Oct 2015 Alberta Budget Discussion

[sworkhard]

Originally Posted by foshizzle11

$1.6 Billion on government buildings? So Rachel wants to have a nicer office? I honestly don't spend a lot of time in government buildings, but $1.6 Billion seems like a lot.

Must be finishing Allison Redford's penthouse suite....

But really... I wonder why they need 1.6B in government buildings. Seems like 1.6B in healthcare facilities preparing us for the upcoming aging of the population and ensuring we have the facilities necessary to actually succeed in diagnosing health issues quicker and reducing complications would more useful...

[Regorium]

Originally Posted by rubecube

You also can't do the Norwegian model without setting up a crown corporation that automatically receives the majority of resources, which is not something that would ever fly in Alberta.

Or a 25% VAT. Norway has so many other things that every time someone compares Norway to Alberta I immediately write them off as being uninformed.

I think it's time for a PST. I'd like Notley to just do all the unpopular things that we need to get done so that we can actually be sustainable going forward.

[LanceUppercut]

Originally Posted by Handsome B. Wonderful

But they're creating infrastructure jobs! I'm sure all the unemployed corporate office folks can get one of those immediately. They won't need to sacrifice more money and time on training or anything like that.

Hey, all those corporate office folks MUST be multimillionaires with all the money they stole from Hard Working Albertan's by not paying "their fair share". They can afford to be unemployed!

[polak]

Originally Posted by sworkhard

I'd like a sales tax too, however if Alberta was to implement it I would expect to see a reduction in income tax for the lower tax brackets. The nice thing about a sales tax is that it's a consumption tax allowing us to get tax revenue from both visitors and residents instead of just residents.

So you want to bring in a tax but negate any extra revenue from said tax?

Revenue is the problem right now. You either raise taxes or cut spending on crucial services.... Pick one (or neither, which looks like the route the NDP went with)

[polak]

Originally Posted by sworkhard

Must be finishing Allison Redford's penthouse suite....

But really... I wonder why they need 1.6B in government buildings. Seems like 1.6B in healthcare facilities preparing us for the upcoming aging of the population and ensuring we have the facilities necessary to actually succeed in diagnosing health issues quicker and reducing complications would more useful...

Diagnosing health issues quicker and reducing complications?

You let the old people die.

Problem solved and for free!

[LanceUppercut]

The inability of any government (PC or NDP) to constrain spending in the last decade is/was the problem.

[shermanator]

Originally Posted by Regorium

I think it's time for a PST. I'd like Notley to just do all the unpopular things that we need to get done so that we can actually be sustainable going forward.

I agree, if ever there were a time for a PST, it's now. The "Alberta Advantage" is really not an advantage at all if during the bust cycles the province is flat broke.

[peter12]

Pretty typical NDP budget. Sad to see us sink to the fiscal position of the other provinces. No more snark for Ontario, I guess.

[peter12]

Originally Posted by polak

So you want to bring in a tax but negate any extra revenue from said tax?

Revenue is the problem right now. You either raise taxes or cut spending on crucial services.... Pick one (or neither, which looks like the route the NDP went with)

The poor face a relative disadvantage from a sales tax, but pay relatively little in income tax.

[darklord700]

Nothing doing in the budget, nothing that we didn't know of from the beginning. For example, Ceci just said the flat tax is gone but didn't specify how. Or how the new job creation credit works.

Also the beer and tobacco tax increase, is it on top of the March increase or the NDP is just following through with those increases?

[Resolute 14]

I wonder how long the NDP plans to bang the "we're just fixing the PCs mess" drum?

Anyhoo, I like the "we'll create jobs by giving any business that hires someone $5000". Wonder how many of the "new jobs" the NDP will take credit for would have been created anyway, even without the subsidy?

Other than that, pretty much what I expected. Spend like drunken sailors and figure out how to pay it back later. No doubt Notley is going to spend a lot of time over the next couple years working people over on resigning themselves to a PST.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Slava

Wow, they're borrowing for operations, not just infrastructure. That's bad news for sure. Debt could be $47B by the end of their term.

this is a big problem, it basically tells me that we can no longer afford our government services without borrowing because the previous governments and this government keep throwing money at the issue without understanding why its completely broken.

We're spending beyond our means, and not even getting service levels equivalent to other provinces.

And yes this can be blamed on the Conservatives, who bloated the government, but the NDP is based around not seeing a civil service job that they not only didn't like but a beaurocracy that they didn't want to increase.

This is a ridiculous mess, and its going to get worse, once they head down this road, there's probably no turning back.

We're basically peeing away $1.6 billion dollars with little to no return.

I can completely understand why they didn't want to release this budget during the election, Mulcair would have seen his seat total halved.

[Locke]

Originally Posted by polak

So you want to bring in a tax but negate any extra revenue from said tax?

Revenue is the problem right now. You either raise taxes or cut spending on crucial services.... Pick one (or neither, which looks like the route the NDP went with)

No, it isnt.

I noticed Ceci say a few times that 'Albertans have rejected the notion of laying off education and health-care workers and that we're not going to recoup the required money from underpaying a few administrators.'

