Alberta Politics Thread

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by belsarius

Nope she didn't say a carbon tax, she said they would appoint a committee to engage with all Albertans and come up with recommendations for how to proceed with a climate change strategy.

That panel headed by Andrew Leach with co-chairs from Suncor, Enbridge, NGOs and the aboriginal community recommended the best option moving forward for Alberta was a carbon tax and decommissioning of coal power. The NDP have acted upon this strategy as recommended.

So no they didn't implicitly say a carbon tax, but they did follow through with their platform on climate change.

http://www.alberta.ca/documents/clim...ve-summary.pdf

so lets be honest, do you think that if she had stood up and said, I'm going to increase corporate tax rates and personal tax rates and implement a carbon tax that she would have come anywhere close to winning the election?

Not a chance, and saying I'm going to form a climate change committee is a far cry from I'm going to implement a carbon tax.

It would be similar to telling my kids that I'm going to talk with their mother about the status of their allowance instead of telling them outright that I'm going to cut their allowance.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

the raising minimum wage isn't increasing business, I don't know where that's coming from when you can see a lot of instances of businesses contracting because of it. Because of the increases in priced goods, plus the carbon tax they're not going to have significantly more disposable income to spend.

I like the grants for apprentices, that makes sense

trying to get pipelines approved, all that's happened is that Notley's gotten slapped in the face by Quebec and Ontario and BC after announcing things like the Carbon Tax.

And hiring more people increases the operating deficit and especially worthless if they aren't hiring front line people like doctors and nurses and teachers where the money should be going. Instead it looks like they're just hiring more bureaucrats which is a net deficit increase. It will be interesting to see how many people they jam in to run this carbon tax. On top of that it just makes the pensions more unaffordable under the current budget.

At this point the best thing that they could do is announce a hiring and wage freeze and let some attrition happen.

Workers having more disposable income will help boost some businesses. That being said, some businesses will suffer due to the increased labour costs, however that does not mean that those same businesses won't have the labour costs offset by an increase in business from those extra consumer dollars from minimum wage workers. People can make the argument until they're blue in the face about businesses contracting because of the increase, but I have yet to see any concrete data that indicates the bad will certainly outweigh the good, my guess is you are in that same boat.

As for the carbon tax and the increased cost for goods and services, the attacks from the right wing parties claims that this tax will cost families about $600/year, but if a worker goes from making $13/hour to $15/hour they will have over $4k annually in extra income, which will offset that cost substantially, not to mention the rebates of up to $420 annually for certain incomes(minimum wage earners included) which will also help.

The article below doesn't say whether or not that total cost is just for the direct tax or if it includes the increase in prices of other goods, but for arguments sake I'll assume it doesn't, so let's say a family currently spends $200/week on groceries and those go up by 5% because of this tax, that would add $520 annually, so minimum wage earners are still coming out ahead. While higher income earners may not get a break, I think it's fair to say they are likely in a better position to lower their overall costs by taking measures to reduce their impact from the carbon in other ways, and typically those measures create an economic boost by creating income for others(renos etc)

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/canada/c...aign-1.3790992

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

Workers having more disposable income will help boost some businesses. That being said, some businesses will suffer due to the increased labour costs, however that does not mean that those same businesses won't have the labour costs offset by an increase in business from those extra consumer dollars from minimum wage workers. People can make the argument until they're blue in the face about businesses contracting because of the increase, but I have yet to see any concrete data that indicates the bad will certainly outweigh the good, my guess is you are in that same boat.



As for the carbon tax and the increased cost for goods and services, the attacks from the right wing parties claims that this tax will cost families about $600/year, but if a worker goes from making $13/hour to $15/hour they will have over $4k annually in extra income, which will offset that cost substantially, not to mention the rebates of up to $420 annually for certain incomes(minimum wage earners included) which will also help.

So your basically saying they won't pay taxes on the increase? because yes a $2.00 an hour raise is theoretically $4000.00 per year which is pre tax.

