Take Alberta for instance.
Province rich in oil and gas, ranches, and business.
We are probably the richest province in the country. What has the Klien government done to get us to this point?
You can say the province (more preciselly, people in the province) could have been richer without governemnts. Ask what any govenrment could have done. Tax income, capital, property etc., regulate through environmental or other law. Set minimum wage, maximum working hours. Gazilion things. All acting against wealth creation. Among other things.
This didn't affect the amount of money comming into the province, from oil and gas sales. Becuase Klien made cuts to those programs when he did, we where able to cut our provincial deficient, and become debt free.
Is there a `gas tax` in Alberta? If there is, it increase the price of gas coming from Alberta thus affecting demand after Alberta gas and money `coming into the provice` (which is a debatable term, but for the sake of a conversation). Every other regulation works the same way.
The debt free status was achieved when income of the government is higher than its expenditure. If this is achieved by lowering expenditure, thats one thing. If balancing of the books is achieved by higher tax revenue, thats completely different thing. What I`m trying to say - `debt free` could mean two qualitatively very different things. It depends how it is achieved.
Thats all well and good, but Klien being in power doesn't have any effect on oil prices, gas prices, employment and unemployment stats.
No economic theory I know of would claim such thing. Everything government does has its effect on the market. Thats the purpose of the intervention. However, if the market are strong and government weak, the effects are minimalized, but they are still there.
I already mentioned oil and gas prices, employment is affected by such things as minimum wage, overall taxation, contract law, welfare programs, how easy it is to set up a business in bureacratic environment and million another things (maybe gazillion).
Another example. The economy was booming in the late 90's. Why? Becuase everyone was investing in the "dot com's". The NASDAQ was up around 10, 000 - 11,000 points. People where creating companies, selling IPO's, and becoming millionaires.........
This is whole another can of worms. Couple of cans actually.
Yes, Bush has run up a huge defficet (sp?), becuase of the war on terror, the DOHS (department of homeland security).
I have already stated that the deficit would be huge (the biggest to date) even if you subtracted war on terror costs. Later I might be able to dig up the link. But to me, other things than whether the debt is big or not matter. I outlined that above. It is how the budged deficit/surpuls was achieved that matters and how big the budget is matters too. Not to mention the state budget itself is an evil thing
