Well, of course-duh

Seek & Yee Must Find, could be the title here.

Yet at the same time, the combined revenues from the sales tax, property and property purchase taxes, the fuel and tobacco taxes, and other miscellaneous taxes, have soared by 31.4 per cent.

So? What could be expected otherwise? Is that so bad? Spending is up so sales tax revenue increased. Property and purchases are up so tax revenue went up there too.

A mere 20.3%. So, personal and corporate taxes were cut and yet revenues have increased 20.3%! Is that not exactly what should be expected and what was predicted? Yes it is. Cutting taxes increases revenues due to increased activity. Precisely what the Liberals hoped for and predicted.

If the writer thinks that this tale says that Liberal policies were and are wrong I'd say that his vacation on Lasqueti Island was at some school of baffelgabology.

Yes, R/Man, just ignore the facts, it's what Campbell does

Post-secondary tuition and fees have leaped by an astounding 111 per cent over the period (from $440 million to $928 million), while MSP premiums racked up a remarkable 70.5 per cent increase (from $894 million to more than $1.5 billion).

(It was the Campbell Liberals, of course, who, months after first cutting personal and corporate income taxes, turned around and boosted MSP premiums, and removed a freeze on university and college tuition rates.)

Crown corporation revenues have climbed by a whopping 65.5 per cent since 2001 (from $1.6 billion to almost $2.7 billion). Leading the way were B.C. Lotteries and the Liquor Distribution Branch, where incomes grew by 82.5 per cent and 30.8 per cent respectively, while ICBC turned a $14 million loss six years ago into a $395 million profit in the most-recent period.

Compared with these figures a rise of 20.3% Is Truly PALTRY

But it's all good as long as Campbell and the masters of the universe get to drive their Mercs and Bimmers and Audi Quattros without mounting license plates on the front bumper. Seems to me I remember you writing covetously about such vehicular envy recently too. Let's keep the luxury car market profitable and who cares if 80% of the young families in BC can afford a home of their own or not.

Some HOUSING BUDGET eh!

It's so aesthetically jarring I'm surprised someone of your sensitive artistic nature can stand the dissonance.

Nice column Will.

Glock?

The bit about the Glock is a bunch of silly nonsense and should have never passed an editor's desk. Reminds me of something I would read from a middle school boy's diary.

Can I infer that it is better for a Crown Corporation to run at a loss?

Oh for a loss

20.3% increase in revenues from personal and corporate taxes after these were lowered is paltry? What did you want, a reduction in revenues?

Why all the complaining. What do you want, to outlaw public gambling and lower the taxes on booze? OK. I'll vote for cheaper wine.

"The Province finished its fiscal year with a significant surplus, which helped fund a record investment in public infrastructure and lowered British Columbia’s debt." (BC Govt). Opposition naysayers are, I suppose, obliged to moan. Fortunately, they are not taken seriously and that's probably why this article is written as humour. I don't think that this can seriously be categorized as anything but good news and a success.

one man's loss...

"Can I infer that it is better for a Crown Corporation to run at a loss?"

Whether it should or not is a political decision that should be made in each single case, on its merits. The 'crown corporation' is a bizarre animal, neither fowl nor fish. It is a corporation (read: sociopathic reaction pattern), but with ties to the 'crown', meaning 'servant of the public good'. It 'serves' presently as dumping ground for politcal washouts, but it also 'serves' to sneak in the notion, that5 public services should be run like businesses, and should perform along the same criteria - an insane notion.
Most of the return we get on public service investments are so diffuse and so far down the road, that it almost amounts to religious conviction. However, it is here the idea of doing the right thing comes in. Instead, due to the corporate stuff, we now have doctors and nurses met with the demand of presenting a 'business case' for improvements or rearrangements of patient services. this is not legitimate, but the semantics is so powerful, that it almost seems to be. I say, keep the beard to one side and the snot to the other, that will serve us best in the long run, and the long run, as opposed to flim-flam, is what counts.

Crown and not Crown

Dorothy, you make some good points but,

Health is not a Crown Corporation.