Well no kidding, I dont think anyone is advocating massive layoffs of teachers, doctors and nurses, but hey, people are taking cut-backs all over the place.

We're not even talking about reductions in salary, but small reductions to their pensions and benefits alone could free up a ton of money.

Yeah, they'd have to pay for whatever Alberta Health doesnt cover, like most people, and yeah, they'd have to be responsible for a portion of their own retirements, like most people, but you arent firing them or reducing their pay and you're likely driving that money right back into education and health care anyways.

When they talk about inefficient systems these are two of the three on the posters, they're flanking the Post Office.

[Resolute 14]

Originally Posted by sworkhard

Must be finishing Allison Redford's penthouse suite....

But really... I wonder why they need 1.6B in government buildings. Seems like 1.6B in healthcare facilities preparing us for the upcoming aging of the population and ensuring we have the facilities necessary to actually succeed in diagnosing health issues quicker and reducing complications would more useful...

In fairness, the government actually owns a great deal of buildings that, like everything else, requires maintenance. It is hard to judge that line item without having a greater idea of what that money is intended to pay for.

[sworkhard]

Originally Posted by polak

So you want to bring in a tax but negate any extra revenue from said tax?

Revenue is the problem right now. You either raise taxes or cut spending on crucial services.... Pick one (or neither, which looks like the route the NDP went with)

It would't actually eliminate the extra revenue from the said tax. It would just reduce the amount of extra revenue; but it would still bring in a substantial amount. It would make our tax structure more similar to B.C's structure. Someone making $30000/year can ill afford what is effectively a 5% tax increase while those making much more will be less effected percentage wise (as they don't spend as large of a percentage of what they earn) which is why you would expect a tax cut on the low income brackets.

[mrkajz44]

The worst part is the NDP are clueless about how much of a tax shift will occur with rates rising. I work at a Big 4 accounting firm and we are having a campaign to get out to clients and have them extract as much cash from businesses as possible now to avoid taxes later (overly simplified approach, but that's basically the message).

It's going to be a double whammy for them. More tax revenues this year because everyone pulls out a ton of cash (NDP thinks "even better than expected!"). Then the tax revenues quickly dry up as people wait to see if a new gov't in four years will make the rates better.

And that's without the impact of raising the corporate rate - I don't think people realize how much corporate tax planning uses Alberta due to the old low rate. You can kiss that revenue good-bye now too, as there is no point to run money through Alberta versus someone's home province.

I highly doubt we will ever see an NDP gov't here running a surplus. The tax revenues they are banking on will just not be there. You can't just increase rates and wait for the Bordens to roll in - there will be (already has been) a massive reaction to income and revenues in Alberta.

[CaptainCrunch]

I would agree that its probably time for a PST, however I would not be in favor of it without seeing a strong simultaneous plan to contain spending, especially on the operations side of things and the civil service side of things.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by Locke

No, it isnt.

I noticed Ceci say a few times that 'Albertans have rejected the notion of laying off education and health-care workers and that we're not going to recoup the required money from underpaying a few administrators.'

Well no kidding, I dont think anyone is advocating massive layoffs of teachers, doctors and nurses, but hey, people are taking cut-backs all over the place.

We're not even talking about reductions in salary, but small reductions to their pensions and benefits alone could free up a ton of money.

Yeah, they'd have to pay for whatever Alberta Health doesnt cover, like most people, and yeah, they'd have to be responsible for a portion of their own retirements, like most people, but you arent firing them or reducing their pay and you're likely driving that money right back into education and health care anyways.

When they talk about inefficient systems these are two of the three on the posters, they're flanking the Post Office.

the bolded is such a BS statement by the NDP, what they're trying to do is create a collective guilt about cleaning up any part of the civil service. The NDP are basically putting the label of crucial front line worker on every position in the government and trying to guilt us about any thoughts of cleaning it up because we're going to machine gun teachers, and doctors and nurses.

The fact is that the bloat isn't with teachers doctors and nurses, the bloat is in middle management and admin and operations workers and senior managers.

But the NDP won't go after them any more then the Conservatives under Redford because that's they're voter base.

When I suddenly hear the terms that the NDP are throwing around, I'm having flashbacks to Kathleen Wynne in the last election, where she complained about the Conservatives machine gunning 100,000 civil servants to get spending under control, and suddenly it was "The Cons are going to fire teachers and doctors and nurses". No the Cons were going to go after the bloated admins, and middle mangers etc.

This is clearly a government that has no clue about what they're doing, and that makes them dangerous.

[puckedoff]

Its posted on their website now, http://alberta.ca/budget/index.cfm

I have little faith that they will be able to meet their goals as most of their forecasts for 2016 and 2017 reflect a healthy rebound in the economy (grain prices, population growth, and $50 WCS!! if my old eyes are reading the graph correctly).

Perhaps I have a more pessimistic view than the current government, but I don't think that the most probable case is for royalty revenues to jump to $4.4bn (2017F) from the current $2.9bn, given the production decreases that we will see as capital spend rolls off.

[Regorium]

I'd be on board with slashing teachers/nurses/doctors salaries as well.

They're the most well compensated in all of Canada, and when everyone is suffering around them, they should take a hit as well as slashing middle managers and admins.