News Story of the Day: After giving the taxman his money by force and covering the basic necessities of life, Canadians have just about one-fifth of their income for themselves. Yeah, Canadians pay a lot of taxes, says a new report from the Fraser Institute, a right-wing think-tank.
According to a new study, Canadians on average are forced to pay 42 percent of their income to the government at the federal, provincial and municipal level. This includes a wide range of taxes: payroll taxes, sales taxes, property taxes, health taxes, fuel taxes, vehicle taxes, import taxes, alcohol taxes and a lot more. In 2014, the average Canadian family spent 21 percent on housing, 11 percent on food and five percent on clothing.
For the average Canadian family, taxes have grown much faster than any other type of single expenditure. It has increased by 1,886 percent from 1961 to 2014. Tax increases have also outpaced shelter (1,366 percent), clothing (819 percent) and food (561 percent) during the same time frame. Also, tax increases have outpaced consumer price index (CPI), which grew 691 percent in the same time period.
“With more money going to the government, families have less to spend on things of their own choosing, whether it’s a new car, technological gadget, or family vacation. They also have less money available to save for retirement and their children’s education, or to pay down household debt,” wrote Charles Lammam and Milagros Palacios, co-authors of the report, in an op-ed piece.
“While there’s no doubt that taxes help fund important government services, the issue is the amount of taxes that governments take compared to what we get in return.
“With 42% of income going to taxes, Canadians might wonder whether they are getting the best value for their tax dollars.”
Chart of the Day: The Financial Times published a fantastic chart that compared the stock market with the Federal Reserve’s balance sheet. You pretty much see stock market gains when the United States central bank increases its balance sheet. With the stock market being rather volatile in the past week, will the Fed introduce a fourth edition of quantitative easing?
Illustration of the Day: We’re still a year away from the 2016 presidential election. But it’s quite safe to say: whoever wins, we lose. This cartoon from Dan McConnell is pretty much how libertarians will behave the day after the election.
Quote of the Day: Economist Murray N. Rothbard on the subject matter of greed:
“It’s true: greed has had a very bad press. I frankly don’t see anything wrong with greed. I think that the people who are always attacking greed would be more consistent with their position if they refused their next salary increase. I don’t see even the most Left-Wing scholar in this country scornfully burning his salary check. In other words, “greed” simply means that you are trying to relieve the nature given scarcity that man was born with. Greed will continue until the Garden of Eden arrives, when everything is superabundant, and we don’t have to worry about economics at all. We haven’t of course reached that point yet; we haven’t reached the point where everybody is burning his salary increases, or salary checks in general.”
Video of the Day: 2016 presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson provides a sound and sensible response to the issue of gun control. Surprisingly, Dr. Carson is polling second nationally, but still way behind Donald Trump. Anyway, Dr. Carson offers CNN host Don Lemon a pretty good reply when people call for gun control.
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