Still not reading

A 20.3% increase in revenue from taxation is paltry over the period under consideration in a growing economy - as the other measure of economic growth show.

Why do you think McMartin pointed them out?

There would be little or no reason - sans the insanity of throwing a provincial economy into deficit merely to please one's political friends - for the abysmal mess in health care, housing, hydro governance, child care, education and child poverty with which we are now confronted if the tax system were actually administered fairly and every dollar earned was a dollar available for tax.

Instead, Campbell rewards the masters of the universe, robs the services that 80% of the population relies upon and creates a future which will be mortgaged forever to his corporate friends. Take the budget surpluses and spend them on the things Campbell doesn't care about for a change.

There are enough fancy cars and SUVs polluting the air and clogging up the roads. Let’s have some free transit and decent health care for everyone (not just the folks who can afford to visit a private clinic with their gold card); address issues of child poverty and family stress and remember that trickle down economics usually just ends up with yellow stains on the carpet.
Some democracy.

The point....

I read a little book in philosophy class called "How to Lie with Statistics." It shows how figures can be maniulated.

The fact is, even though BC cut imcome taxes in 2001, income tax revenues increased by over 20%. We also have the lowest provincial income tax in the two lowest income brackets.

This is the proof that the tax cuts have not affected income tax revenue, which in fact is a small part of the provincial budget.

Is this a bad thing? The booming economy means people have more money to spend on sin taxes.

MSP premium assistance thresholds were also raised meaning more low income citizens than ever are paying nothing for MSP.

Tuition was frozen for ten years and the previous government did nothing to make up for the lost revenue.

Lotteries are a tax on people who are bad at math but go to a casio and see who is there, it basically a way of getting the elderly to part with their money.

The LCB has always been a cash cow and with more people working, there is more money for booze. I think sin taxes should be even higher!

If I had my way:

1) Open ICBC to competition. If they are so good for us, they can compete in the market.

2) Double the provincial gasoline tax. Use the revenues for transit and rebates on zero emission vehicles.

3) Introduce annual auto taxation based on CO2 emissions like in the UK. For example a TOYOTA Aygo 1 litre VVTi 5-door Manual pays £421 ($900) a year while a Cadillac STS 4.6 litre pays £5,565 ($11,889!) a year. Imagine the revenues this would create!

4) Introduce a provincial scholorship system based on academic performance, not just doll out student loans.

Ok then

So, you want more revenue from personal and corporate taxes. Then do more of what was done before to raise the revenues by the 20.3%, as McMartin pointed out. Lower them again since lowering them before bought in more, do it again. Please pass this on to Carole; Taylor that is.

McMartin - funny and smart! Bet your Glock.

I can't believe some of the negative comments here from Tyee posters - Will McMartin's piece is not only very funny, it is informative and tells a story we have yet to see anywhere in other BC media.

McMartin conclusively proves that the vaunted tax cuts have NOT paid for themselves.

Carole Taylor is more believable on Gucci shoes than government finances but it takes a pencil-pushing pundit to point out the obvious.

Lastly, one quibble. Beers doesn't carry a Glock - it's a Cobra Patriot .45 ACP - an economically priced polymer-framed handgun with stainless steel slide and barrel.

- Bill Tieleman

Yes, Bill, why are some so negative?

Exactly, according to McMartin even though tax revenues have declined a paltry 1.4% revenues are up. Way up because economic activity has increased and more people are working in BC. Hence, more revenue. Not a negative story at all but a most positive one.

We pay and pay

Right Ed, it's called transfer pricing, or to be more accurate transfer mispricing. And it's not payments to US head offices that are the real problem. Multinationals can sell the resources they extract to themselves at massively deflated prices. For example, the Canadian unit of a multinational could sell the oil it extracts at well below market rates to the multinational's Cayman Islands unit (where there is no corporate income tax). That Cayman Islands unit can then go on to sell the oil at international market rates to a customer. The multinational only pays taxes on the amount the Canadian business unit sold the oil for. Thus only a tiny fraction of the realized profit from the Canadian oil is recouped by Canada. What's more that multinational enjoys government subsidies for resource extraction, so they are essentially paid to take the resources, reducing their tax bill even further.