But what you're ignoring is this. The labor pool for minimum wage workers will shrink. Its already happening as companies automate, reduce hours or outright shrink their labor force. So its more then likely that the number of minimum wage workers will shrink as some will transition to not having a job, and the overall dollar pool will shrink as hours are reduced. on top of it, the $600.00 per year increase in costs off set by a rebate that doesn't cover it means that they have less income. As well the CTF has looked at overall costs of the carbon tax which includes increases to consumer goods essential goods, peoples rents will probably be closer to $1000.00 so they'll be out probably more like $600.00 per year, which to a low income earner is a big hit.

The article below doesn't say whether or not that total cost is just for the direct tax or if it includes the increase in prices of other goods, but for arguments sake I'll assume it doesn't, so let's say a family currently spends $200/week on groceries and those go up by 5% because of this tax, that would add $520 annually, so minimum wage earners are still coming out ahead. While higher income earners may not get a break, I think it's fair to say they are likely in a better position to lower their overall costs by taking measures to reduce their impact from the carbon in other ways, and typically those measures create an economic boost by creating income for others(renos etc)

http://www.cbc.ca/beta/news/canada/c...aign-1.3790992

Groceries go up
Gas goes up
Rent will probably increase
Utilities will certainly increase
the price of luxury goods will increase (You don't think things like dinners out and theatre tickets aren't going to be effected.
Every retail item will go up to offset the increased costs of their labor and their leases.
Property taxes are going to have to go up as the cities aren't excluded from the carbon tax.
Take your kids to the pool or the rec center you can bet those memberships will increase.
Everywhere that there's a lightswitch or a furnace is going to get more expensive
You want to take your kid out for ice cream, that'll increase.

We're going to be talking about death by a thousand small cuts here on both sides of the spectrum. Everything is going to increase, and employment of minimum wage workers will probably decrease.



You can probably argue stagnation of spending at best. I'm arguing that this carbon tax is actually going to hurt low to low middle class people a great deal. the minimum wage should have been increased, but now its a radical increase over the next couple of years that's going to do immense harm to the small business sector where you find a lot of these workers.

The $420.00 rebate is a joke because its frankly under what looks like a minimum cost increase which puts people behind and again the $600.00 pricing that they're putting on it looks to be a calculation simple on gas use and utility bills and its impossible to calculate based on spending habits (ie groceries and entertainment) which are all going to increase.

Because the lower income people can't afford to buy a new car or a more efficient furnace they have no real avenues to reduce their carbon tax unless they reduce their spending so that they don't get hit with it as hard.

[belsarius]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

so lets be honest, do you think that if she had stood up and said, I'm going to increase corporate tax rates and personal tax rates and implement a carbon tax that she would have come anywhere close to winning the election?

Not a chance, and saying I'm going to form a climate change committee is a far cry from I'm going to implement a carbon tax.

It would be similar to telling my kids that I'm going to talk with their mother about the status of their allowance instead of telling them outright that I'm going to cut their allowance.

Honestly, I think people were so fed up with the PCs that yes, she could have put a carbon tax in her platform and still won. The only other option was a parrot who could only say "no new taxes" as his entire platform. It was pretty obvious that was how they were leaning, pretty much everyone I knew had an idea that they were leaning towards carbon taxing instead of cap-and-trade.

She also said that royalties were being reviewed and everyone assumed it was going to mean an increase. It didn't, so was she being disingenuous there too? Should she have campaigned on no royalty changes?

Based on your example I get the feeling you think it was a foregone conclusion. I disagree and think it was a decision made with input from a panel that engaged with Albertans. She promised to take climate change seriously and do something to improve how the rest of Canada and the world view our efforts in that regard. She did it. It just wasn't what you wanted, but I for one wasn't surprised in the least how it turned out.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

so lets be honest, do you think that if she had stood up and said, I'm going to increase corporate tax rates and personal tax rates and implement a carbon tax that she would have come anywhere close to winning the election?

Not a chance, and saying I'm going to form a climate change committee is a far cry from I'm going to implement a carbon tax.

It would be similar to telling my kids that I'm going to talk with their mother about the status of their allowance instead of telling them outright that I'm going to cut their allowance.

To be honest, she may have still been elected because people were so fed up with the conservatives. (Edit: what belsarius said)

I see your point that it wasn't 100% stated as such, however the carbon tax was a possible outcome from the climate change committee's findings so it's far from a bait and switch, politicians get to make decisions while in office, I'm sure if over a decade ago Ralph Klein would have told voters "I'm going to balance the budget, and then give $400 to every single person living in Alberta as opposed to putting it towards public services or infrastructure" a lot of people would have been up in arms, but he was able to do it because it was his call at the time.

