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So the taxes paid by a corporation are on par with their average employee?

   

If you want to add all that, individuals pay CPP and EI as well. There's a portion paid by employer, and a portion by employee. Employees pay both federal and personal income tax. And there's PST & GST. Business (whether incorporated or not) can get a tax credit for GST they paid for cost of goods sold, applied to what they remit to CRA after collecting GST from sales. Individuals don't get that. In Manitoba, business can get an exemption so they don't pay PST for tools or inventory. Individuals pay PST on everything.

In Ontario, there was OHIP; also a portion by employer and a portion by employee. But an increasing number of employers required employees to pay both. That was illegal, any employer caught would be in a lot of trouble, but employers threatened to fire anyone who blew the whistle. So Bob Ray replaced OHIP with payroll tax; effectively telling employers they have to pay the whole thing. (That'll learn ya!) When Ontario Liberals got back in, they introduced the Ontario Health Insurance Premium (instead of Plan), paid entirely by employees, not employers. And retained the payroll tax. So payroll tax is the employers portion. Keeping the two separate means employers can't cheat.

That's a great idea. When the national healthcare system was created in the 1960s, Manitoba had a debate whether to charge a premium. Some doctors in Manitoba had set up a private system, patients paid a premium to subscribe. But Manitoba chose to create a 5% PST to pay for healthcare. Manitoba didn't have PST before that. Today PST goes to general revenue. There's also a payroll tax. I want to replace Manitoba personal income tax with Ontario's system.

In the spring of 2013, Manitoba hiked PST to 8%. The increase from 7% to 8% paid for a raise to MLA, cabinet minister, and Premier salaries, and senior bureaucrats including judges. And they created an exemption for school tax for seniors. I heard a couple lobby for this, they didn't want to pay property tax on their cottage. Their cottage. Sorry, but I feel if you can afford a second house (that's what a modern cottage is), then you can pay property tax for it.

Ps. I lived in Toronto from July 1987 through July 1990. The riding was Eglington--Lawrence.

   

Sure I can. Debt incurred when times are good is a bad thing, period - even more so when it is spent on things that benefit only a portion of the population. In the case of previous Liberal governments, it was social programs. In Harper's case, it was boutique tax cuts aimed at his base.

But spending on infrastructure at a time when debt is cheap and labour plentiful is a smart investment. As I said in the other thread, infra pays out economic benefits for generations, not a few years or even a decade or two.

Look at the Canadian Pacific Railway, which tied our nation together from coast to coast and stimulated trade between the provinces. Even better, look at the network of highways spanning our country. The construction of that network not only created thousands, if not millions of jobs over the past six decades, but also created ancillary effects like causing tourism to boom.

75 years ago, it wasn't possible to drive from coast to coast in Canada - now it is possible and a fairly common trip for many Canadians. All those trips created the need for thousands of hotels, gift shops, restaurants, gas stations, etc and created millions of jobs and billions of tax dollars since its creation in the 1950s/60s. That same network also increased inter-provincial trade and allowed goods to be shipped across the country.

If we spend some of it on mass transit, that will help reduce congestion, emissions and pollution, as well as providing jobs and economic benefits for Canadians, so that's a win-win too.

The difference here is that infrastructure spending helps all Canadians at all income levels, unlike Harper's tax cuts which largely favour his base - corporations and the top 20%.





No, I don't agree with running a deficit when the country is in relatively good economic times, no matter who is in office.

As I said, his deficit spending was necessary in the two years after the subprime meltdown, but after that, he chose to run deficits because he kept cutting taxes instead of paying down debt.

He and his government never failed to brag to Canadians and the rest of the world how strong our baking sector was or how we weathered the storm so much better than everyone else did. If that was truly the case, we shouldn't have had a deficit for the three or four years. But we did because his system of tax cuts created a structural deficit which he couldn't dig himself out of, even with oil at $90/barrel.






Yeah, it was a contraction according to Harper, wasn't it?

Sorry, but the economy shrank for two straight quarters - that's the textbook definition of a recession and one a supposed economist like Harper should know. But admitting the ugly truth might just endanger his chances of re-election, so it's a contraction instead.

Who knows, maybe the second quarter of this fiscal year will have some growth and the recession will be over, but we won't know that until after the election.

Apparently you haven't read a damned thing I've said here. I've stated several times that debt in bad financial times is unavoidable and often necessary. I also don't begrudge the $120 billion or so Harper added after the subprime meltdown. It's the $50+ billion he added after the storm ended that I disagree with.

Zip sure hit the nail on the head about you toeing the party line. Thanks for confirming yet again how biased you really are.

