More Smoke and Mirrors on the Canadian Economy

Now that the election is over, the Conservatives are reneging on their promise to balance the books a year earlier than their original fairy tale.

The only shock is that they still think we believe anything they say.

Embassy magazine reports several wikileak memos, and one deals with the U.S. view of how Harper handles the economy.

In a cable dated Jan. 4, 2010, American officials at the Embassy in Ottawa summarized the Harper government’s top five policy priorities for 2010, starting with Mr. Harper’s top goal, “remaining in power” and, secondly, the economy.

“The Conservatives will need to demonstrate slow but steady progress on the economy and to claim credit even when it is not necessarily due to them,” reads the document, signed off by US Ambassador David Jacobson.

“The Conservatives do not appear to have any bold measures up their sleeves to improve the economy,” it adds later, “but appear content to wait for more results from their uncharacteristic stimulus packages and for a rising global economy—especially in the US—to lift all boats.”

That pretty much sums it up: "claim credit even when it is not necessarily due to them" and "wait" hoping that other factors save them.

Another campaign promise was the "tax free savings accounts", a gift to the wealthy.

Neil Brooks, a professor of tax law at Osgoode Hall Law School, says the program does little for moderate earners, and is really about eliminating taxes on capital gains and other income from capital – something the financial community has long lobbied for but been unable to achieve.

Brooks argues that the TFSA program has far-reaching implications, moving Canada away from the income tax – which taxes income from both capital and wages – towards a system that taxes only wages. That will shift the tax burden away from investors, and increasingly onto the backs of wage earner ..

If this government put only a fraction of their focus on the average Canadian as they do the wealthy and the corporate sector, they might not have to worry about outside forces saving their bacon.

Neoconservatism scores another victory.