What Pierre Poilievre Doesn’t Get About His Economic Hero
Monday, April 27th, 2026
Poilievre presents justice — fairness, poverty reduction, the well-being of those left behind — as something that markets produce incidentally when they are left alone. The claim is that free markets lifted billions out of poverty; therefore the path forward is more free markets, fewer regulations, lower taxes, more oil and gas. But this framing depends on a separation of efficiency and justice that doesn’t hold up under scrutiny.
Tags: economy, ideology, privatization, rights, standard of living
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
How the Top One Per Cent Threaten Canada’s Future
Monday, March 23rd, 2026
A modest wealth tax that affects only Canadians with over $10 million in net wealth could raise nearly $40 billion annually. Ninety-nine per cent of Canadians would not pay it. Similar taxes are already in place in Norway, Switzerland and Spain, and California is currently considering a one-time wealth tax on billionaires. Canada is also the only country in the G7 without an inheritance or estate tax.
Tags: economy, featured, globalization, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Policy Context | No Comments »
Insiders Detail Ways Alberta’s For-Profit Surgery Push Is Failing
Monday, November 17th, 2025
“The evidence will tell you that those places with for-profit facilities don’t do more surgeries because they are using the same surgeons and the same anesthesiologists as in the public system,” … In Quebec and Ontario, where governments have released data in response to freedom of information requests, the surgeries performed in for-profit facilities have been shown to be “two or three times as expensive for such operations as cataracts and knees.”
Tags: budget, Health, ideology, jurisdiction, privatization
Posted in Health Debates | 2 Comments »
How Rich Canadians Got Even Richer
Monday, August 25th, 2025
During the first quarter of 2025, the top 40 per cent of Canadian households captured 66.2 per cent of all after-tax income in Canada. The bottom 40 per cent shared just 17.2 per cent of income. It was a record gap, up 11.9 per cent from four years ago… Statistics Canada highlights two main factors driving inequality. First, high-income households saw huge gains from property income — money made from investments in real estate, stocks and other assets. And second, the compensation for Canada’s highest earners is rising much faster than the salaries and wages of other Canadians.
Tags: economy, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Policy Context | No Comments »
The ‘We Are Canadian’ Video Is Serving Nationalism with a Twist
Monday, March 17th, 2025
The new “We Are Canadian” slogan might resonate with many voters who still see Canada as a country built on collective effort — on socialized health care, multiculturalism and government intervention for the common good. But for the modern CPC, which leans heavily on the language of personal responsibility, rugged individualism and minimal government, this shift in national sentimentality could be a liability… if “We Are Canadian” is any indication, the broader electorate may be moving in a different direction — one that values community over the individual.
Tags: featured, ideology, Media
Posted in Governance Debates | 2 Comments »
The Danger of Poilievre’s ‘Axe the Tax’ Scam Hits Home
Monday, August 5th, 2024
Opposition to climate action stems mostly from Canada’s largely foreign-owned fossil fuel industry, American dark-money-funded think tanks and Canada’s major newspaper chain, owned by American hedge funds… Emissions are being reduced, and with the Canada Carbon Rebate the vast majority of Canadians are financially better off under pollution pricing… Canada cannot slogan its way out of the climate crisis
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Inside the Campaign to Kill a Step Toward Tax Fairness
Monday, June 10th, 2024
… interest groups don’t have to offer an alternative and can just snipe at proposals that they dislike. The capital gains change is expected to bring in more than $19 billion over the next five years. Anti-tax groups don’t need to explain where that money should come from, or what services should be cut if the tax is axed… But the process is a warning about the powerful forces that will battle any move to increase tax fairness, if it means the rich will pay more.
Tags: budget, ideology, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | 3 Comments »
Democracy Is Under Siege Globally. Canada Is Being Tested
Monday, April 8th, 2024
Finkelstein preached that you didn’t need a vision to win in politics, just good polling that revealed what people were against. Once that was established, the goal became tying the unpopular thing — immigration, carbon tax, inflation — to a flesh and blood political “enemy.” … The idea was to avoid talking about your own positions and policies, the better to demonize your opponent. The objective was not to sell yourself but rather to destroy your opponent… repeating simplistic slogans… “Axe the tax.” “Not worth the price.” “Everything is broken.”
Tags: featured, globalization, housing, ideology, immigration, rights, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Don’t Blame Carbon Pricing for Affordability Challenges
Monday, January 1st, 2024
With the latest data, we find that the gradually increasing indirect taxes, including carbon taxes, have caused overall consumer prices to be only 0.6 per cent higher in October 2023 than they were in January 2015… The effect of carbon pricing on rising food prices is even smaller, accounting for the indirect effects of carbon taxes… Carbon pricing is definitively not to blame for affordability challenges.
Tags: economy, jurisdiction, standard of living, tax
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
How to Defeat Poilievre’s Politics of Abandonment
Thursday, September 14th, 2023
For Poilievre freedom itself is conceived in opposition to government… The profit motive is what drives efficiency, no matter what “good” is being considered. Privatization then — whether in health or seniors care, housing, child care or transit — is the solution to the rising costs of living. The individual trumps the collective, competition trumps co-operation, private interests are king. Never mind that unregulated capitalism traps many in lives robbed of freedoms from want and drudgery.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
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