Justin Trudeau hints at boosting Canada’s military spending

I'll believe it when I see it.

 

[markppcli]

Every so often, especially during gun control shenanigans from above, I hear AB friends saying it's time for its own police force because they're underwhelmed by the RCMP.

Except the municipalities are staunchly against it, and have no complaints.


Frankly I don’t care, I’m just stunned that a province as affluent as Alberta hasn’t built a new hospital in its Capital city, despite massive population growth across the province, since 1988.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Wondering what happened to all that UN support talk a few years back. Meanwhile, go Rwanda!

Charted: Contributions to UN Peacekeeping Forces by Country

In 2023, the UN Peacekeeping Forces, under the purview of the Security Council, comprised of more than 60,000 personnel from 118 countries.

www.visualcapitalist.com

 

[Halifax Tar]

Except the municipalities are staunchly against it, and have no complaints.


Frankly I don’t care, I’m just stunned that a province as affluent as Alberta hasn’t built a new hospital in its Capital city, despite massive population growth across the province, since 1988.

That's ok, best I can decipher it looks like Halifax hasn't built one since the 1800s - 1930s, and we take free money from Alberta.

 

[PPCLI Guy]

Equalization payments are explicitly designed to transfer wealth from the Federal Government to some provinces to others.

Albertans pay exactly the same rates of Federal taxes as any other Canadian. Albertan corporations are taxed at the same rate as all other corporations, other than industry and sector distortions.

Albertan's' perception is shaped by manipulative politicians and a very lazy press to foment dissent, to buy votes and sell papers.

Wham you are on the top step of the podium, maybe they should try not to be so petty and petulant.

 

[PPCLI Guy]

You think that any CDN Gov looks at National Security holistically? ever?

FTFY

 

[ytz]

Of course the government went in attack mode, they don't want to give up control. Quebec only got it as an attempt to save an election, Alberta doesn't have the power yet to swing an election outcome. For what Alberta wants the best thing they could do is separate and go it on their own because they will not get it from our federal government. Quebec, Maritimes and the GTA usually decide who gets in so by the time the polls open in BC everyone already knows who won. The attacking people probably just saw it as Alberta attempting to get more than they get themselves. The "how dare they" mentality kicked into overdrive without bothering to look at it, instead they ran with the government. You know, the liberals say this is bad so it is bad. Same thing happens with some people regardless of the party in power.

Pure nonsense from ignorance. Quebec has their own pension plan because they set it up the same time as CPP. They never joined and withdrew from CPP. Alberta politicians didn't just talk about leaving CPP. To try and dupe their own voters, they came up with some insane lies about how Alberta would be entitled to something like a quarter of the CPP fund. That is, of course, not how any of this works. And of course, when the federal government pushed back on these lies and threatened to offer up actual accounting that determined Alberta's share, this was deemed bullying by Alberta politicians who didn't want their BS exposed for what it was.

You know where we've seen all these tactics with a worse outcome? Brexit. Same nonsense.

 

[ytz]

Just a reminder this is the federal budget from last year. Transfers to provinces are obligated and can't be cut. Debt payments can't be cut. So balancing the budget and any defence spending increases come from the rest. One of the biggest budget pressures is Elderly Benefits. It's due to be $100B by 2030. Any government that isn't willing to cut OAS is basically doomed to failure on budget balancing.

 

[Good2Golf]

$535B for 2024…would definitely like to see the split and where the additional $38B went (I suspect much to debt payments, but interested in the rest of the increase).

 

[ytz]

You'll also notice in the above that "carbon tax" and "carbon rebates" aren't line items. Something I've been trying to explain to some of you. The carbon tax and rebate programs are provincial programs administered by the Feds. They don't impact federal budgeting at all.

 

[ytz]

$535B for 2024…would definitely like to see the split and where the additional $38B went (I suspect much to debt payments, but interested in the rest of the increase).

This was the 2023/2024 budget. I got the Sankey diagram from Hill Times analysis from April of last year. Obviously, when eventually accounted for, if spending is higher, it's probably some combination of debt payments and program expenses.

 

[Good2Golf]

Maybe one day when I have lots of spare time, I’ll go through the Main Estimates and figure it out…and maybe even add slices for adjustment by Supp A, B and C.

 

[ytz]

Another interesting view of government operations is to see which government departments have grown and shrank over the years in numbers of employees. Especially since the last government.

