We’ve seen this script before. Higher spending. Tax increases. Persistent deficits. Growing debt. Warnings from credit rating agencies. A government unwilling to make the tough choices to turn things around.
ontario government
June 16, 2014
6:00AM
Ontarians have re-elected a government whose decade long reign dovetails with the lowest growth rate of provincial real per capita GDP in the Canadian federation.
January 9, 2014
2:00AM
Another year has come and gone and Ontario's weak public finances remain largely unchanged. The provincial government did little to improve its fiscal position in 2013 and recently signalled it intends to continue with debt-financed spending into the New Year. But the status quo isnt serving Ontarians well. For 2014, the government should chart a new course that places provincial finances on a more sound footing. That would be a much-needed New Year's resolution for Canadas largest province.
May 3, 2013
2:00AM
The May 2 minority Liberal budget is a politically expedient document that likely avoids an election but unfortunately fails to tackle Ontario's looming fiscal crisis. The longer the province waits, the more difficult and painful the reforms will be when the inevitable day of reckoning arrives.
February 5, 2013
2:00AM
Even Greece, the poster child for rampant debt, carried an Ontario-style debt load as recently as 1984
Don Drummond (2012) Commission on the Reform of Ontarios Public Services
February 5, 2013
2:00AM
I do not want Ontario to become like California Finance Minister Dwight Duncan once proclaimed. And it's not hard to understand why, California is a fiscal nightmare. It has the lowest bond rating in the United States and its own Treasurer, Bill Lockyer, referred to the state budget as "a fiscal train wreck." Yet, despite all that is said about California's finances in the media and financial markets, there is a Canada province that is in much worse shape. Welcome to Ontario.
December 13, 2012
2:00AM
At a recent political event, outgoing Premier Dalton McGuinty touted his legacy as leader of Ontario. Our government hasnt been perfect, he said. But when it comes to the big things that families count on us to get rightschools, health care, the environment, and the economyweve gotten it right every time.
March 4, 2012
2:00AM
In his recent shot at Alberta, Ontarios premier Dalton McGuintywho blamed the Wests resource boom for a slowdown in Ontarios manufacturing sectorinvented a fascinating explanation for the relative decline of Ontario.
While McGuinty later backtracked and claimed his original clear point was not his actual opinion, what is yet transparent is how, in McGuintys world, Ontarios problems have nothing to do with his own policy choices, or events outside of Canadasay, worldwide competition in the manufacturing sector.
While McGuinty later backtracked and claimed his original clear point was not his actual opinion, what is yet transparent is how, in McGuintys world, Ontarios problems have nothing to do with his own policy choices, or events outside of Canadasay, worldwide competition in the manufacturing sector.