Posts Tagged ‘tax’
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Why a guaranteed minimum income is a better option than raising the minimum wage
Rather than blithely decreeing that employers must pay their employees an amount the rest of us think appropriate, and hoping it all works out for the best, the option is open to us as a society to put our money where our mouths are: to finance a decent minimum income for all with our taxes — which unlike wages are not so easily avoided. Maybe this latest increase in the minimum wage will prove less harmful than feared, but it is certain to be more harmful than the alternative: a minimum income, socially guaranteed and socially financed.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, poverty, standard of living, tax
Posted in Policy Context | No Comments »
Now, more than ever, we need to solve Ontario’s health-care crisis of capacity
Our health-care system is simply too lean. Ontario needs more hospitals, more rehab facilities and more long-term-care beds. We need health-care professionals to staff all these new sites, plus ease shortages at the ones we already have. This will mean money… enthusiasm for new large expenditures will be limited. But we can’t deny reality.
Tags: budget, Health, mental Health, standard of living, tax
Posted in Health Delivery System | No Comments »
It’s 2018 and time for tax reform focused on fairness
Mr. Trudeau, will you commit in the next budget to tackling unfair tax rules, specifically through eliminating the preferential treatment of stock options and increasing the inclusion rate for capital gains for CEOs? In short, will you commit to bringing some fairness back into the tax treatment of top business executives, billionaire investors and the wealthiest in Canada? It’s time to put an end to the special set of rules that exclusively benefit the affluent and well-connected.
Tags: budget, ideology, standard of living, tax
Posted in Equality Debates | No Comments »
Disruption we can get behind
The main innovation of most self-declared disruptors is that they’ve found a way to take an even bigger share of the wealth from the workers who produce it than was possible before we all carried around the internet in our pockets. It’s not the disruptors who are the biggest problem, it’s the inequality—in incomes, in power and in access to scarce resources—which is worsening in Canada, to the benefit of a small number of established and disruptive elites alike.
Tags: economy, globalization, ideology, jurisdiction, participation, privatization, standard of living, tax
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THE HIGH COST OF LOW CORPORATE TAXES
StatsCan numbers show that drastic cuts to the corporate income tax rate over the last 20 years have not stimulated new business investment… “In Canada, the evidence is that increasingly a larger fraction of income to corporations is related to excessive profits,” said Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Laureate and Professor at Columbia University. “Lower tax rates encourage firms to engage in more excessive profit seeking… income and wealth have boomed for a tiny fraction of the population, but this has not benefitted the rest of the population at all.
Tags: budget, economy, featured, globalization, ideology, standard of living, tax
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$14 minimum wage, free pharmacare for young people, other Ontario regulatory changes start Jan. 1
Thousands of workers will also get an extra week of vacation, and sick notes for the boss are banned among a host of changes that take effect Jan. 1… New Year’s Day sees the minimum wage surge $2.40 an hour to $14 and a new pharmacare plan — the first of its kind in Canada — called OHIP+ covering 4 million children, teens and young adults under 25… Other changes coming January 1 include: a 22.5-per-cent cut in the corporate income tax rate, from 4.5 per cent to 3.5, for small businesses to offset the higher minimum wage
Tags: budget, economy, pharmaceutical, standard of living, tax, youth
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
Canada needs tax reform. Here’s where Ottawa should look to improve the system
So what should be the focus of tax reform? … corporate-personal income tax integration… The Carter Royal Commission… “comprehensive limits” proposal [re. retirement savings]… “A buck is a buck is a buck.” … Major improvements in enforcement against tax evasion… and even in detecting serious tax avoidance strategies… But tax cuts themselves are not tax reform… base broadening would be… a logical complement to a reduction in tax rates.
Tags: economy, featured, ideology, tax
Posted in Governance Policy Context | No Comments »
On small-business tax reform, Bill Morneau was more right than wrong
… tightening up the rules around income sprinkling, large passive investment portfolios held inside small business corporations, and conversion of dividends into capital gains – was sound… the Senators were right to also call for a big, independent study of the whole tax system, and not just one part of it, to consider major reforms for reducing complexity, enhancing competitiveness and increasing fairness.
Tags: economy, ideology, tax
Posted in Governance Debates | No Comments »
Now is the time for broad reform of Canada’s productivity-killing tax system
… the Canadian tax system is a creaking, productivity-killing wreck: hugely over-complicated, and riddled with unjustified deductions and exemptions that distort economic decisions and bleed the government of revenues… Better by far to raise output — the base on which taxes are applied… by a sustained increase in national productivity… Enter tax reform. While there are other things we can do to spur productivity (for example, opening protected sectors of the economy to greater competition), tax reform is essential.
Tags: budget, economy, globalization, ideology, tax
Posted in Debates | No Comments »
It’s time to take another look at our tax system
… Touted as among the best ways to create jobs, corporate tax cuts have by most accounts turned out to be no such thing… every dollar spent on infrastructure spending, income supports or housing investments is seven times more effective in creating jobs… for every dollar corporations pay to the Canadian government, individual taxpayers now pay $3.50 – a result not only of repeated cuts, but also of a slew of tax loopholes and international treaties introduced in recent decades that promote or at least facilitate corporate tax avoidance.
Tags: budget, economy, globalization, ideology, tax
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