Quote:
Originally Posted by SebC
I suspect the reason you see it that way is because of Canada's economic performance through the recession. I don't give them the credit for this that you do. We had a stable banking sector thanks to previous governments, and we were able to afford our stimulus spending thanks largely to Paul Martin. The budget that was implemented included stimulus spending because the opposition would have toppled the Conservatives had it not, and we were already in a worse position for stimulus spending because of the GST cut and spending increases pre-recession. As far as I'm concerned, we pulled through the recession very well in spite of the Conservatives, rather than because of them. (If they were leading Canada, it was in the direction that the Libs and the NDP were leading them.)
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I don't think that Harper would have campaigned on the GST cut if he had known that he would be able to hold onto the office for as long as he has. I saw the GST cut as a one time action to reduce taxes that would be hard to undo. If he cut income taxes instead then successive parties would be able to creep them back up but that will be much harder to do with the more visible GST.
He did also mention that provinces had the option to increase their sales taxes by the same two percentage points turning the cut into a permanent transfer.