To add insult to injury, the oil doesn't even have to move out of Canada. It could be sold to a distributor in Canada at international market rates (that distributor could very well be yet another business unit of the multinational). So Canadians end up paying market rates for oil that was extracted and payed for in Canada at a tiny fraction of the international market rate. We get screwed twice. First by a loss of tax revenue, second by paying for the obscenely inflated profit margins of the multinational. And that screwing doesn't even begin to factor in the cost of environmental damage caused by the resource extraction, and by the pollution caused by the processing and burning of the oil.

Except that, as usual

Most of the benefits go to a small clique of Campbell's friends while the services: Health, education, Child care, infrastructure and housing go begging.

Nothing at all positive about it unless you're one of Campbell's corporate friends - the rest of us just run harder and work longer hours and fall slowly farther and farther behind.

Very negative.

Sadly.

Ideological blinders

"Exactly, according to McMartin even though tax revenues have declined a paltry 1.4%..."

It declined only by that amount because most of the income tax revenue shortfall was made up by increases from sales, property and other miscellaneous taxes. Those increases, given the paltry increase in income tax revenue, were likely due to inflation without concomitant raises in income to match. The indication from the numbers seems to be that the personal income of most BC taxpayers has not kept up with the booming economy (or inflation). As the numbers bear witness, individual taxpayer income has been declining as a share of government revenue. If incomes were going up, and if so many more people were working at better paying jobs, then the opposite would be true, as Taylor mistakenly suggests. What should happen, despite the income tax cuts, is that income tax revenue as a percentage of total government revenue should have gone up, but it hasn't. Why can't r/man and w/man read the numbers? Why do you insist on wearing ideological blinders?

Here we go again

No matter how many times it is proven with an abundance of facts that the spin from the liberals and Campbell does not stand the reality test, the same liberal cheerleaders come here to the tyee rather than go to their propaganda organs the CanWest Media. There you would think they would be welcomed with all the ink possible. Is it because CanWest can see their hollow rhetoric and it does not even warrant repeating in a pro liberal rag? Will has it right. He does his work the same way that Schreck does his. They let the facts speak for themselves. Some of these negative posters just can't seem to appreciate the facts as they clearly do not support their already entrenched conclusions.

Way to go Will!

Sleight of hand(s)

Carole, like all other current governments is giving with one hand and taking with the other. Overall taxes are rising at a much faster rate than the number of taxpayers. So, by whatever process, more and more of the average taxpayers productivity is ending up in government coffers……..

R-Man, et al:

Take away anything to do with 2010, then see how the numbers crunch .........especially for "public infrastructure" outside the lower mainland.

nln

The problem is government handouts given to Campbell's friends and neighbours - contracts to road builders - gimmees to the residents in the Arbutus corridor, special giveaways of assets like BC Rail, BC Hydro, Ferry system mismanagement and special deals for various automobile sales organizations. But there is never a question about having funds available for the gateway project...the Canada line and special arrangements to get power for the government's friends in the mining and smelting business.

Stop the corporate handouts and rationalize the tax system so every dollar earned - no matter how - is available for tax. If that happened your tax bill (as a wage earner) would drop and the masters of the universe in the Premier’s back pocket would start paying their fair share of the freight. Further, most of the taxes you're complaining about are consumption taxes - unrelated to income.

Factor out consumption taxes and your argument goes out the window. And I don't want to hear any complaints about property tax either unless you're willing to roll back property values!

...

Another well researched piece, Will, glad to be reading more of you here...

GW

Not sure how you came up with the list of Campbell’s so-called friends and neighbours that are the exclusive recipients of tax largesse, wishful thinking I presume. We pay a ton of taxes that aren’t related to income, no need to limit the discussion about taxation to just income taxes. Will himself points out that in the “Other” category taxpayers paid $7.4 Billion last year…a tax is a tax is a tax.

