So Slim Jim decided to go ahead with a 1% cut in the GST after all. He's also cutting income taxes -- increasing the exemption as well as rolling back the 0.5% income tax increase he stiffed us with 18 months ago. Corporate taxes are also being cut. Pretty good.
My feeling is that he's hoping the Alberta effect can be felt nationwide. Um ... sooner or later the good times are going to end. And we could end up where we started back in the 1980s -- when Trudeau and Mulroney nearly spent Canada into oblivion, if we're not careful. I'd rather have prudence than throwing caution to the wind.
This is a "fingers-cross" mini-budget; and because it's based on high hopes and blue skies rather than pragmatism -- I give it C-.
Vote for this post at Progressive Bloggers.
2 comments:
Well at least you are giving some credit. That's better than most of the partisan hacks in PB.
I'm a pragmatist, MC, not an radical. I still think an increase in the Child Tax Credit as well as other targeted tax cuts could have produced the same kind of injection into the economy and would have preferred that over a GST rate cut. I honestly believe the GST one could have and should have been deferred to 2010.
But if a tax cut can be funded through surpluses and not borrowed from thugs like the heads of Mainland China, Singapore and Saudi Arabia like Bush Jr. did -- I'll support it.
Post a Comment