Apolitical Staples

A tax cut bidding war. In Canada…

Actually one of the bidders is making this up.

Every time Dion opens his mouth there in an opportunity for the government to position itself to kneecap the Liberals. All Harper & Co have to do in the next budget is incorporate a slight income tax cut and — voila! — the Libs either approve it or implicitly contradict their tax cut message.

Also, any astute taxpayer understands that for all the tax cuts the Liberals announced while in power, they increased payments to CPP and/or EI to offset the gain.

Real tax cuts represent a golden opportunity for the Conservatives.

Bit off topic, but I beat you to the latest. Decima has Tories down one to 35% and Libs up two to 29%. No Majority for the naughty monkies!

A few things about Dion’s speech.

CTV? The fact that they would give a full bloody half hour of live feed to Dion either means they are showing an incredible Liberal bias or they are trying to kill him by making us watch him speak. Even the Liberal website is not showing video of his speech, rather they have it in written form.

Wasted Year? Even if you buy into the premise that Harper wasted a year for Canada on any front, it has to pale beside 13 years of nothing by the Liberals. There is a lot of math in Dion’s speech but no mention that 13 > 1. It’s rich to see Dion trying to attack Harper on his record. It’s less effective than attacking him for being a right wing ideologue.

I managed to listen to 3 minutes of the speech before I couldn’t take it. I did read the whole thing, however, and found it to be a bigger waste of my time than Harper’s year was a waste for Canada.

bigcitylib,

Shameless plug here, but I’ve commented on my blog about this new poll. The increase is due to better support in Quebec, which is bouyed by the Provincial Liberal popularity and PQ unpopularity. IMHO.

Now, now. ‘Where’ is a very important question and I would suggest the equal of ‘how much’. I would think, because of your leanings on financial issues, an income tax cut of equal dollar amounts to a consumption tax cut would be, in the end, of higher value.

Mmmm. Big spending and tax cuts. Both parties are trying to push us back into deficit.

Notice how Dion is desperately claiming that any and all actions carried out by Harper are ‘really’ Liberal ideas which they, poor things, were prevented from carrying out by Harper’s ‘unacceptable win’. The FACT that the Liberals had 13 years to implement any ideas and did nothing - escapes him.

Oh, and a few weeks ago, Dion was claiming that Harper was simply copying Bush’s ideas. Hmm. So, if Dion claims that Harper is copying Bush, AND that Harper is copying the Liberals, doesn’t this mean that the Liberals are the same as Bush???

Oh, and Dion also claims that he will ‘take the high road’ and would never attack Harper (attack ads); he considers Harper as taking the ‘low road’. Again, hmm. Does he forget that his first actions on becoming leader were to voice malicious descriptions of Harper as ‘far-right’, as ‘a control-freak’? Does Dion consider that behaviour ‘the high road’?

We know all about Liberal promises - from Chretien to Martin to Dion. They are all empty - and Dion changes his mind each week.

Real tax cuts represent a golden opportunity for the Conservatives.

Sorry chief, the Conservatives are billing themselves as the party of We’re Socialists Too But We’re Not French And We’re Not Unions And We’re Not Hippies (tm). It played very well in the focus groups. Your idea is also a good one, but the people who need tax cuts have neither the time nor the inclination to f4rt around in focus groups and participate in inane polls.

‘Where’ is a very important question and I would suggest the equal of ‘how much’

Whaddya think, that people go around with one pocket full of “income tax” money and one pocket full of “GST” money ? People either spend or save every penny that they earn which is not ripped out of their hands by government. What they spend gives them and their family happiness and provides an honest living for whoever sells them something. What they save will be invested, will increase in value, and will give them and their family even more happiness down the road, and provide an honest living for even more people. What is taxed away from them mostly vanishes into a never-never land of waste and corruption. (cough, gun-registry Adscam Kyoto HRDC welfare codfish-extinction Shawinigate Airbus helicopters Pearson-Airport gold-plated-pensions medicare-black-hole unwatchable-subsidized-art)

Tax cuts in one of these areas may indeed give more of an electoral bang than the other, but if so it’s because the media is far too generous in sharing everything they know about economics.

“Whaddya think, that people go around with one pocket full of “income tax” money and one pocket full of “GST” money ?”

Actually, yes. Income and consumption taxes have different incidences - so they affect different economic decisions (and economic agents) differently. The decsion of whether to save and invest, or to work to earn more money is greatly affected by expected income taxes, while consumption taxes are not such a consideration. The decision about what (or whether) to buy, is affected by consumption taxes, as is the general cost of living. Different patterns of taxation will lead to different decisions at the margin, and in aggregate, in a different economic structure of society - although the changes take a long time to play out.

Tax design (the “where”) of taxation is, as Greg suggests, a very important question - to ignore it, as you would seem to, is to dramatically over simplify a complex issue.