I’m no fan of corporate handouts but if you change the tax system that affect how much businesses pay you’re also going to change the costs for the goods and services they deliver….probably a zero sum game.

But did the tax cuts provide more revenue?

Unless one can show that Campbell's tax cuts was the direct cause of more federal government transfers to BC, (which is not possible) Will is right on the mark.

Hidden costs

I would be interested to see the provincial figures with two additions.

-First with the expenditures of BC Ferries factored in, since they have spent large money in Germany on replacement boats after orchestrating a huge loss on sale of assets. Those figures have been deliberately and deceptively hidden by cynical manipulations soon after the Liberal election.

-Second, the true costs of BC highways, all accounted together and adjusted to account for real estate and asset sales by the contractors of assets that used to belong to the crown but were included in the operating assets of the BC Highways Department when it was transferred to private hands.

Sales Tax interesting.

"Next in size of growth was Victoria's sales tax revenues, which, since 2001, grew by $1.1 billion. (Taylor failed to mention that the B.C. Liberals had raised the social services tax to 7.5 per cent in 2002, before restoring it to seven per cent in late 2004.)"

So ... the BC Liberals increased this tax over the same time period and it did better than the percent revenue increases from the taxes they chose to cut? And people are still claiming that the tax cut paid for itself? ROFL! Go ahead and make an ideological argument about letting people keep their money, but the whole "paying for itself" line is just hilarious.

G West

But "as we all know" ('cause we've been told time and again by a variety of governments, all right-leaning), if that happened, "essential" businesses would stampede out of the province, if not the country........

There is more to life than surplus money

I was rather shocked to have a copy of this article emailed to me from a spiteful ex socred supporter I am regretfully familiar with. His email included an arrogant Fraser Institute style heading reading “BC Fed finally admits admits tax cuts work, taxes down, revenue up”

The gloating and heckling I will not mention in detail but suffice to say it appears residual right wingers are very moved by this article as they see it as some sort of gleeful endorsement.

I ave also now lost a bet about our government liquor stores. I wagered that privatization would cost us money and accoridng to this article, the profits are actually up. My neighbor is a widow who has worked for a local government liquor store and barely scrapes by as it is since her husband died. I find this news disturbing. All this article seems to do is show how the Campbell has made all kinds of proifts but it say nothing about the people like my neighbor. Or about my friends in the HEU who continue to keep getting kicked by this government.

Yes, maybe this government has made lots of money, but there is more to life than money when you are dealing with people. Maybe in the future we don’t need articles that can trumpted the money making ways of the Liberals and instead focus on those who have been hurt.

Fraser Institute

How are the Fraser boys doing anyway? Still trying to sell the world the idea that getting rid of income taxes and increasing all other taxes, fees and levies makes us all gazillionaires with maids and Ferraris and the whole ball of wax?

Must be fun to live permanently in 1983.

Too bad for them most people on the planet figured out that those calling for a reduction in income and wealth taxes have great plans for increases in other taxes so that their long list of pet gov't projects aren't affected.

Lots of myths around these days Frank

The latest Global Competitiveness Report is in from the World Economic Forum. It reveals some very interesting facts about union membership and union membership density:

Interesting, eh?

And also this, from yesterday's Toronto Star

http://www.thestar.com/comment/article/243774

Keep it up Will. You're not the only one out there who can count and add.

Unions serve many purposes

thanks G.W. you do dig up some interesting facts.

The conclusion might well be that unionized workplaces have an atmosphere with a degree of security?

If a worker has to look over his shoulder to see if he is observed and evaluated, his whole attitude will be one of wondering if he has a job tomorrow!

While a worker who feels relative safe that his work is appreciated, will relax and make fewer mistakes.

Employers should remember that a worker invest his own time and effort, just as they invest their monies: in both cases there should be some sense that the investment is worth it!

Making a worker feel he can be instantly replaced, does not create a happy employee!

That is where union solidarity comes in, trying to create some sense of permanency.

