Canada Ping!
Posted on 11/12/2013 2:49:53 PM PST by Former Proud Canadian
The federal government is not only on track to balance the budget by 2014-15, it will also end seven years of deficits to emerge with a surplus by the time Canadians head to the polls in 2015, said Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, who was in Edmonton delivering the fall economic and fiscal update.
The government is projecting a deficit of $5.5 billion for 2014-15, with a projected surplus of $3.7 billion in 2015-16; that compares with a deficit of $6.6 billion for 2014-15 and a budgetary surplus of $800 million in 2015-16, which Flaherty projected in the March budget.
"We promised we would bring the budget back into balance, and that we would do it without raising taxes or reducing funding for health care or other important social programs,"
(Excerpt) Read more at cbc.ca ...
All this was achieved without printing a whole lot of money. A freeze on government spending works wonders over a few years.
and we can't even get all republicans to concur on sequestration.
Democrats in this country would never allow that to happen! They threw a huge hissy fit of the very VERY limited cuts that have been attempted over the last few years. Just look at how big of a fit they threw this last week over some minor and insignificant cuts made to food stamps. Yep, will never happen here.
Much of this is due to candian resolve to encourage energy development rather than thwart it.
Fossil fuel production is fueling their economic boom.
America could easily replicate and improve on this record with the right political players.
Paper projections. I want some of what he's smokin' or drinkin'!
Canada is rich with natural resources & agricultural production, plus has a small population compared to that natural wealth. Despite a number of terms of liberal PMs, the conservative party comes in enough to lessen the rush to a full welfare state. If western Canadians did not have to carry most of Quebec on their backs, Canada would have a massive surplus.
It isn't so much Quebec anymore, it's Ontario. Ontario used to be the economic engine of the country, but after years of Liberal rule, Ontario is reduced to being a "have not" province. Truly sad.
ping
Just remember Canada was an economic basket case twenty years ago, with the Loony trading at US$ 0.75 Remarkable what sober government can accomplish.
Canada Ping!
That’s a major factor, but the cuts to corporate income tax rates will sustain the boom regardless of what energy markets do. I can’t believe it’s happened in my lifetime but taxes in Canada are among the lowest in the world.
There are actually a number of examples both among US states and international states that prove the US could at the federal level have a productive political relationship with citizens that would yield both growth, economic affluence, and surpluses.
North Dakota and Texas certainly prove this along with Canada and other powers moving toward lower business Taxes.
Spain and France prove the doom inevitable in our current course.
Go Canada!
Flaherty’s paper projections usually come in as having been on the pessimistic side. It ain’t his first rodeo.
The Prime Minister has a degree in economics, and at least in this area, the government up here seems to know what they are doing.
Umm, actually the CDN$ traded as low as $0.65US IIRC. So, exporters took a real hit over that time period, and things worked out even better.
Record low was 62 and change, IIRC
Can we also agree that cutting taxes and government spending works?
I haven’t tracked things that closely in Canada, but my overall impression has been that there have been very few spending cuts—but not very many spending increases either, with a resulting actual cut in terms of percentage of GDP through economic growth. About the only thing that I can recall being cut is the gun registry, which certainly did cost enough.
While there have been some tax cuts, they have been comparatively small (the sales tax was cut from 15% to 13%) and I think the effect is mainly psychological—if the government is taking a little less of my money, I need not continually worry that the government will be continually taking more and more of my money.
A freeze on government spending and hiring is a de facto spending cut as the economy expands.
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