ideas that might result in tangible impact.
But the idea was culled in a hurry from political necessity, more than economic need or historical tradition. I say historical tradition because we should not forget that Social Credit wanted and tried to institute government by experts. The experts would create the policy and the politicians would put it into place. Parts of what took place last Saturday exhibited shades of that colourful Alberta past, the premier would be horrified to admit.
I must give credit to the premier for having sat through the proceedings all day, sometimes listening to ideas critical of her doings and undoings, and lack of doing in some instances. I thought that subjecting herself and her MLAs (perhaps most ministers) to the process showed an uncharacteristic amount of humility, for which the premier is not known. It was either humility or meeting a strategic demand in practical politics. Either way, Redford is deserving of credit for it. But it is difficult for me to imagine that the premier will agree to subject herself to the same thing each and every year.
Featured News
Preston Manning: Report of the COVID Commission
Introductory Comment Brian Giesbrecht, Retired Judge, Frontier Centre Senior Fellow: The Frontier Centre for Public Policy is honoured to present Mr. Manning’s latest offering, in what he calls a fictionalized story. It is about everything that has happened to this...
Canada: Returning to the Original Vision
Many Canadians are aware of stories of how immigrants were originally attracted to Canada through the promise of free land. The then Minister responsible for immigration, Clifford Sifton, had his staff spread out across central and eastern Europe promising free land...
Taxing Height?
Let’s not. However, this is an awfully entertaining tongue-in-cheek critique of utilitarian approaches to optimal taxation levels and income distribution.
Europe Shows the End Game for Big Government
“If you want to understand the European crisis, you only need two statistics. The first is the development of the ratio of government expenditure to GDP over time; the second is the level of government debt.”
Higher Taxes in Illinois and the Beauty of Federalism
Yesterday, the state of Illinois approved an increase in the state’s personal income tax from 3 percent to 5 percent. Corporate taxes are also set to increase. I’m not familiar enough with Illinois’ budgetary circumstances to say whether the tax increases are a good...
HST Saves Business Money
This type of cost sharing is one more reason why Manitoba and Sask should be looking at implementing a HST.
Manitoba Should Consider An HST
Manitoba has a reputation as a diversified and steady long-term economic performer. Indeed, in 2009, Manitoba alone among Canada’s provincial economies did not contract. Yet there is the nagging feeling that all is not right and Manitoba demonstrates some economic weaknesses.
Canada’s Competitive Edge: A warmer climate for capital up north.
“It wasn’t long ago that Americans viewed Canada as a poorer neighbor with only one competitive advantage—in hockey. No more: On January 1, Ottawa cut the nation’s corporate tax rate to 16.5% from 18%, compared to the U.S. federal rate of 35%.”
Mayor Responds to Tax Report: Farbridge asks staff to review report that Guelph residents pay some of the highest property taxes
“Council is entering the 2011 budget planning process. This presents a great opportunity to review the findings of the report and ensure we provide good information in advance of budget setting to Council and the community.”
Kevin Libin: Why a backward approach makes city taxes go higher
Municipal tax hikes happen all the time. In most cities, denizens have come to accept them as an annual tradition, as arduous and inevitable as Lent or Yom Kippur. Still the question is: why do we accept them so apathetically? Canadians give no other level of government such easy licence.
Ireland’s Bold Plan: The recovery blueprint reads like a list of supposed political impossibilities..
“The Irish government’s new budget plan, released this week, is a remarkable document. Faced with a huge deficit, skyrocketing debt and unemployment north of 14%, Brian Cowen’s government has responded with a plan that reads like a list of political impossibles.”