On the other hand

Looking at Will's numbers I'd be more inclined to say the good economy is because of low interest rates, high commodity prices and federal transfers. Seems more likely, than buying the idea that lowering income taxes and raising fees and other taxes had anything to do with the economy. The numbers just don't support that belief. But then ideology rarely requires facts for true-believers.

Saskatchewan

By the way, since those on the right believe the lowering of income taxes in BC actually improved the economy before the Liberals were even elected is it also fair to assume that Saskatchewan's economy also improved during the same time frame (under and NDP government) due to the BC Liberal income tax cuts?

The windfalls in O&G, et al......

....fueled this economy. One only has to ask why the provincial debt is actually going up in this Golden Decade, to see how well the Libs are "managing" the economy.....

Wrong Martin, WRONG!

"What has resulted is what the lefties said could not happen:"

No they did not. They did not say the economy would not improve. What they said is that you did not have to inflict all the suffering which the Liberals did in their first term. The article shows it was completely unnecessary and that it has been high world commodity prices and increased federal transfers that has brought the better economy. You could even claim that Olympics spending has helped the Vancouver area but none of the boom has extended passed the Okanagan or Hope and that is a direct result of the Campbell policies. The article proves that tax cuts is the useless mantra of the right-wing ideologues. Were it not for a liberal cheerleader media, one would not have to keep stating the obvious. The economy was showing signs of improving even before Campbell and CanWest fooled the people.

20%? Not even close

That's exactly what we got. During those six years, inflation rose 16%,deevaluing the currency by that amount (given that the Bank of Canada seeks to hold inflation in check by allowing the money supply to increase by the same amount). So the much vaunted increase in tax revenues is only about 3.7% in real terms (120.3 divided by 116). I'm ignoring the effects of "bracket creep" which is impossible to assess accurately given the tax cuts' unequal effects on peoples' incomes.

But in that time, 270,000 people came to BC, a healthy number of whom, presumably came to earn money and pay taxes. This population increase of nearly 7% means that the province did indeed earn about 2.3% less revenue from taxes in 2006 than in 2000.

Tax cuts didn't work. I'm not sure why Will didn't point this out to Carole Taylor, but SOMEBODY should.

And another commenter needs a refresher in the Fiberals' book of promises:

The first tax cut was not across the board - it was to affect higher salaries proportionately more. The net drop on my salary of $40,000 at the time was $0.12 per biweekly paycheque. But for income earners over $150,000, the drop was more than $9,000 a year or $350 per biweekly paycheque. It was Gordo's second tax cut a couple of years later that was "across the board".

You can still find all these great facts and more at www.bcstats.gov.bc.ca

270,000 came to BC

...and many of those came because taxes had been cut across the board - for all. This was a reversal from the time, during the NDP reign, when BC was ultimately losing people. The Campbell Liberal tax cut encouraged some of these people to return to BC and expand the economy. Also, if the Federal transfers were partly responsible for the revenue increase should the Stephen Harper Conservatives also be thanked?

All residents should pay their fair share of taxes and credit for budgetary success should be given when due.

Quote:...and many of those

And I assume the BC Liberal income tax cuts are also fuelling the number of people moving to NDP-Saskatchewan?

And unlike BC, most of those moving to Saskatchewan are families with people that actually work unlike the vast numbers of retirees who come to BC because of the scenery.

Claiming that anything good that happens in this province is the result of the BC Liberal income tax cuts (and ignoring the rise in other taxes and fees) is ridiculous.

This would be true except that Federal transfers were pouring into BC before Harper was elected. Just as the BC economy was turning around before the BC Liberals were elected.

All I'm saying to you guys

All I'm saying to you guys on the Right is look at the big picture. Going outside and seeing a "help wanted" sign doesn't mean Gordon Campbell is an economic genius any more than deciding you think the weather is better since GC was elected and that his income tax cuts must be responsible for that too. Both theories are charmingly simplistic and both would also be wrong.

Its important to keep in mind the bigger picture of what's going on elsewhere, what was going on before they were elected and so on.

I didn't say that

"Health is not a Crown Corporation."

