[IliketoPuck]

No.

It is far simpler than that and is being made way too difficult.

If the cost of living is higher in Alberta, you need to pay higher wages to attract anyone to work in the Province. That goes for any job. Engineer, Teacher, Geophysicist, Lawyer, Bus Driver.

If you don't pay that higher wage to compensate for the higher cost of living, no one can rationally be expected to take an economic pay cut to work here.

Froth at the mouth all you want about standardizing wages. It simply demonstrates a naivete to some pretty basic financial concepts.

The reality is that Alberta costs more to live in than in most other jurisdictions in Canada, therefore, the wages to attract people to work here are higher. Simple.

If you want to make the argument that we are not efficiently delivering our services due to structural inefficiencies in our public sector, I'm all ears. But blaming it on higher wages when the cost of living in Alberta is far higher than average is an argument that will get no traction with actual decision makers (and rightfully so).