Urban Hunting

[August1991]

I get really angry when my tax money just sits there and some people face inappropriate eligibility standards for services.

The surplus is about $7 billion or about $250/Canadian.

The best and easiest way to get that money to poor, working Canadians would be to raise the personal exemption or lower the tax rate for on incomes below $30,000.

If the government puts the money into providing more services, it will get gobbled up by the bureaucracy. Take a look at Indian and Northern Affairs.

A 10% inheritance tax will solve our financial problems.

Pot of gold, once again. "Eat the Rich".

First, your proposal would mostly fall on farmers who would not be able to pass the farm on to their kids.

Second, there are too many ways to avoid an inheritance tax. For example, if a living parent buys a car for a child, should that gift be subject to a 10% tax? In any case, think where this would all lead to.

We are all good Christians here, right.

If the Left must rely on appeals to religion, it is sure to fail.

[maplesyrup]

The top 5% in Canada and top 1 % in the US take in one of every 2 dollars. I read this recently at another discussion forum - apparently from Stats Can & the like.

First, your proposal would mostly fall on farmers who would not be able to pass the farm on to their kids.

It is always easy to poke holes in something when your agenda is to destroy it. There are not that many farmers and for those that are, special arrangements I presume could be arranged.

Inheritance tax or close the tax loopholes. Take your pick.

We should hire one of those think tanks to check it out.

[ndpnic]

I get really angry when my tax money just sits there and some people face inappropriate eligibility standards for services.

The surplus is about $7 billion or about $250/Canadian.

The best and easiest way to get that money to poor, working Canadians would be to raise the personal exemption or lower the tax rate for on incomes below $30,000.

If the government puts the money into providing more services, it will get gobbled up by the bureaucracy. Take a look at Indian and Northern Affairs.

A 10% inheritance tax will solve our financial problems.

Pot of gold, once again. "Eat the Rich".

First, your proposal would mostly fall on farmers who would not be able to pass the farm on to their kids.

Second, there are too many ways to avoid an inheritance tax. For example, if a living parent buys a car for a child, should that gift be subject to a 10% tax? In any case, think where this would all lead to.

We are all good Christians here, right.

If the Left must rely on appeals to religion, it is sure to fail.

$30,000.00 ia barely viable. I would think $40,000.00 Net would be more realistic.

Solutions, not band aids!!

[Stoker]

Inheritance tax or close the tax loopholes. Take your pick.

Investors stay in Canada or leave. Take your pick.

Who is going to pay for your social programs once you create these wealthy tax refugees?

[August1991]

The top 5% in Canada and top 1 % in the US take in one of every 2 dollars. I read this recently at another discussion forum - apparently from Stats Can & the like.

I have never seen any such Stats Can data.

It is always easy to poke holes in something when your agenda is to destroy it.

You're right, MS. I simply want to destroy everything. That's my agenda.

[maplesyrup]

Inheritance tax or close the tax loopholes. Take your pick.

Investors stay in Canada or leave. Take your pick.

Who is going to pay for your social programs once you create these wealthy tax refugees?

With the assets the rich will be forced to leave behind, should they choose to abandon Canada, the place that allowed to make all that money in the first place, we have more than ample for everyone in Canada to be looking after as far as food, clothing, shelter, medical7 dental care & eduction. We'll do just fine, thank you.

I suppose you think it is OK, and a good example, for our Canadian prime minister to have put his company off shore, to avoid paying Canadian income taxes (which could pay for a lot of social services btw), and Canada's environmental and labour laws.

Let the whining begin.

[Guest eureka]

It might be useful to remember that "poverty" is a Provincial" concern. The federal government wirsened the problem in Canada by its abuse of the EI programme. However, since then the rise in poverty - 50% in Alberta and Ontario by the measures that were used a decade or so ago, are entirely a consequence of Conservative administrations in those provinces.

So let's leave out the anti-Liberal clamour unless it is to demand a restoration of the EI to its former poverty fighting standards.

