[FlameOn]

People in BC are angry. Apparently there's been a huge system of tax giveaways that have resulted in over $140 million given away to corporations under the Advantage BC program under the auspice of job creation with almost minimal created. Rules are opaque on how tax breaks are doled out, there is no oversight and the companies, no guidance on how many "jobs" are created and no published list of participating companies

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — British Columbia is well known for its spectacular landscape and outdoorsy living, its swanky urban real estate and bouillabaisse of cultures.

A fact not so well known? It has a sweet deal for businesses, offering them tax breaks in an unusually opaque arrangement.

Like many places, British Columbia set up a system of tax incentives to lure businesses to the far western Canadian province in the hopes of creating jobs and transforming Vancouver into a global financial center.

But if the program has been good for business, it’s been less beneficial for British Columbia.

Participating companies have created few jobs, according to government figures, while more than 140 million Canadian dollars ($106 million) have been doled out in tax refunds since 2008, when the initiative was expanded.

As Companies Seek Tax Deals, Governments Pay High Price DEC. 1, 2012
The incentives operate under a cloak of secrecy that is unusual for similar efforts in Canada and the United States, critics say. The province will not name the companies that get the breaks. The only information available about them is on the website of a nonprofit that promotes the program.

“This is essentially a temporary foreign-worker program for the rich, with secret government subsidies for multinational corporations,” said Dermod Travis, the executive director of IntegrityBC, a nonpartisan political watchdog group based in Victoria, the provincial capital. “The government is selling B.C. as a tax haven for the global elite to park investment here, but not have to contribute.”

The provincial Ministry of Finance, which runs the effort, says it is a success, with 82 companies participating. Jamie Edwardson, a spokesman for the ministry, declined in an email to identify those companies or discuss the amount of refunds each has received, citing a ban on publicly disclosing taxpayer information in the law that created the incentives. He said the law protects taxpayer privacy.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/02/w...=tw-share&_r=0