With the holiday season now behind us, the oncoming flood of credit statements to Canadian households is a powerful reminder that there are no free lunches. Borrowing to pay for current consumption brings interest payments, and ultimately, the need to pay off principal balances. Most Canadians are intimately familiar with this reality when it comes to their household finances. But this same reality also applies to governments. As taxpayers, Canadian families are also responsible for interest on government debt. And these payments are significant.
government spending
January 6, 2014
2:00AM
December 20, 2013
2:00AM
For many years, Ontario has been the quiet enabler for the vast system of subsidies the federal government provides to Atlantic Canada, Quebec and Manitoba. With rare exceptions, it has stood by as equalization grew and as the federal government incorporated subsidies to regions in more and more of its regular programming.
In recent years, evidence has been accumulating that the regional subsidy system is much bigger than it appears on the surface, unsustainable for both Alberta and Ontario and entirely counterproductive because it discourages growth in all recipient provinces.
November 21, 2013
2:00AM
Allegations of expense scandals in the Senate have shocked many Canadians and rightfully so. Although unsettling, such antics are not an isolated case; they are part of a larger institutional problem with government.
November 19, 2013
2:00AM
The government sector in Alberta is unhappy and they want Premier Alison Redford and her colleagues to know it. Universities are advertising against provincial reductions in their funding; government unions are activating their members about proposed pension changes, reforms that would make them more akin to the private sector and less like a taxpayer-funded entitlement.
It is not clear why the government sector believes it must be immune from change. The case for reform is not difficult to make.
November 14, 2013
2:00AM
After federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty unveiled his latest financial plan Tuesday, much of the media hype centred on the government's larger than expected surplus in 2015-16. Early chatter seemed to accept the government will deliver as promised and some declared its "conservative assumptions" might allow for the deficit to be eliminated even earlier.
November 12, 2013
2:00AM
Therell be no doubt that were balanced in 2015, federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty told reporters after recently meeting with a group of private sector economists. This is among Mr. Flahertys most categorical statements to date on his plan to achieve a balanced budget in 2015-16. But in light of recent economic forecasts and potential threats to the governments revenue projections, he would be well-advised to focus on further spending restraint something he can fully control in order to deliver on his promise.