andyt andyt:
I don't agree Boots. How can you expect Ontario to have balanced budgets, with its manufacturing sector so decimated, when Alberta with all that oil wealth can't even manage it? And the people arguing with Delwin want the same kind of low tax regime as Alberta has. Probably start whining, just as Albertans do, when the govt services they happen to enjoy get cut.
All that oil wealth? You make it sound like oil royalties account for most, if not all of the provincial budget.
The fact is they make up about 20% of the government revenues and because they do, Albertans refuse to pay taxes at levels similar to the rest of Canada. That makes it harder for the government to operate, because they have to provide all the same services everyone else does with less tax revenue.
That's why when oil and gas prices fell in 2008, the government had to run a deficit to maintain services, because most Albertans are adamant that taxes not go up.
If Albertans paid the same progressive income tax as people in other provinces, revenues would be higher and we would be less dependent on royalties to fund services, which in turn would allow us to sock some of it away for the future instead of spending every penny as it comes in like we do now.