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1. Ontario’s ‘mini-budget’ makes little progress on deficit

   Today, Finance Minister Vic Fedeli tabled Ontario’s Fall Economic Statement. Given Ontario’s difficult fiscal situation (a large budget deficit and mountain of public debt), and signals that the update would be a “mini-budget’ with ...

2. Successive Ontario governments increased net debt from $139 billion to $338 billion

   The Ford government today released its fall economic and fiscal update, which includes taxation and spending changes, with Finance Minister Vic Fedeli noting that the "fiscal hole is deep.” However, perhaps the most telling ...

3. Ontario has a $15 billion deficit—not the $6.7 billion claimed by the previous government

   The Ontario government’s review of provincial finances is finally out, and the picture is even grimmer than what the auditor general and the Financial Accountability Office have presented. The key findings confirm that Ontario since 1990 ...

4. Ontario budget ignores past promises, offers no plan to enhance economic competitiveness

   Predictably, many of the headlines on Ontario’s 2018 budget, released today, focus on Premier Kathleen Wynne’s so-called “free” child care plan and other big-spending items. It is, after all, a big-spending budget. But crucially, the ...

5. Repeating Past Mistakes? Spending Restraint Critical for Ontario’s Fiscal Health

   In 2016/17, Ontario’s net debt reached $302 billion, or approximately $21, 500 per Ontarian. The province’s debt-to-GDP level stands at 38 percent, just below its all-time historic high. Ontario’s net debt has increased dramatically since 2003/04, ...

6. Canada’s Past Fiscal Leaders Are Now Fiscal Laggards: An Analysis of 2017 Provincial Budgets

   Around the turn of the 21st century, Alberta and Ontario could both boast of having comparatively sound public finances relative to most other provinces. In recent years, however, serious fiscal problems have emerged in both provinces. Alberta and Ontario ...

7. Dear Alberta, please don’t make the same mistakes we did in Ontario

   Appeared in the Ottawa Sun, August 30, 2016 Alberta recently released its first quarter fiscal update, which showed that the province’s budget deficit this year will be even bigger than expected, weighing in at $10.9 billion. The grim headlines and eye ...

8. Ontario premier's fiscal imprudence is reckless

   Appeared in the Winnipeg Free Press and Flin Flon Reminder, Jan 25, 2015 How governments manage their finances matters a great deal. Spend and borrow too much and the result is a spiral of increasing deficits that create ever higher debt. Then, ever-more ...

9. Moody's report yet another warning sign for Ontario to act

   Appeared in the Guelph Mercury A new report on provincial debts and deficits by Moody's, the international credit rating agency, is another piercing reminder of Ontario's serious fiscal challenges. Based on media accounts, the report warns that ...

10. Ontario usurps California's role as poster child for bad fiscal management

    Appeared in the Ottawa Citizen It has been more than two years since an independent commission submitted its report to the Ontario government on the province's poor public finances and high government debt. The report's findings were sobering. ...