Budget time is a good time to signal a new path towards smarter federal spending.
Taxation
‘It’s Unsustainable’: Special report: The public service falls under scrutiny as government wrestles with a fiscal crisis
As the province confronts its biggest fiscal crisis in history, the phenomenal growth of New Brunswick’s public service has landed in the spotlight.
Media Release – Harper’s Boutique: Rethinking Tax Expenditures in a Time of Deficit
This backgrounder scrutinizes two specific federal government tax expenditures (the Public Transit Tax Credit and the Children’s Fitness Tax Credit), and finds that at a combined cost of $164 million they are not meeting their targets, and calls for their elimination.
Harper’s Tax Boutique: Rethinking Tax Expenditures in a Time of Deficit
This backgrounder scrutinizes two specific federal government tax expenditures (the Public Transit Tax Credit and the Children’s Fitness Tax Credit), and finds that at a combined cost of $164 million they are not meeting their targets, and calls for their elimination.
Featured News
How the Prairie Provinces Can Benefit from an Improved Trans-Pacific Partnership
The Trans-Pacific Partnership was one of the world’s most ambitious trade deals. The agreement between Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Vietnam and the United States was signed on February 4, 2016. Its goal was...
Social Conflict Abridged: From Unperceived Injuries to Claiming—What is Conflict?
Societies today are in a state of flux influenced by myriad factors—globalization versus nationalism, liberalization versus traditional values, and immigration versus closed borders. Some people perceive that an injustice has been committed against them while others...
A Toll on the Common Man
On average, a 1% increase in the corporate-tax rate is associated with a 0.8% drop in wages over the next five years.
High Gas Taxes Only Hurt The Poor
Most people drive most of the time for necessity, of course, and only occasionally for pleasure. It’s reasonable, in either case, to expect drivers to pay for the roads and the bridges. Higher gas taxes, levied at the pump, punish only poor low-income people.
A taxing Tale: Feds Keep on Getting Richer
Canadians may not be making much more money lately, but their governments certainly are. The country's taxpayers dished out 8 per cent more in personal income tax last year, filling government coffers to overflowing, Statistics Canada says. Government surpluses,...
Manitoba’s Tax Cuts Lag: Report
Manitoba’s modest tax cuts in recent years pale in comparison with other western provinces and neighbouring states, according to a report released yesterday by the Frontier Centre for Public Policy.
B.C. First, Manitoba Last in Western Canada Tax Reduction Derby
Since 1999, all Canadian jurisdictions have experienced declining tax loads. The most dramatic reductions have been in B.C. and Alberta, followed by Saskatchewan. Manitoba’s reductions have been the least aggressive in the region, and have declined by only a third of B.C.’s reductions and by less than half of Alberta’s.
Our Cities Should Learn to Live Within Our Means
After a decade of mostly raised taxes by New Democrats — with deathbed conversion cuts near the end of their rule — a reduction in the personal tax burden was overdue.
Saskatchewan ponders business tax relief
CALGARY - Saskatchewan's NDP government is expected to make deep cuts to its corporate taxes to keep up with its business-friendly Western Canadian neighbours. The province's budget, due in late March or early April, is expected to implement at least some of the...
Taxation: How to Knit a Country Together
History of Taxation in Canada
The Call for Lower Taxes is Canadian, not American
Those who love taxes will unhappily discover theirs are heading down this year. A British Columbian who earns $45,000 will pay $133 less compared to 2005. Add in the late 2005 please-vote-for-me changes added by Finance Minister Ralph Goodale, and a British Columbian...