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People who are freezing to death are unlikely to consider the long term impacts of cutting down a tree for warmth.

Also, taxing the beejeezus out of people for some nebulous long-term gain is politically unsustainable unless there is a very solid reason for the taxation. Over the past century the only times that excessive tax rates have been sustained by a population is when they've been coupled to a definite expiration date.

I'm willing to pay twice my current level of taxation if that were to pay down the national debt and if deficit spending and any further tax increases were expressly outlawed.

I am vehemently opposed to higher taxes just so I can fund even crazier levels of deficit spending.

For instance, in California a variety of laws have created a structural deficit in the state budget. The state is legally obligated to spend 108% of every dollar collected in revenue. The Democrats whine about the deficit and want higher taxes but the problem is that even if they seized 100% of incomes in the state it would never be enough!

My short term and long term losses are utterly unrewarded by any long term gain.

To some degree or another, it's the same in Canada.

You want higher taxes but then those taxes go to subsidies for refugees, transfer payments to Natives and Quebeckers, and any other end of nonsense.

Given the state of education in North America it's become a fallacy to propose that taxes for schools are some sort of long term benefit when school kids can't read, calculate, or appreciate their culture or history.

I agree with Zip - you cannot justify high rates of taxation when you're not providing a high level of value in return.

   

Last Friday I paid US$6.99 for two loaves of Milton's MultiGrain bread at Costco. The cheaper breads by Oroweat are running US$5.39 for two loaves.

The price of hamburger was up but, oddly, the price of New York steak was down to $5.99. (I stocked up).

   

Costco... 3 hour drive... Nearest Walmart Supercentre... 3 hour drive LOL

Actually, I paid 4.39 for a flax bread on sale today

   

Chapters Books piss me off with the US vs Canadian price etc. They get away with it and have done so before when our buck was at par. JC Penny screws us as well.
I was just over the border and they said the our dollar was 22 cents less.

   

Buy a breadmaker...

   

Buy? I married mine!

   

But how are her........buns??

   

Awesome)

   

3 hours - time to get out of the sticks and move somewhere bigger (economies of scale versus monopolies and all that).

If you want to live in the BC mountains and enjoy the scenery, then I suggest Kamloops or Kelowna. Both are bigger and have more jobs, bigger populations and consequently probably lower prices (both have a Costco for example).

If you aren't willing to move to a larger population centre, then IMHO, you don't really have a reason to complain, as you've self-imposed those costs on yourself by being unwilling to live elsewhere.

   

Are you really freezing to death? Not by what you've said on this forum.

You say you're opposed to higher taxes to fund deficit spending - higher taxes would allow the govt to not go into deficit. That's why you're in so much trouble in CA - can't raise taxes, so you empty the prisons instead. Good idea.

Of course the tax system has to be rationalized. But the same people who bleat about taxes bleat even louder if their particular tax exemption or govt subsidy is eliminated. There's lots of "keep your govt hands off my medicare" types out there. Transfer payments go to all provinces that need them, not just Quebec. But I'd be all for nationalizing natural resources so it's not a crap shoot which province you live in as to how much money comes into the provincial treasury. Then you wouldn't need transfer payments.

In BC we certainly need more money going to education - parents are being squeezed more and more to directly contribute to school expenses, which means the wealthier districts get better funded education than the poorer ones. Education is meant to be the great leveler, and should be well funded. OTOH, the govt should get tougher with the teachers and weed out the bad ones. Also teachers don't need any salary increases right now, they're doing pretty well compared to everybody else. But the govt finds it easier to settle big contracts with the teachers, then starve local school boards for funds to save money. So teachers get laid off, programs cut.

Just starving the govt for funds won't make things any better than they are now. To build a well functioning, civil society takes money. But I agree that the tax system needs to be rationalized. For instance in Canada we could stop giving the oil industry billions in tax breaks - make them fund their fair share. And in the US you have people proposing to cut out all those tax exemptions that bleed the treasury. If that was coupled with a progressive tax system, with steeper tax rates on higher incomes, that would be a good idea. But watch the bleating if anybody actually tried to introduce such a scheme. Or for real fun, cut the farm subsidies.

Oh, and you guys could move to govt healthcare - copy the best of what's being done in every other Western country and save 1/2 a trillion dollars a year. Maybe don't elect presidents who engage in futile wars - another big saving. Etc.

   

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