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There is no Harper Nation
Saturday, March 26th, 2011
Mar 25, 2011
… Harper Conservatives have singularly failed to change the Canadian ideological landscape. Instead, Canadian politics changed the Conservatives… This week’s budget, in which $2-billion in loose cash was promptly distributed to a score of special interests and political agendas, left in place a $40-billion deficit for 2010 and solidified a $100-billion increase in the national debt over five years… There must be something more to Canada than an ever-increasing role for governments, bureaucrats and politician to fill a constant demand for more and more government spending and intervention.
Tags: budget, economy, ideology, tax
Posted in Governance Policy Context | No Comments »
Justifying lower corporate taxes
Saturday, March 26th, 2011
Mar. 26, 2011
… there’s a school of thought that inherent flaws in the tax regime are preventing Canada from reaping the gains of lower corporate taxes. Michael Smart… said there is “a raft of policies” that offset the benefits of lower corporate tax rates. Chief among them, in his opinion, is the move to reduce tax rates for small businesses alongside cuts to the main statutory rate that applies to larger companies. Small firms, he said, tend to be less productive than larger corporations, and reducing their rates below the statutory level provides no incentive for them to expand and invest.
Tags: economy, globalization, tax
Posted in Policy Context | No Comments »
The federal budget and 50 years of Canadian debt
Tuesday, March 22nd, 2011
Mar 22, 2011
… adjusted for inflation, today’s federal debt pales in comparison with the records of the mid-1990s. For instance, the debt in 1996 stood at nearly $769-billion when adjusted for inflation, 25% higher than the present-day debt… How much debt a country should carry is a divisive topic for economists… sometimes being fiscally responsible doesn’t get the recognition it deserves.
Tags: budget, economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living
Posted in Governance Policy Context | 9 Comments »
The sky-high cost of taxes
Friday, March 18th, 2011
… good cost-benefit analysis would make you judge proposed public expenditure in a very severe light… Taxes cause people to change their behaviour. Tax an activity and people will do it less or, in the case of corporations, they’ll do it somewhere else. They were doing whatever it is you decided to tax because it provided benefits. If the tax kills the activity, the benefits evaporate. Some of our tax rates are pretty high. Push them a little higher and you lose a lot of beneficial activity.
Tags: budget, ideology, tax
Posted in Governance Policy Context | No Comments »
Freedom beckons for Ottawa’s trained seals
Thursday, March 17th, 2011
Mar 17, 2011
Mr. Page does not think of his office as a watchdog — that’s the role of Parliament itself. Yet with only “trained seals” barking, Canadians have long since lost confidence in Her Majesty’s Government being held to account in Parliament… a private member’s bill that would establish the PBO as an officer of Parliament, akin to the auditor general. Currently, Mr. Page is an employee of the Library of Parliament, and serves at the pleasure of the cabinet. Even government backbenchers should back the bill, and in a minority House, the opposition should be determined that it gets through.
Tags: budget, ideology, participation, rights, standard of living
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Prisons or poverty? The choice is clear
Thursday, March 17th, 2011
Mar. 15, 2011
Since 2006, the Harper Government has drained its own coffers. After taking office, it cut the GST by two percentage points, creating an annual revenue loss of $12-billion. It trimmed corporate taxes, from 18 to 16.5%, effective 2011… Yet the government somehow manages to find money for its favourite expenditures: War and crime… The Harper Government should use the 2011-12 budget to tackle Canada’s real challenges related to poverty and inequality, literacy and educational attainment. Any new federal spending should invest in people, not prisons.
Tags: budget, crime prevention, disabilities, featured, ideology, Indigenous, pensions, poverty, standard of living
Posted in Social Security Debates | No Comments »
Women’s choices not the same as men’s
Wednesday, March 16th, 2011
Mar 15, 2011
What women want is not to benefit from “positive discrimination” policies or from convoluted figures under pay equity acts, but to be hired and compensated because they are the best for the job. What we want is simple. It has been proven over and over that what it takes to improve anyone’s lot on this earth are economic and legal freedoms enabling us to fulfil ourselves to the best of our abilities — nothing more and nothing less.
Tags: economy, ideology, participation, standard of living, women
Posted in Equality Debates | 1 Comment »
Ontario health minister has strange concept of fairness
Monday, March 14th, 2011
Mar 14, 2011
[Breast] cancer has a high likelihood of reoccurring if not treated with the drug Herceptin, which can cut the chance of cancer returning in half. But Ontario only provides the drug to those whose tumours have grown to be larger than one centimetre in diameter. Ms. Anzarut, by catching her cancer early, disqualified herself from the best possible treatment. Her appeal for an exemption was rejected… Morally and fiscally, the healthcare system is offside with reality… Especially since Herceptin is already given to women in Ms. Anzarut’s situation in other Canadian provinces.
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, standard of living, women
Posted in Health Debates | No Comments »
Prisons should be repair shops, not garbage dumps
Monday, March 14th, 2011
Mar 12, 2011
Prison should not be a place of languishing; its purpose should be punishment, reparable stigmatization other than for extreme offenders, and largely regimented time to be spent in activity sensibly designed to make the returning prisoner less likely to reoffend. This would include therapy, skills training and reorientation. It should be authoritarian enough to incite non-return, but not so heavy-handed that it over-penalizes and breaks the will of inmates to resume life with a promising likelihood of success.
Tags: corrections, ideology, Indigenous, mental Health, poverty, rights
Posted in Child & Family Debates | No Comments »
The modus operandi of the very rich
Friday, March 11th, 2011
Mar. 10, 2011
It is this ability to keep buying and keep building that marks the modus operandi of most of the billionaires on this list. It is perhaps the root of how capitalism works. Put capital to work and it begets more capital… Much has been made in recent years about the growing disparity of incomes and wealth. In the United States, for example, the top 1% of the population holds about 34% of the country’s wealth — defined as assets minus liabilities. The top 10% has about 80%, leaving 20% to the bottom 90% of the population.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
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