It might also be news to some that much of the waste in Ontario came from the Harris government's payment of more than $250 million dollars to an American corporation to set up a new computer system to improve efficiency; catch fraud; and reduce waste.

It did not find waste and there more problems today in administration. It also did not find evidence of fraud on a scale that was already known to those on the delivery system. It also placed great stresses on the social workers who now spend a great deal of their time in front of a computer instead of with the needy clients.

And, we are still paying Andersen Consulting for the upkeep and repairs to a failed system.

So much for Left and Right in this issue.

[Stoker]

With the assets the rich will be forced to leave behind, should they choose to abandon Canada, the place that allowed to make all that money in the first place, we have more than ample for everyone in Canada to be looking after as far as food, clothing, shelter, medical7 dental care & eduction. We'll do just fine, thank you.

What assests? Empty office buildings? Empty factories? Forget about all the now unemployed people. What makes you think that an sharp increase in taxes will not further deter our Doctors, Dentists, nurses and other Healthcare professionals? How will your now low investment based societiy stop the Brain Drain of our young and educated?

How are you going to pay for it? Don't dodge the question, answer it?

I suppose you think it is OK, and a good example, for our Canadian prime minister to have put his company off shore, to avoid paying Canadian income taxes (which could pay for a lot of social services btw), and Canada's environmental and labour laws.

Did he break the law? Do you want the government to govern with Christian morals now MS?

[Cartman]

If I may suggest that we return to the initial question here.

My question is, is this really a crime, punishable like all other crimes, or is this what survival in Canada has come to?

If a court finds that a person steals in an effort to feed their family or themselves, should this crime be treated like other instances of theft? Should poverty be a mitigating circumstance in punishment?

[Guest eureka]

Your question cannot be entered to your satisfaction before you disabuse yourself of your erroneous ideas about Canadian taxation.

You might also consider all those truly higher taxed nations whose citizens are not clamouring to get to the US or to Canada now.

[Cartman]

Your question cannot be entered to your satisfaction before you disabuse yourself of your erroneous ideas about Canadian taxation.

You might also consider all those truly higher taxed nations whose citizens are not clamouring to get to the US or to Canada now.

Uhhmmm...I don't quite follow here. Sorry. I think that we are relatively well taxed in Canada though the money could probably go further. Perhaps I am being thick?

[August1991]

Should poverty be a mitigating circumstance in punishment?

Well, how do you define "poverty"?

If we define it in relative terms, and I live in a neighbourhood where everyone else wears Gucci but I can only afford Aldo, then I guess I'm entitled to steal. Or, the judge should take into account my relative poverty when deciding my sentence.

[Cartman]

If we define it in relative terms, and I live in a neighbourhood where everyone else wears Gucci but I can only afford Aldo, then I guess I'm entitled to steal. Or, the judge should take into account my relative poverty when deciding my sentence.

I was thinking of only absolute poverty; extreme cases where a someone's life may be at risk. But, it would have to be used very sparingly otherwise we would have chaos.

[August1991]

I was thinking of only absolute poverty; extreme cases where a someone's life may be at risk.

Less than life might be necessary.

Consider this case:

You are lost in the woods near nightfall without food or water and you come upon a locked cabin. If you break in and take food, should you be charged?

One way to see this is to consider what damages should you pay to the cabin's owner? In any case, it would be absurd for you not to break in.

[caesar]

No, you would not be charged but you should pay any damages and replace what you used.

[caesar]

10% inheritance tax will solve our financial problems. Just cancel all other forms of taxation, and 99% of the bureaucracy that goes into collecting them. There would be an abundance for everyone. We are all good Christians here, right. 

Why should the government collect 10% from someone who died. And NO; we have many religions in Canada; we are not all christians good or bad.

[ndpnic]

Should poverty be a mitigating circumstance in punishment?

Well, how do you define "poverty"?

If we define it in relative terms, and I live in a neighbourhood where everyone else wears Gucci but I can only afford Aldo, then I guess I'm entitled to steal. Or, the judge should take into account my relative poverty when deciding my sentence.

