Alberta has very big government. Its ratio of civil servants to population is high, relative to elsewhere in Canada. Its public services are large and well-funded, again compared with everywhere else. Thursday’s budget didn’t touch those services, except to pour more money into them.
At the same time, Alberta keeps its taxes low: no sales tax, relatively lower personal and income taxes. How does it perform this enviable fiscal miracle: low taxes but high spending? It sure isn’t because of red-blooded right-wingers in the provincial government.
One line item in every Alberta budget shows how the miracle unfolds: non-renewable energy resources. Last year, Alberta took in $8.6-billion in personal income taxes, $3.6-billion in corporate income taxes, $3.8-billion in “other” revenue, $4.7-billion in federal transfers and $8.3-billion in resource revenues. In other words, oil and gas revenues (about half of which – $4.1-billion – came from tar sands oil) poured almost as much money into the Alberta treasury as personal income taxes. What provincial government wouldn’t love that?
Pretty scathing article saying that AB is basically squandering the use of resources revenues for future Albertans to satisfy low tax demands for the short sighted. I agree entirely.
I took a Class about this, it was an Alberta Industrial Development course and basically went on to say we could do stuff such as diversifying, but politicians make deals to get them elected now, not in 30 years. Unfortunately its how it will likely always be.
We've outspent everyone in Canada over the past 30 years, and with not much to show for it. Well, some very wealthy public employees to be sure.
Yet, the majority of our politicians demand we spend more and more and more. Would have been nice to see resource revenues generating income forever instead of one time raises for the special interest group of the day.
Yeah, god forbid we talk about raising taxes to offset the spending growth, while at the same time making sure you have long-term plan to balance the budget, while ALSO making sure you're saving the money that those resources are providing.
When people are making 100K a year, its hard to make them believe the Province could be in a better position.
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MYK - Supports Arizona to democtratically pass laws for the state of Arizona
Rudy was the only hope in 08
2011 Election: Cons 40% - Nanos 38% Ekos 34%
Alberta’s budget projects a deficit of nearly $900-million. If Mr. Liepert and Ms. Redford had managed to keep their cheque-writing pens in their pockets, and kept expenditures at 2011 levels, they could have recorded a $400-million surplus this year, rather than run up more red ink.
The province will take on no public debt as a result of its unbalanced budget — the fifth in a row — but it will drain its rainy-day Sustainability Fund. After this free-spending fiscal year, the reserve fund, which stood at $15-billion just three years ago, will be down to just $3.7-billion. If the province’s oversize projections for natural resource revenues — based on a long-term price for oil of $100 a barrel or more — prove overly optimistic, the fund could disappear entirely. Over the next two budget years, the government plans to increase total spending to over $44-billion.
Alberta flushing its resource revenues down the drain
