Lets share some facts about this election. How you vote comes down to whether you believe Stephen Harper, or whether you believe all the other Party Leaders when it comes to the value of continued corporate tax cuts.
The Conservatives have one solution for all of Canada’s problems. To grow the economy they say we must borrow money, mortgage our futures, give up the services our communities and our families rely on, accept lower wages, and an uncertain but certainly darker future to give profitable corporations further billions in tax breaks. In return for these billions Corporations are not bound to invest a single dollar in the Canadian economy, provide a single extra job, fully fund a pension plan, clean up a toxic mess, provide safer food, lower consumer prices, or re-train a single employee. Yet Harper is pinning this whole re-election and his bid for a majority government on making you believe that if we all sacrifice for the Corporations then they will open the their vaults which are stuffed with over $745 billion dollars in accumulated tax breaks and hire a few of us. Well look around Leeds Grenville has Harpers policy worked? The answer is obvious. Yet Brown says we should continue following the same economic path. It’s his position that if we only make the wealthy rich enough and the poor desperate enough then we will open the door to future prosperity. Does that make sense to you? That is his plan. The plan this media chain supports. If I was rich I’d vote for that plan! Look what it has already done. It’s time for Tax fairness. It’s time that corporations stopped paying taxes at one third the rate of working Canadians, its time corporations were told their free lunch has ended.
I for one would rather know that my children can afford higher education, that my family will have access to timely and affordable health care which includes affordable medications, that the environment that we live in is clean and the food we eat is safe and that our Seniors can afford to live in a heated home and still enjoy a healthy diet. I would rather know that my neighbours worked for living wages and could look forward to sustainable pensions than know that some multinational corporation or Bank could now afford to pay out record tax free corporate dividends, or additional billions in bonuses. Recent polls show seventy six percent of Canadians agree with me, now is not the time for corporate tax cuts!
Untargeted Corporate tax cut giveaways have proven to be the single lest effective and the single most costly way for a government to attempt to create jobs. Since 1990 corporate investment in Canada has declined. Investing in Canadians instead of Corporations would create over four times the economic activity. Flaherty no longer even claims these tax cuts are anything but “confidence builders”. Who’s confidence is he building, not mine!
At the end of the day never forget, if the rich paid their taxes they would still be rich.
Dave Lundy
OPSEU Regional Vice President Merrickville
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