Harpers approach sounds like it gives Canadians a lot more freedom, after all isnt that supposed to be what government is about? Freedom? I am hoping to keep this blog relatively balanced, and declare my biases as needed, so here I declare that I support the left, and whole heartedly disagree with Stephen Harper's approach.
The problem with tax cuts is that the money from taxes is used for something. We don't pay taxes just so that the politicians in Ottawa can get a paycheque, we pay taxes because the government does a lot for its citizens that require funding. The obvious sacred example is Universal Health care, each province is required by the Canadian government to provide free health care to every Canadian, if you are sick, someones going to help you, regardless of your wealth or ability to pay it back. Most of our health care is paid by our Provincial taxes, but the federal government has a hand in it too through Provincial funding programs.
The example of health care may not be the most relevant example but it carries the most shock value so I use it. But here is an example of service cuts. Cultural funding has become the hot button topic. when Harper cut taxes ($200 billion total) he started to chop away at the arts programs, things such as funding Canadian based television shows no longer get the same sized government grants. The funding cuts look to amount to about $50 million from the arts. You may be saying 'I totally don't care about Canadian television, it always sucked anyways, except of course Corner Gas' Thats fair, the fact that arts are losing funding won't bother you too much. But stop for a second and think, if the Canadian Radio and Telecommunications Commission had budgeted X amount of dollars for 2009, and now knows it won't get it, what are they going to do? The practical option would be to rebudget, but no matter how they do that someone is going to be pissed. Instead, they have to find other ways to come up with that money, Heres one option:
The Toronto Star ran a story today with the shocking headline Internet Tax. The idea is that the CRTC is considering making Internet providers include an additional fee for your service, sort of like the $6.95 service fee you pay for your cell phone. Well this is just a preliminary idea, but they do have the ability to do it. So what do you think about your tax cut now? The 2% less you pay when buying goods is just redistributed to other fees elsewhere. If you have to pay a fee to use the internet (let's say $5 a month) just to cover $50 Million, where is the other $199,950,000,000.00 going to come from? you will either end up paying for it elsewhere financially, or through a reduction in services. Imagine waiting 6 months for your passport to arrive because the passport office had to cut jobs. or waiting for 6 hours in line to get your Social Insurance Numbere issued. I am being alarmist I know, but what I am saying is taxes do something for you, when you pay less taxes, those things will be reduced.
Nobody likes the Government in their pocket, but I submit to you that our pockets would be more empty if they took their hands out.
3 comments:
The rational economic model suggests that when the Government slashes taxes, whether it be GST or Income Tax, people should be saving money in preparation for a tax increase to follow later. So, what do I think of my tax cut? I think it's awesome because I save 2% 'now'!
I'll cry later when I am directly impacted though.
i wasn't so please about the 2% cut actually...it was supposed to be a relief for consumers, BUT.... retailers cheated by raising their own prices! GRRR....
I'd say yay for income tax cut, which is what liberals going after, to balance with carbon tax right?
Absolutely W. The Liberal proposal does not fall under the same problems of the Conservative's cuts. Dion proposes a Tax Shift (hence the Green Shift) Which in theory would not create a loss of revenue thus a potential savings for the consumer without having to lose services.
I do speak about Potential savings, as in any economy, the cost of the Carbon Tax will trickle down to the consumer, however with Carbon Tax the consumer has a little bit more control over their own share of consumption.
Also as a follow up to the original entry. I wrote critically of the Conservative design, but i was not intending to label it as stupid. Privatization is exactly what Right Wingers believe in. It is not dumb or backwards. In my opinion it is less fair and less just.
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