Population of the federal public service by department or agency - Canada.ca

This data table shows the number of employees for each government department, each separate agency (excluding Crown Corporations), and the number of ministers' exempt staff, for each year from 2005 to the present.

www.canada.ca

 

[Good2Golf]

Another interesting view of government operations is to see which government departments have grown and shrank over the years in numbers of employees. Especially since the last government.

Population of the federal public service by department or agency - Canada.ca

This data table shows the number of employees for each government department, each separate agency (excluding Crown Corporations), and the number of ministers' exempt staff, for each year from 2005 to the present.

www.canada.ca

Always interesting to see the details….like how the Trudeau government shit down the Canadian Competition Bureau…

 

[ytz]

Maybe one day when I have lots of spare time, I’ll go through the Main Estimates and figure it out…and maybe even add slices for adjustment by Supp A, B and C.

For discussion sake, it's just the broad strokes necessary. There's a few takeaways.

1) For all the talk. The carbon tax isn't relevant to the federal budget. Cutting it doesn't do anything.

2) OAS growth is not a minor problem. But all our politicians are ignoring it. It was half the cost in 2018 I think. It's growing like a tumor.

3) There aren't actually a ton of discretionary areas to cut. And if defence can't be cut, there's even less.

4) If defence has to be grown while budgets are balanced, cuts elsewhere have to be absolutely savage.

The best line I've heard about this was from an ex-Harper staffer. He actually didn't disagree with some Trudeau spending (like Childcare). But he said that right now, "We have Trudeau spending and Harper tax rates. This isn't sustainable in the long run."

 

[ytz]

Always interesting to see the details….like how the Trudeau government shit down the Canadian Competition Bureau…

View attachment 86697

I'd be careful with judgements like that. Sometimes those functions got rolled into another agency and employees moved. Or the agency period is subordinated and their employees not count as part of the larger department. Likely the case here because the Competition Bureau still exists under ISED.

Also, look at the years. Technically, they were zeroed under Harper.

 

[Good2Golf]

2) OAS growth is not a minor problem. But all our politicians are ignoring it. It was half the cost in 2018 I think. It's growing like a tumor.

This^ Huge trend!

The best line I've heard about this was from an ex-Harper staffer. He actually didn't disagree with some Trudeau spending (like Childcare). But he said that right now, "We have Trudeau spending and Harper tax rates. This isn't sustainable in the long run."

I think this was part of Harper’s intent when he cut the GST from 7% to 5%. He knew that there was no way that Trudeau would be able to run a champagne socialist program indefinitely with that cut…but that would only gain ~20-25B/yr. That’s not going to pay the growing elderly payments and defence increase.

I'd be careful with judgements like that. Sometimes those functions got rolled into another agency and employees moved. Or the agency period is subordinated and their employees not count as part of the larger department. Likely the case here because the Competition Bureau still exists under ISED.

Admittedly a point poke…the more important dive is looking into the CRA, ESDC, and myriad of touchy-feely-but-do-they-help-our-productivity type activities.

 

[MilEME09]

Albertans pay exactly the same rates of Federal taxes as any other Canadian. Albertan corporations are taxed at the same rate as all other corporations, other than industry and sector distortions.

Albertan's' perception is shaped by manipulative politicians and a very lazy press to foment dissent, to buy votes and sell papers.

Wham you are on the top step of the podium, maybe they should try not to be so petty and petulant.

People seem to really hate when I point out the oil and gas industry actually did better under the NDP then it did under the UCP. Guess who has more money though?

 

[Brad Sallows]

Transfers to provinces are obligated and can't be cut.

The federal government can set the sliders anywhere it wants, if it wants to strongly enough.

 

[ytz]

People seem to really hate when I point out the oil and gas industry actually did better under the NDP then it did under the UCP. Guess who has more money though?

Also interesting that Harper couldn't get a pipeline built to the coast. But Trudeau did.

Politics is politics. Some people are going to get a rude awakening when the government changes and things that they care about don't advance one bit.... Because it wasn't politics ever holding those things back.

 

[Brad Sallows]

"We have Trudeau spending and Harper tax rates."

Harper's government cut the GST. Federal income tax cuts, though, were LPC achievements. Here. The LPC made its own choices about the mix of tax cuts, increased spending, and deficit financing.

[Add: Overlooked that Harper's government also cut corporate rates. Working out what particular rate a corporation pays, given its circumstances, is not a matter of just picking one number from a list, but general corporations still pay an effective rate of 15%.]