Ontario's Corporate Welfare Bill - $27.7 billion

Since the early 1990s, Ontario governments of every partisan stripe have used tax dollars to subsidize private for-profit businesses. Between 1991/92 and 2008/09 (the first and last years for which comparable data are available), Ontario’s governments spent $27.7 billion on direct subsidies to corporations. For anyone who paid income tax in 2008, the cost of corporate welfare was $424 per Ontarian (or $848 per dual-income couple). By lowering taxes rates for all and offering subsidies to none, Ontario’s government could concentrate its spending and tax policy where it would do the most good.