Surplus and the truth.

I can't believe how quickly this turned from two rather interesting topics, our surplas and alternative fiscal systems, into personal attack after persoanl attack.

As much as I don't agree with everything that Linda McQuaig says she makes a valid comment that most of the Scandanavian countries manage to provide a higher level of social programs. However you have to counter this with the fact that you may pay higher taxes in some of these countries than we do. According to worldwide-tax.com the Fins can pay up to 35% income, Danes 60%!! Canadians upto 31%. If anyone has better data please let me know.

Also this isn't to say that if we tried to be Finland-West we would get the same results. I would love to see a few of their ideas put to use here, private hospitals which cater to everyone in the community, free education to name a few. And maybe the huge surplus (if the liberals were willing to change the law saying that it must be spent on the debt) could pay for some of this, and help rebuild our military (but maybe I'm a little biased on that point

)

There is a massive poarisation of society over the actions of the Bush regime and those Canadian fifth columnists who would give this country over to them, Blubs. I try to respond reasonably until the Canada-haters attack, then I respond in kind.

although it's true some scandinavian countries have private health care, the simple truth is all western countries involve the private sector. The BIG differance with the american system (which is essentially has it's own system) is that it's publicly insured while some of the care is private while the american system relies also on private insurance (HMO). Ther's a really good article on the economist about it. I'll try to find the issue.

the problem with linda is that what she's talking about is not so black and white. Should we pay off as much of the debt has possible because a whole generation of people will soon retire, and will demand a lot from our health care system and therefore put a strain on our finances. Remember that money that is used for one cause cannot be used for another; money is not created. But these soon to be retired old folks will also stop saving their money and start consuming so will they be a brake on our economy (i don't like using the word brake but you know what i mean) or will they add to our economy.

And before we start talking about spending these surpluses, the gov't should do it's best to reduce waste and pork. Pointless to spend our surplus if most of it goes to waste. No household throws money out because it has too much, right.

And Godz46, when you're talking about the poor, remember that under macroeconomics says that under our system, few people will have incredible wealth while many will be middle income and some more will be very poor, so the poor are more a symptom of our current economic system. Macro doesn't tell you who these people will be, just that on a aggregate whole, you'll have these class differences. That's what happens when you have finite resources. How do you best use your resources to acomplish whatever needs accomplishing.

Most of the waste and pork goes to corporations, Gerry. For all the blather about a bloated government, the truth is that it has already been cut down to the point where there isn't much left to cut.

We need to cut the corporate welfare to the bone, but that isn't going to happen because most of the pork is in tax breaks.

The problem with the surplus is that it's dishonest. The government is basically hiding money until the end of the year, then they say, "Oops, look what we found." That doesn't give any of the opposition parties a chance to argue that the money be spent on anything else.

What should be done with it? Well, I wouldn't bet on it always being there, so putting it into ongoing programs is a bad idea.

The tax base should remain at least as high as it is until we have no debt, although restructuring the system so that corporations and the very wealthy pay more and average Canadian citizens pay less would be a major step forward.

Paying off the debt is important, but it isn't the only important thing.

This country has been ignoring its infrastructure for twenty years. Things are falling apart. We need to rebuild and modernise everything from highways to sewage systems. The provinces and cities don;t have the money to do that, so the feds need to step up to the plate.

We have an environmental disasteer on our hands with global warming, yet the Liberals, who signed and ratified Kyoto, don't have a plan as to exactly how they will reduce emissions. Considering that the development and implementation of new technologies has always created wealth, putting some of the surplus towards alternative energy projects and giving tax rebates for the upgrading of homes and businesses that choose to become more energy efficient is really more of an investment than spending.

So figure out the budget properly so that we know how much money is there and earmark the portion they would have normally hidden towards infrastructure and seed money for environmental project, as well as debt payments. Say we give one third to each, or even half to the debt and the other half to infrastructure and the environment, but do it above board so everybody can see what's happening, and the surplus issue goes away.