   

I figure the tantrum the industry is having in Alberta right now because of the Notley government is really short sighted. With labour rates collapsing right now and with cheaper construction materials aplenty due to all the projects that have been postponed or cancelled, this would be the primo time for a foresighted company to do a big project. On the labour materials they could probably end up saving about 30 to 40% alone just from the lower wages and lower prices from suppliers they could demand. They're in a sword-of-Damocles position right now with all the control in their hands where an investment in a project now will make them nothing but money later on when prices rebound thanks to the savings they'd make today. This is where I end up agreeing with some of the critics of Alberta. Too often were far too much of a parochial place because our government and business leaders have been such a reactionary lot with no real vision for the future.

   

It's not just tax cuts. As I've said before, Conservatives drastically increased spending the first 2 months alone, in 2006. They dramatically reduced the surplus by dramatically increased spending. This was irresponsible. In the 1980s we saw interest rates skyrocket, and so did debt. We were damn near bankruptcy. The Liberals had to make very hard decisions to get us out of that mess. My criticism of the Liberals is once they had a high surplus in year 2000, they should have stayed the course. But they increased spending, shrunk the surplus. Once Paul Martin was PM, the surplus grew again. But they didn't even pay off the debt incurred during their first years in office. They did pay off most of it, but not all. Harper shrunk the deficit in 2007 to $3 billion contingency plus $0.3 billion surplus. Fiscal year 2007/08 ended up with a $9.6 billion surplus, but again that was due to Canadians paying more tax, not anything the Conservatives did. All that was before the US fiscal meltdown. When times are good you get out of debt. Fast. Before the economy tanks again.


My favourite is my city. Winnipeg has identified a need for an LRT since the 1950s. Before I was born. Actually, plans in the 1950s were for a subway. In the 1960s plans were more modest: LRT or Disney style monorail. Proposals this century were for an LRT. I still criticize the city: whey they bought the Gateway rail yard, it already had rail on it. They should have converted that to LRT. It could have started our LRT. And after Mayor Katz built the BRT, he realized building an LRT on that route would have been negligible difference. BRT is just a bus on a dedicated road. Just a bus. Proponents for BRT claimed we can convert it to LRT later, but it'll cost more that way. However, I would still like an LRT there. Toronto already has extensive mass transit. Winnipeg is the largest city in North America with no mass transit what so ever, we only have diesel buses. And we did have electric buses (trolley buses) when I was a child. There were street cars before I was born; many rails remained in roads for decades after it was shut down. If you want to focus on mass transit, could we start here?


True. I still think it would be better to re-balance tax, so average working Canadians get a break. Ensure those below the poverty line pay less than multi-billion dollar corporations. And treat the debt as a mortgage, pay they whole thing off. Once gone, completely abolish federal personal income tax. That's a big project, and covers our ass for when interest rates rise.






I do. Mulroney got in when the deficit hit it's then all-time-high of $38 billion. Progressive Conservatives went from majority to 2 MPs when they brought in a deficit of $43 billion. (plus GST, plus everything else) Deficits were necessary after the subprime mess, but they wouldn't have been that deep if he hadn't squandered the surplus while times were good. Cutting taxes is good, cutting corporate taxes that deep is not. The last country to cut corporate taxes like that was Ireland; look how well that worked out. And the amount he spent before subprime just cannot be excused.

   

Most companies are too worried about the next three months to worry about the next three decades.





The last one we had was Peter Lougheed, but all of his successors were too gutless to follow through on his vision (Heritage Trust Fund). If they had, we'd be sitting on a few hundred billion (worth less than $20 billion) and could draw on it to cushion this oil shock.

Instead, we're left with a 'Contingency Fund' worth $5 billion....thanks for nothing Ralph Klein.

   

Times right now aren't bad. So your entire point about spending now because times are "bad" is just plain false.

Economists all over Canada, have shown growth in both June and July.

So while we're talking "recession" in the first half of 2015, the term is being thrown around wildly because of the election when many economists don't agree.

The recession, as tiny as it was, is over. Nothing like a recession that add's 100,000 jobs, right?



http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-o ... e26056053/



There's already money in the budget for infrastructure projects. Trudeau has taken the money that was already there and doubled with the intention to stimulate the economy. There's still billions already allocated for these projects.

If you are true to your word, you wouldn't support his budget.



If that is indeed the case, you wouldn't support Trudeau's plan.



Pot/Kettle, boots.

I don't "toe" any party line. I don't blindly support the CPC, not a member, no sign on the lawn and never visit their website for information. In fact, my line of thinking is much in line with the NDP on this.

Bottom line here is, Liberals like yourself think that government can spend their way to a prosperous economy while Conservatives think putting the money back into the pockets of Canadians and allowing them to use the money to stimulate the economy is the better choice.

Just because I believe the economy is driven by Canadians and private business, doesn't mean I "toe the party line".

