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There's a structual deficit, the government is going to have to make some cuts and Budget 2011 is being sold as when that'll happen. Cuts are not popular, they cost somebody, but are the right wing idea. When you have a deficit you have the political opportunity to make some cuts to government. However almost no one has any good idea of what to cut. Do you have some ideas? Lets hear em. What could the government cut without outrage in the media.

   

Government funded lunches.

   

Nothing. There is nothing large enough to make a difference that can be cut that isn't someone's sacred cow.

   

Cut welfare. Those bastards have no political power anyway, let em starve in the streets. It worked for Gordon Campbell for 3 terms. Oh, and bus passes for seniors.

   

Instead of cuts, Harper should raise the GST by 1% - that would take care of a huge chunk of the deficit. However, that is highly unpopular, so he won't do it.

Odds are cuts will happen to health care, defence and the social safety net - just like when that awful Chretien had to eliminate the deficit. The other thing is that the stimulus plan has ended, so that's $20 billion or so right there. Still, I don't see how he's going to be able to cut so little that he'll win enough votes to actually stay in office.

Pretty much Harper is damned if he does cut and damned if he doesn't.

   

Exactly. So long as pols feel they need to pander to various groups in the hope of a vote or two, it'll never change.

I shudder at the amount of money wasted at all levels of government on useless shit. Heaven forbid someone with some hard headed common sense enter public service. The media will see to their ruin in jig time.



Since there would be outrage regardless, I'm not going to consider that aspect. I'd be cutting at all levels:

Funding to lifestyles
Funding to religion
Funding to language
Funding to cultural celebrations
Funding to artists
Funding to unions
Funding to NGO's

to name a few...

   

Weird scrolling thing is happening...

Funding to private business.
Funding to charitable organizations.
Subsidies to daycare.
Reduction of Civil Service and elected member perks and personal budgets.

There's also some serious cutting needed in the various Ministry programs.

   

If you're using IE8, pop it into compatibility mode (the little file icon by the address bar).

   

Ahh that's the ticket! Thank you.

   

It's hard to name a place where cuts should be made because there are SO many things the government does that few of us know anything about. For example, Agriculture Canada runs a program where genetic testing is done on cows and pigs. Farmers get things like backfat tested by the government. We tax payers are paying for a service for farmers to improve their herds. Why? Sure, it's a small program compared to, say, National Defence, but there are 10s of thousands of these types of programs. It's this sort of spending that isn't waste, per se, but is definitely not something that tax payers should be paying for. This is where we need to cut.

The other place for cuts is waste. To echo Dr. Caleb, tax dollars should NEVER be used to pay for someone's lunch. You have to eat whether you're at work or not. Why are tax payers, at all levels of government, being billed for food and drink?

   

Everyone wants to cut waste. Heck, what could be better than cutting waste? Nobody has his ox gored and you're increasing efficiency. Problem is that ideas' been thought of altready and waste cutting programs have been reverberating throughout the system for as long as government has been around. Eliminating waste is a good thing, but cuts woulnd't be substantial. Also, I'd argue that a certain amount of waste is inevitable, if not necessary.

Fact is that most of the money goes to debt payment, transfer payments and entitlement programs.

   

Cutting out the 2.8 billion tax subsidy to the oil industry might help.

Getting our act together on health care. There should only be a federal plan that gives everyone in Canada the same coverage - no provincial plans. And, have the feds get tough with the doctors. Especially using nurse practitioners and nurses for a lot of stuff the docs do now. Use the feds buying power to reduce drug costs.

Earnings over 127k are only taxed at 29%. Raise that to 35% and add another category for earnings over 200k at 45%.

But I agree, you can't cut out all waste in any large organization. But Lemmy and Spcfor also have a point about cutting out a lot of the little bullshit programs - maybe they add up to a significant amount, I don't know.

Invest in children - put more money into dealing with child poverty. The savings well be a long ways down the road, but they'd be huge.

   

Child poverty was eliminated in the year 2000. Didn't you get the memo?

But, I agree here too, as with Lemmy and Sapper. Lots of small projects add up to big money. And dammit, I have to pay for the lunch I'm eating now, why don't those lazy bastards with all the tax breaks have to?

   

   

What are you saying here?

   

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