Against Political Bribes
Justin Trudeau's GST "holiday" started a couple of days ago, and I noticed. I probably have spent more money because of it, which was the trap. Now the government will be deprived of GST money for two and a half months, and for what? So Trudeau can bribe us for votes?
My understanding is that both Trudeau and Doug Ford are planning to mail out bribery cheques. I disapprove of both of these. I hate the messaging here. Are we saying that governments can do without the billions of dollars of tax revenue that they are losing because of these handouts? That does not seem true to me. We have a housing crisis and a homelessness crisis in this country. We have collapsing public healthcare system staffed with burned-out doctors and nurses, many of whom are quitting.
I reject the premise that this tax money is better rebated to us than it would be if the government pooled it together. Even if the government spent it suboptimally (and of course there is going to be a certain amount of waste) it is still more effective pooled in the government's hands than in ours.
What happens when this GST rebate window is over again in March? How do we not feel angrier that we have to pay GST again? How is this possibly going to work out for the Trudeau government?
I hate that Doug Ford cancelled car registration fees. It doesn't cost the government money to track car registrations any more?
I hate that these bribes are effective. That is why politicians turn to them. They are effective because they are tangible -- we can see them. Contrast that to something abstract like the carbon tax. Those of us who get carbon rebate cheques can see those cheques, but they are abstract -- I have no idea why I am receiving them, or why I am getting $300 instead of $200 handed to me.
The sums of money that we are bribed with ought to be offensive. $250 from Doug Ford is not a trivial amount of money, but it won't cover a month's worth of expenses and certainly will not cover my rent. It is a small enough amount that I would prefer the government keep it and use it for something important. Every year the Ontario government wants me to contribute to the Ontario Opportunities Fund to pay down the debt, and then they turn around and hand out $200 cheques to everybody?
The real spectre here is Pierre Poilievre. He is talking big talk about cancelling the CBC and "axing the tax", by which he means the carbon tax. Both of these will be incredibly harmful for Canada, independent of whatever else his government decides to roll out. But we are all falling for it, because taxes are irritating. Who needs a public broadcaster when there is Youtube? (Ugh.) I for one am not prepared to normalize Poilievre -- the dude is bad news -- and this idiocy from the Trudeau Liberals just makes it more likely that the Conservatives are going to win power.
I am much more worried about the federal giveaways than about the provincial ones. I am not particularly happy with Doug Ford (especially with his pro-car, anti-greenbelt inclinations) but in my opinion the Ford Conservatives have been more pragmatic than not. There are plenty of policies I despise from the Conservatives (and not just the distractor issues like bike lanes) but I do not see his government as an existential threat. I am also not particularly happy with the Bonnie Crombie Liberals ("but she kept taxes low!"), and I am thoroughly disappointed with the Marit Stiles NDP. Regardless, any of these three parties forming government would not, in my view, be an existential threat. I feel quite differently about the federal Conservatives, which may not be Republican GQP crazy but are plenty bad.
I do not enjoy paying the HST at the junk food store, but I understand basic arithmetic -- you cannot demand expensive services from the government and also expect to pay no taxes. Although I lean towards fiscal responsibility I am no "small government" sociopath -- there are clearly situations where the free market fails to provide for people's needs, and in those situations it makes sense for the government to step in. (And yes, I think the CBC might be one of those situations.) But by bribing citizens to the tune of billions and billions of dollars, governments are making it sound as if they really don't need tax money.
A pox on all their houses. A pox on all their bribery.