[CaptainCrunch]

I think its a foregone conclusion. Remember what happened when Dion started parroting his energy tax during the federal election. He got crushed, especially west of the Manitoba border.

I guarantee you if Rachel had started talking about a carbon tax during her campaign people would have plugged their nose and voted for Prentice or voted for wildrose and we would have probably had a right wing minority government. Remember also that during the election we were already seeing the economy sliding into the tank a carbon tax would have been jumped on during the campaign as a direct attack by the NDP on our primary industry.

As it stands even now if you look at the polling I think nearly 70% of Alberta are strongly opposed to this carbon tax.

If Rachel would have run on a carbon tax, she probably would have finished in third place and be looking for work shortly afterwords.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

So your basically saying they won't pay taxes on the increase? because yes a $2.00 an hour raise is theoretically $4000.00 per year which is pre tax.

But what you're ignoring is this. The labor pool for minimum wage workers will shrink. Its already happening as companies automate, reduce hours or outright shrink their labor force. So its more then likely that the number of minimum wage workers will shrink as some will transition to not having a job, and the overall dollar pool will shrink as hours are reduced. on top of it, the $600.00 per year increase in costs off set by a rebate that doesn't cover it means that they have less income. As well the CTF has looked at overall costs of the carbon tax which includes increases to consumer goods essential goods, peoples rents will probably be closer to $1000.00 so they'll be out probably more like $600.00 per year, which to a low income earner is a big hit.

So you clearly understand that the labour pool is already shrinking because businesses are already cutting jobs to reduce costs. In which case the best argument you can make is they're damned if they do, damned if they don't raise the minimum wage. However raising the minimum wage now will actually benefit those currently working minimum wage right now, and put them in a position to do things like further their education so they can not be stuck if and when their job is eliminated.

Groceries go up
Gas goes up
Rent will probably increase
Utilities will certainly increase
the price of luxury goods will increase (You don't think things like dinners out and theatre tickets aren't going to be effected.
Every retail item will go up to offset the increased costs of their labor and their leases.
Property taxes are going to have to go up as the cities aren't excluded from the carbon tax.
Take your kids to the pool or the rec center you can bet those memberships will increase.
Everywhere that there's a lightswitch or a furnace is going to get more expensive
You want to take your kid out for ice cream, that'll increase.

We're going to be talking about death by a thousand small cuts here on both sides of the spectrum. Everything is going to increase, and employment of minimum wage workers will probably decrease.

Prices will go up regardless of this tax, will it create a short term surge? Absolutely. However you are still completely stuck in the mindset that the bad will outweigh the good, ie there will be more income lost from job cuts than there will be income increase from the raises, and you don't have any real data to back this claim up. I'm not saying it's not possible, I'm simply stating that passing it off as a fact is inaccurate.

You can probably argue stagnation of spending at best. I'm arguing that this carbon tax is actually going to hurt low to low middle class people a great deal. the minimum wage should have been increased, but now its a radical increase over the next couple of years that's going to do immense harm to the small business sector where you find a lot of these workers.

The $420.00 rebate is a joke because its frankly under what looks like a minimum cost increase which puts people behind and again the $600.00 pricing that they're putting on it looks to be a calculation simple on gas use and utility bills and its impossible to calculate based on spending habits (ie groceries and entertainment) which are all going to increase.

Because the lower income people can't afford to buy a new car or a more efficient furnace they have no real avenues to reduce their carbon tax unless they reduce their spending so that they don't get hit with it as hard.

The math for the numbers on the lower class(anyone currently making less than $14/hour) does not support your claim. As far as small businesses are concerned, there may be hardships on some, but you appear to believe that it will absolutely crush every business, again while that may be a possibility, it's also possible that it will not be the case and that the majority of this talk from businesses is selfserving in order to keep things the way they want.

For those who will claim I'm talking conspiracy and what not let's just take a brief look at what has happened historically:

[Handsome B. Wonderful]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

For those who will claim I'm talking conspiracy and what not let's just take a brief look at what has happened historically:

LOL a drawing with made up quotes is not history. I'm sorry you can't tell the difference between hyperbole and facts.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Handsome B. Wonderful

LOL a drawing with made up quotes is not history. I'm sorry you can't tell the difference between hyperbole and facts.