I didn't say I thought it was. My wording was that the presence of these hybrids serve to work into the mix the notion that public services should be able to 'perform' along the same lines as a for-profit run corporation. This of course is nonsensical. Public service is a kind of government sanctioned and supported buyer's collective, but profit as such does not figure in its makeup. There are supposedly other kinds of return, quality of life, attendance to values we all share, future expectations, etc., but not direct 'money out'.

and so on...

Fair enough, Frank, the big picture is important but to continually hear that there is no connection to the strong economic condition and healthy government finances of this province and that the Liberals deserve no credit is silly ideology. Economic activity is up, exploration is way up, infrastructure upgrading is huge, culture funding has been maintained and expanded at both levels of government ensuring a growing sector, relations with Ottawa are far improved. Anyone who does not know of people and businesses, and jobs, that left BC during the NDP reign of mis-management is probably a tenured academic or in the Public Service - and living in the boonies.

Not necessarily nonsensical

I never said that you did, Dorothy but I felt it should be clarified since you ran it all together.

Effective budget control has to be carefully monitored, particularly due to rapidly evolving expensive technology used in health-care. The objectives you outline are admirable yet other aspects of the health-care providing structure deal with items that need to watched by people with sharp pencils.

On health care and 'effective budget control'

Perhaps one ought to look a lot more closely at the hybrid monster the Campbell Government has turned loose on the Medical Services Plan for a start Realisticman.

A little less concern about precious notions of enhanced 'cultural' spending and a little more empathy towards the 80% of BC families (not to mention the elderly who can't find a decent place to spend their final years in dignity with family close by) who live their lives on a roller coaster so that corporate profits can be maintained and enhanced would be in order.

You might also want to consider what Alberta spends on ‘culture’ and how this province’s marginally better treatment of artists and publishers won’t be bulldozed to the utterly abysmal level of our eastern neighbours now that Tilma is coming into force.

As for the state of health care - get out your pencil. You might want to start with this item:

http://www.strategicthoughts.com/

If Campbell has nothing to hide, why is he so determined to hide it so well? I see the Dow fell almost 400 points today.

tick, tick, tick, tick…..it’s coming.

tick, tick, tick, tick…..it’s coming.

If you want to help out West leverage some of your equity and pick up some stocks. If you're really a pessimist you could go short.

realisticman

Its the economic cycle. Saskatchewan was in bad times too and now everything there is running flat-out.

So my point would be what is happening that would cause BC, Alta, Sask and Man all to have thriving economies at the same time? BC Liberal income tax cuts just don't hit my radar screen because they simply don't account for the other provinces. It must be something that all the provinces have in common, and therefore I come back to the trilogy of low interest rates, increased federal transfers and high world prices.

And the "help wanted" signs up on every 2nd business along Saskatoon's business districts, such as 8th street, can't have anything to do with the lowering of income tax rates in BC either. My own belief is that since the overall employment numbers aren't showing the big increases in labour activity that the lower unemployment numbers would have us believe (I'll ignore the fact that I think the way of counting the unemployed is nonsensical) it might be because of the number of people leaving the work force due to retirements. A condition that would go farther in explaining the labour markets across western Canada than BC Liberal income tax cuts would.

standard of living

Hey Will, 20%+ rise in income tax revenue seems a little exaggerated, at least it's not coming from me! Try this:

-how much did the population rise during that time? factor that out.
-how much of that got eaten away by inflation? factor that out.
-how much of that is explained by public sector wage increases? factor that out.

Then tell me how much the "booming" BC private sector has increased *my* standard of living. I think that this situation is just as much an argument for lifting public sector wage freezes and implementing infrastructure mega projects as it is for lowering income taxes (while hypocritically raising every other kind of tax/fee).

And maybe then take a look at the rise in the average prise of a house over that time, and tell me how much the chance of an *average* citizen ever owning a house has shrunk.

And then just for kicks, try explaining why it's bad for the government to have a growing piece of the pie, but it's just fine for the private banks to skim off more and more billions. I would have suggested factoring that out too, but do they pay any taxes? I would happily pay 10% extra income taxes just for the warm feeling of seeing the banks' profits slashed in half or more.

