Sunday, December 02, 2007

Political Idiotism on Taxation, Again

This topic is a little stale in terms of current news, Government proposes $60B in tax cuts, with further GST drop, but I never got around to writing about it when it was current and it is so negligent and stupid.

There is a booming economy. The economy will not always be booming. These proposed cuts will NOT be sustainable with a down turn in the economy. It is one thing for an individual to be so ignorant to stretch their resources to the limit in good times and then rightfully deal with the consequences of such imprudent behaviour. It is unacceptable from government and we have a high level of debt because of this kind of negligent behaviour in the past. It is time be responsible and say no to a short term gain for long term pain.

Our collective greater good would be best served by debt reduction and working to ensure we have maneuverability for an economic slow down. The only reasonable thing to do in the whole proposal is to increase the personal tax exemption. That is a tax neutral action that is offset with increased tax revenue due to wage increases. More importantly it is the only thing that reverses some of the gross inequities to the working poor.

I can assure you that the working poor are unlikely to see their income increase by $700 this year and if we have any sense of humanity we should be questioning why anyone who IS working and CAN'T afford to PAY RENT, BUY FOOD and BASIC NECESSITIES is taxed at all at the slave labour minimum wage rates? Indeed, every cent these people get goes directly into the economy because they are trying to live on a deficit level of income despite genius greater than Einstein in budgeting. You simply can not get water out of a stone and they ran out of places to cut spending YEARS ago.

Give me a tax cut and guess where I'm going to spend -- NOT in Canada. I am taking my discretionary income, and going on vacation in another country. Why should tax cuts continue to subsidize this kind of behaviour of the "haves" when we having increasing numbers of working poor lining up at food banks? Giving me a tax break will do zero to stimulate the economy and will increase my ability to take Canadian dollars outside of the country and this is true for where the majority of the proposed tax cuts would go. As a nation we have enormous debt, we should ensure debt is paid back at a faster rate in boom times. Together we will be stronger in an economic down turn.

Better yet, it is high time we took a serious look at where the tax breaks need to be. We have seniors who make up 20% of the population controlling something like 60% of the wealth and we given them an age exemption on top of pensions that they never paid for except for but for a pittance towards it . A pension is something that is supposed to be paid for by those receiving it. At the very least it is high time we got rid of the age exemption and replaced it with a means exemption for the working poor and put some fairness and humanity into the tax system.

How can any nation think they are great when there is such theft of dignity for the working poor?

1 comment :

Deborah said...

I've been reading http://www.cbc.ca/news/yourview/2007/10/canadas_economic_statement.html, which is comments made by many people on the tax cuts.

I was pleased to see that many Canadians do want our debt paid down and appreciate the degree that tax burden that the debt has been and how much it has weaken our dollar and buying power in the past. And then of course there were those who continue to see nothing but the "me, me, me."