Funny, I was thinking the same thing.

Maybe do some research before making a statement.

[calculoso]

Uhm... Really? This was the best name they could come up with?


NDP 'Fairy Fundraiser' for LGBTQ caucus draws fire
http://edmontonjournal.com/news/poli...ises-questions

The first Prairie Fairy Fundraiser, a political fundraiser for the Alberta NDP, has sparked an outcry from members of the gay community, prompting an apology from organizers and a swift renaming of the Nov. 18 event.

[Locke]

Um, yeah. Who thought that was a good idea? Thats a fairly derogatory term for Homosexuals.

[Wiggum_PI]

WestJet CEO: Carbon taxes will cost us between $60 and $70 million in 2017

CALGARY — WestJet CEO Gregg Saretsky says Alberta's carbon tax will cost the airline $3 million in 2017.

The federal carbon tax? Between $60 and $70 million, "all of which we would work to pass through ticket prices," Saretsky said.

The estimates were revealed after the Calgary-based airline posted the second-highest quarterly profit in its history, despite the economic downturn in its home province.

[Resolute 14]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

Prices will go up regardless of this tax, will it create a short term surge? Absolutely. However you are still completely stuck in the mindset that the bad will outweigh the good, ie there will be more income lost from job cuts than there will be income increase from the raises, and you don't have any real data to back this claim up. I'm not saying it's not possible, I'm simply stating that passing it off as a fact is inaccurate.

Some people will make some extra money due to minimum wage increases.

A few people will lose jobs due to same.

More people will lose jobs due to economic hardships created by massive increase in taxes. This is on top of job losses due to oil tanking.

Everyone will see their purchasing power decrease, and everyone except those minimum wage workers will see discretionary income decrease.

So, yes, the mindset that the bad will outweigh the good is hardly unexpected. Especially when the proponents of the good outweighing the bad seem to be expecting Alberta will become a major world exporter of fairy dust and unicorn horns.

[Jacks]

Originally Posted by belsarius

Honestly, I think people were so fed up with the PCs that yes, she could have put a carbon tax in her platform and still won.
............
She also said that royalties were being reviewed and everyone assumed it was going to mean an increase. It didn't, so was she being disingenuous there too? Should she have campaigned on no royalty changes?

Massive difference.
Increased royalties would mean that those evil faceless corporations would have to pay more, people like that because they think the other guy will be paying and not them. Carbon taxes would mean money out of people's own pockets. No chance they get elected if they ran on a carbon tax.

It's the same thing every election. Those damn rich people need to pay more, everyone thinks people who make more than them are the "rich".

[calgarygeologist]

Originally Posted by Wiggum_PI

WestJet CEO: Carbon taxes will cost us between $60 and $70 million in 2017

No big deal. That is only about $4 per passenger. On a $500 or $600 ticket that small increase is really nothing.

[Howie_16]

I like reading this thread, but don't want to skim all 213 pages to see if someone has asked this question before:

Who will be Alberta's next Premier?

Not who you want, but who will be, and why?

[killer_carlson]

Jason Kenney - will unite the right, strong ground game, strong fundraising, and will out work the other candidates between now and the election

(my prediction)

[RinkRat]

The pc's have seen a resurgence in polls lately but most wild rose supporters I speak with would rather watch the province burn then vote pc. Kenney has some work ahead of him.

But I also live in Airdrie where the average voter struggles with Evolution being a thing.

Sent from my SM-G930W8 using Tapatalk

[CaptainCrunch]

Jason Kenney will win, there will be a protest vote to the Wildrose, so I'm betting a minority. The NDP will be annihilated to single seat status and Notley will resign to write her memoirs "I'm better then everyone else so settle down" it will end up in the $1.00 bin at Walmart and nobody will buy it.

[belsarius]

Notley with a second term minority (mostly because conservatives in this province refuse to believe how progressive it is becoming) and Jason Kenney returns to the bridge he crawled out from. She then promptly loses her first budget vote and an another election is triggered. Nenshi wins the PC leadership and takes them to the next Progressive Conservative dynasty.