Archive for the ‘Governance Policy Context’ Category
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Morneau expects to raise $3-billion a year by cancelling more tax credits
Mr. Morneau said a review of so-called tax expenditures will begin this year and he’s optimistic that it will produce billions in new revenue… The budget gave the CRA $444-million over five years to fight tax evasion and avoidance, and booked $2.6-billion in expected new revenue from this added enforcement activity… “… our objective is to make the tax code simpler and our objective is to ensure that there’s tax fairness.”
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, standard of living, tax
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How federal budget 2016 aims to help middle-class wallets, and target wealthy Canadians: ‘A classic soak the rich scheme’
… the budget proposes to do away with income splitting for couples with children under the age of 18 for the 2016 tax year and going forward… Pension income-splitting is not affected by the changes… the government is taking away some key tax planning vehicles that allow the wealthy to rebalance their portfolios without incurring a deemed disposition, meaning they will face immediate tax consequences.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, standard of living, tax
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How Canada got a step closer to taming its big fiscal beast
For years now, the government has been drifting toward the use of tax expenditure as a means of policy, and we have lacked the tools to analyze what’s happening. Colloquially known as boutique tax breaks, benefits, or loopholes… Measures such as these are thought to incentivize desired behaviours through targeted tax relief. It sounds simple, almost like a tax cut. But, in fact, these budgetary boogeymen are subsidies to the select few…
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, participation, tax
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Ontario’s early bird budget didn’t get the worm
… the lion’s share of this government’s deficit reduction activities has come at the expense of expanding program spending to improve public services… This budget allocates a 1.5 per cent increase to social assistance benefit rates, including a further increase for single OW recipients… Ontarians who have been living in poverty have been waiting 12 years… for a return to more adequate social assistance incomes. This year’s increases are too little, too late.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, Health, housing, ideology, jurisdiction, poverty, standard of living
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Ontario cracks down on underground economy, goes after tax cheats
The Ontario government says it will be cracking down on the underground economy by creating teams of specialized auditors to root out tax cheats… since 2013-14 it has collected $930 million, $330 million of which was collected in the past year, thanks to enhanced measures, including working with the Canada Revenue Agency. About $300 million was revenue owed to the province, while $630 million was due to the federal government.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology
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Why equalization no longer works
… in 2017, Ontario could shake off its status as a “have not” province for the first time since 2009, losing almost $3 billion in equalization payments. This is not because Ontario is doing well fiscally. Rather, the resource economies of Alberta, Newfoundland and Labrador and Saskatchewan are reeling. At the same time, these resource-based provinces will likely be aggrieved that the three-year weighted average calculation of fiscal capacity does not fully take account of their current financial pain
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, standard of living, tax
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Time to put the Charter first in law-making
Proactive accountability and transparency measures are sorely needed to help compel our government and parliamentarians — both present and future — to honour their fundamental duty to uphold the Charter throughout the law-making process. This is why CCLA has launched a new campaign called Charter First, which calls for the reform of our legislative process such that Charter rights are prioritized and Canadians are informed about the constitutionality of proposed bills.
Tags: crime prevention, featured, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, rights, standard of living
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Provinces can’t blame Ottawa for red ink: Transfer payments have grown rapidly over past decade, Fraser Institute finds
… the Fraser Institute “finds that major federal transfers to the provinces and territories are currently higher on an inflation-adjusted per-capita basis than at any other point in Canadian history.” … [but] “In 2015-16, Ontarians will contribute approximately $6.7 billion to the Equalization program while receiving roughly $2.4 billion in return, representing a net contribution of $4.4 billion – the highest of any province in Canada,”
Tags: budget, economy, jurisdiction, tax
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Deficits are a poor measure of Canada’s fiscal prudence
The federal net debt is currently $617-billion – an all-time high. But it is only 31 per cent of GDP, far below its post-1950s high of 67 per cent in 1996 (and even further below the 110 per cent attained in 1946, just after several years of wartime borrowing). it will be wise for the federal government to keep its debt-to-GDP ratio on a downward path… But lowering the debt-to-GDP ratio does not require balanced annual budgets.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, ideology, standard of living
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Encryption is crucial to our privacy and freedom
… encryption… enables our very freedom in a digital world. Encryption is a vital tool for enabling journalists to operate in countries without freedom of the press; allowing dissidents to co-ordinate against oppressive regimes; and in democracies, encryption empowers ordinary citizens to counteract intrusive government surveillance programs… Encryption may protect the content of a message, but it doesn’t hide where it is being sent.
Tags: crime prevention, ideology, rights
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