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1. Scrap corporate welfare and restore Canada’s business tax advantage over the U.S.

   Appeared in the Financial Post, May 15, 2018 It’s been more than two months since Finance Minister Bill Morneau said he would study Canada’s crumbling business tax advantage—while cautioning against any “impulsive” measures in response to tax changes ...

2. From the welfare state to the entitlement state

   Appeared in the Calgary Herald Question: If someone made $62,000 last year, had $187,000 in their bank account, and yet sought a $5,360 subsidy from government, what would the common sense response be? Most people would say that person possesses chutzpah ...

3. Governments go subsidy-wild with $684 billion spent on subsidies since 1981

   Appeared in the Victoria Times Colonist and Trail Daily Times Ever wonder how Canada's net federal debt reached $671 billion by 2013? Or how net provincial debt among the provinces ended up at $509 billion that same year? Wonder no more. It's ...

4. Fewer gimmicks, more transparency needed in Ottawa

   Appeared in the Calgary Herald, New Brunswick Telegraph Journal, Winnipeg Free Press, Waterloo Region Record, and Guelph Mercury No normal person pays close attention to who is "in" or "out" as finance minister, and that's a good ...

5. The Alberta government's $2-billion leap back into corporate welfare

   Appeared in the Financial Post Alberta’s provincial government has provided plenty of political theatre as of late, with, as I write, three resignations from the government, including that of Alison Redford as premier. However, the Redford resignation may ...

6. Chrysler bellies back up to the corporate welfare trough

   Appeared in the Globe and Mail Back in late 2011 after the Occupy Wall Street protests, Fiat-Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne gave a speech in Toronto to decry what he called "the most inane displays of greed." The reference was to behaviour he ...

7. Pro-markets not pro-business: There's a difference

   Appeared in Globe and Mail Economy Lab The federal government recently poured $36.3 million into the Northleaf Venture Catalyst Fund the first of many soon-to-come government-sponsored funds comprising Ottawa's $400 million Venture Capital Action ...

8. Bombardier and Canada's corporate welfare trap

   Appeared in the Vancouver Province In the land of government plenty that vast landscape populated with the tax dollars of Canadians there is no shortage of politicians willing to hand out and defend subsidies to business and no dearth of corporations ...

9. Cut the Orwellian apologia for corporate welfare

   Appeared in National Post In his 1946 essay, Politics and the English Language, George Orwell argued that, political speech and writing are largely the defence of the indefensible. Orwell's quip came to mind again recently after reading Bombardier& ...

10. The Beatles, John Diefenbaker and chronic subsidy seekers

    Appeared in the Calgary Herald Back in 1962 John F. Kennedy had been president of the United States for one year, four lads from Liverpool were about to hit it big in the music world, and a Saskatchewan lawyer, John Diefenbaker, was in his fifth year as ...