In response to this column which appeared in the Metro News, I sent the following letter to the editor which appeared in today's paper.
Dear Sir/Madam:
Charles Davies suggests that to reduce the national deficit, the federal government will likely have to raise taxes. (“Higher taxes may be the only solution”, October 13)
Certainly that will be the likely solution of politicians, which serves to remind us that today’s deficits are really tomorrow’s taxes
Of course, raising taxes is not the only way to trim the deficit.
A better way is for the government to cut its spending, not ours.
As former US president Ronald Reagan, once put it, “The problem is not that people are taxed too little, the problem is that government spends too much.”
So this comes as a pleasant surprise:
ReplyDeleteWho knew!
''....In Canada, the first and second quarter Canadian GDP results show that government spending at all levels of government (federal, provincial and local) increased by 0.5 and 0.8 per cent in each quarter respectively (compared to 1.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2008 and 1.1 in the second).
Government capital investments increased by 2.1 and 3.7 per cent in the first and second quarter of 2009 compared to 4.4 per cent in first quarter of 2008 and 2.8 in the second quarter.
In other words, Canadian governments actually slowed their increases in spending in the first two quarters of this year compared to 2008;
hardly what one would call stimulus spending....''
http://thechronicleherald.ca/Opinion/1147473.html