Nice try Carol. You crooks still won't ever get my vote.

Er...?

Mikev

What on earth has this to do with a Province's balance sheet? Aren't banks in Canada operating under federal charter? The only banks here that would be liable for provincial taxation would be BC Credit Unions and HSBC. What control has the Provincial government over any bank?
Banks in Canada are not private. Anyone can own bank shares and receive dividends from any profits. Most, if not all, pension funds do.

You might want to remember

The tiny tax liability of the Canadian chartered banks (they're even eligible for a federal 10% tax abatement on provincial earnings under section 124 of the Act, and Part IV of the Regulations) is not trivial.

Given the fact that small businesses actually receive only about 3 - 5 percent of the capital loaned by the banks I think I'd have no problem agreeing with Rick W.

Especially considering the banks are usually the most profitable Canadian corporations setting new profit records on a yearly basis and that their chief executives are horrendously overpaid.

Their effective tax rate is always lower than the bottom income tax bracket for
working Canadians and the only bank shares a working Canadian is likely to own are in a pension plan or an RRSP. If it happens to be an RRSP, by the way, the tax costs come retirement will often eat up any anticipated gains made during the depositor's contributing years.

The fact that banks happen to be publicly traded is of little or no consequence - any more than the fact General Motors, Enron, or any other corporate entity is. They just get some special deals and protection relative to the Bank Act. Advantages they use to prosecute their plan to exercise more and more control over the Canadian economy.

All valid points

How does this relate to Provincial surpluses?

Would we be better off if the federal Liberals had allowed them to merge and, at the same time, allowed more competition for consumers by removing the banks' protection from foreign players?

I doubt it

Then when a bank fails, as some very big ones have done in the United States and in Britain, the exchequer just has to come in and prop them up. What we need are more banks, locally and cooperatively owned, whose directors aren't just concerned with their international status and who don't spend all their time trading interlocking directorships with other masters of the universe. I could care less if Canadian banks are successfully shilling for international business – as matter of fact, I’m all in favour of restrictions upon how Canadian banks use Canadian funds to finance foreign takeovers of Canadian businesses. As a matter of fact, a couple of Canadian banks have taken some pretty big baths in American corporate failures – in the not too distant past.

The current system works very well for the kleptocrats in Victoria, Ottawa and the other provincial capitals but it does little or nothing for local development, down-scale housing and 'real' productivity. If the current financial softening begins to cut into the largesse the banks have doled out for quasi-criminal leveraged buyouts it will he a very good thing.

I suspect the point mikev was making had little to do with surpluses as such and was more directed to the role of government and the justification for taxes as a vital component of growth, development and the quality of the social and cultural infrastructure.

If we really had politicians who were more concerned with discharging their duties toward all of the electorate (and not just the upper crust who buy them their seats in the various parliaments) then the aversion to a fair and redistributive tax structure would not be so negative.

The problem is that taxes are used, not as they ought to be, but simply as a way to reward a small circle of friends. That's the problem and Gordon Campbell writes it in block letters in highway gothic script.

realisticman

Thanks G West, I think you've got me pegged. And thanks for all the further details you're always coming up with, good to have you around :-)

First of all when I say private I'm usually speaking of the opposite of the public sector, for example the Bank of Canada is what I would call public. In other words if the government isn't running it then to me it's private. It doesn't really concern me if it's a CEO of a publicly traded company or an outright owner of a privately held company, same difference from down here man.

But mainly my point was that Carol was exaggerating the role of of the BC Liberal government and their income tax cuts by quite a bit when she said that the tax cuts paid for themselves, insinuating that the 10% reduction in rates was entirely responsible for a 20% increase in revenue. There's quite a bit else going on out there.

Mentioning the banks and their obscene profits was only a parting shot. Not related to my main point, just a wider angle look at things. I was saying that who really cares about a few percentage points difference in income tax rates when the ones really gouging everyone are the banks.

Any clearer for you? I assume that you agreed with the rest of what I said since you only nitpicked at the last little bit? Hey I can dream ;-)