   

Being a numbers guy, I don't understand why you keep going back to this like you have a valid point. You're wrong.

Lower corporate taxes resulted in increased corporate tax revenue.

   

It doesn't trickle down. And cutting corporate taxes for manufacturers don't create jobs here, they'll just set up factories overseas. Or Mexico. Even IT jobs are going overseas, to India. Convergys used to be a call centre. They were horrible to work for, and didn't pay much. They paid $10/hour for technical rep's, $9/hour for customer service, when minimum wage was $6.50/hour. But they employed hundreds; my estimate was a thousand on each shift, operating 7:00am to 11:00pm. They provided telephone technical support and customer service for AT&T Worldnet, for all 50 states of the US. And Comcast cable. And the call centre for FedEx. Convergys doesn't exist anymore, India took all that business for a fraction of the cost. RBC has moved their IT department to India. RBC used to have major operations in Toronto and Calgary. Winnipeg has lost entire industries: textile manufacture overseas, furniture manufacture to Mexico.

Low corporate taxes doesn't bring back those jobs. But lower personal tax helps people directly. And I'm concerned about Mulcair's promise to create a federal minimum wage. Increase minimum wage and more employers will move operations out of the country. With lower personal taxes, minimum wage doesn't have to go up.

I suspect Harper is obsessed with resource extraction because that can't move out of the country. Manufacturing can. But he made the mistake of selling raw resources. We should sell value added products. Government worked hard to ensure finished lumber was exported instead of raw logs. American sawmills didn't like that. That's what the softwood lumber dispute was about. Now the oil industry is selling diluted bitumen instead of synthetic crude. No upgrader, maximum jobs out of country.

   

Of course it does! Companies stay in Canada or move to Canada and create jobs. It also helps in Ontario where business is getting killed with energy pricing.

Add to that, the increased revenue in the federal coffers.



Raising them won't bring back jobs either.

Raising taxes will just drive more jobs away, so any income tax cut, offset by a higher corporate tax will be moot when people are out of work and not paying taxes.

   

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If we increase corporate income tax to 15%, it will still be lower than any G7 nation but Germany. The next lowest is UK @ 23%. Actually, I read a promise by the UK Finance Minister that he would cut their corporate income tax rate to 19% by 2017, and 18% by 2018. If we increased ours to 19% by 2018, then only the UK and Germany would have lower corporate income tax rates, and the UK by not much. Do you seriously think that would have a significant impact?

Click here for interactive chart. Source article here:
Corporate income tax rates in U.S. and other countries
The article bemoans America's 35% rate.

   

Completely eliminating personal income tax for everyone, rich and poor, will bring corporate head offices to Canada. They will want their high paid workers here for the tax breaks. So the emphasis is good paying jobs, instead of trying to race to the bottom with third world countries for manufacturing jobs.

   

Giving everyone free booze and pizza would likely have a positive effect, but let's stick to ideas that actually have a possibility of happening.

Doing away with income tax is a non-starter.

   

Yes!

There's far more at play with respect to a business besides corporate tax. The cost of doing business in Canada, with the cost of energy, the dollar, the cost of labour, etc....are all factors.

   

You mention energy. Manitoba has been trying to sell electricity from Hydro dams since the 1970s. Ontario made a deal with Manitoba Hydro to build the Conawapa dam, all the power would go to Ontario. But they got as far as a gravel road to the construction site, then Ontario cancelled. Ontario payed millions to cancel a power deal; history repeats. In 1999 Gary Doer became Premier of Manitoba; part of his platform was to build all 14 hydro projects, plus windmills. Conawapa was just one of he hydro projects. It would have generated 5,000 megawatts more power, all for export. At one point he talked to Ontario to sell some of that power, but as soon as he told the media he was talking to Ontario ministers, the Ontario guys backed off. I talked to one Ontario MPP about this, he told me to find somewhere else to sell power. The northwest Ontario town of Dryden complained they had he most expensive electric rates on the continent, while Manitoba next door has the lowest. They wanted to buy Manitoba power. But Ontario government had a fit over the idea. Ontario politicians are willing to do business with the United States and Quebec, but have a problem with Manitoba. Someone please give Ontario politicians as whack upside the head.

One concern was who pays for the power transmission line. They wanted to go from northern Manitoba to GTA. Manitoba was willing to pay as far as the provincial border, but wouldn't pay for a line through Ontario. While that was the obstacle, Prime Minister Paul Martin offered federal money to pay for the line through northwest Ontario. They were still talking about this at the time of the 2006 election. One modification I would like to make is once power starts to flow charge the line to power utilities on a lease-to-buy plan. Once the federal government has recovered its investment, hand ownership to the utility. But still, Ontario politicians have a problem doing business with their neighbor to the west. Again, please someone give Ontario politicians a whack upside the head.

   

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