No, you're not entitled to steal Gucchi.

WE are talking about FOOD!!!!!

[Guest eureka]

Uhhmmm...I don't quite follow here. Sorry. I think that we are relatively well taxed in Canada though the money could probably go further. Perhaps I am being thick?

Well taxes is an interesting take on raxation. In terms of amount payed, we are at the lower end of developed nations. Before the massive tax cuts, federal and provincial, we were slightly above the mid range.

Just think of something like Medicare where the cost is almost exactly the same -in proportion to national income - as it was ten years ago. Yet we have been bombarded with propaganda about its unsustainability and ballooning cost.

It is the same with welfare. All Canada's social programs have been on the path to hell; and all for the God of tax reduction: for the transfer of wealth, American style, to the better off: for no economic purpose.

[Argus]

Who is going to pay for your social programs once you create these wealthy tax refugees?

With the assets the rich will be forced to leave behind, should they choose to abandon Canada, the place that allowed to make all that money in the first place, we have more than ample for everyone in Canada to be looking after as far as food, clothing, shelter, medical7 dental care & eduction. We'll do just fine, thank you.

You are talking out of your ass. You haven't the faintest whiff of a clue what the total would be of siezing the assets of "the rich", nor what it would cost us in terms of lack of investment and entrepeurship.

[Argus]

So let's leave out the anti-Liberal clamour unless it is to demand a restoration of the EI to its former poverty fighting standards.

It might also be news to some that much of the waste in Ontario came from the Harris government's payment of more than $250 million dollars to an American corporation to set up a new computer system to improve efficiency; catch fraud; and reduce waste.

Why should we leave the feds out? There is only one taxpayer but multiple levels of idiots wasting that money. If the feds are throwing $2 billion down the toilet on a useless gun registry that's $2 billion that could have been used to reduce poverty, educate the ignorant or cure the sick. And by the way, the cost of a useless computer system the Defence Department has been trying to put in place over the last some years is pegged at $750 million.

[Argus]

There is a very simple solution to solving Canada's internal financial issues - let's just tithe.

A 10% inheritance tax will solve our financial problems. Just cancel all other forms of taxation, and 99% of the bureaucracy that goes into collecting them. There would be an abundance for everyone. We are all good Christians here, right.

Hmmm, some of us just aren't very good economists.

[Cartman]

There is only one taxpayer but multiple levels of idiots wasting that money. If the feds are throwing $2 billion down the toilet on a useless gun registry that's $2 billion that could have been used to reduce poverty, educate the ignorant or cure the sick. And by the way, the cost of a useless computer system the Defence Department has been trying to put in place over the last some years is pegged at $750 million.

So then why don't those on the right endorse the NDP plan to eliminate the Senate? I think that this is probably the worst example of patronage and it is perfectly legal! It is not hidden at all and I suspect that Senators have a measure of respect. All parties should endorse this and the plan to restructure representation in the House. That way we can better represent people cheaper. If the right had jumped on this issue with the NDP, the Senate would be gone by now.

[Guest eureka]

Who would then do the work of the Senate? For example, the ongoing committee that is studying the problems of Mental Health in Canada. Who would study and iron out all the faults in all of the legislation that goes through the house.

Jack Layton's dream of abolishing the Senate is one reason I cannot support the NDP. There is another - Quebec.

[Cartman]

Let SSHRC/NSERC figure it out and our MP's can vote on it. We don't need an entire level of government for this. I have a serious problem with appointed, unelected politicians that never show. I have watched some of them being strolled in by nurses to their once a year ten minute meeting. If we cannot identify this as unwanted patronage then we should stop worrying about the sponsorship scandal.

[Guest eureka]

Would you support an elected Parliament that has no check on it: a system where all power is concentrated in Cabinet?

Would you support the expansion of the numbers of elected members to whatever is requires for the increased load of work? Make no mistake about it. The Senate does a lot of work. Some of this is in questioning the actions of Parliament and one body would be a contradiction; a conflict of interest.

I don't think there would be any savings.