Well but the population grows every year therefore the demand for services grows every year. You always need more food inspectors, more bus drivers, more busses, more sewage lines, etc. and the stuff already built always needs to retrofit, repaired refurbished etc. as it ages and as the world around it evolves.

Also as society evolves there are just more things for government to do or become involved in. When someone invents time travel there will need to be new government agencies and new professionals in the old agencies to regulate and deal with time travel related issues. If you’re looking for a real world example I would point to IT departments, and online services generally called “e-government. “ The latter didn’t even exist the last time a conservative government was elected in Ontario. In fact I don’t know if they even had email back then but this year I’ll be voting in my municipal election online.

New technology is also rolled out when it improves service as well. We probably could keep old 40-year old streetcars and subway cars with no air conditioning and old signals and old switches in service for another decade or two and just force people to put up with their shitty service and malfunctions but when new tech comes along that allows you do things better, eventually people will demand change even when you can stick with the shittier cheaper option for a while longer.

Ontario has seen a 55% increase in expenditures since 2002. I'm sure most of us can agree, the service levels of the things Ontario provides us in terms of education, health care, etc aren't remarkably better.

In fact, since 2002, a lot of cuts have taken place have effected me personally. Cuts to chiropractic care, eye exams, and cuts to special education are just a few all while getting hit with increased taxes and things like the health care premium.

When times get tough with household finances, we need to get back to the basics. Food, housing and transportation. The government needs to get back to basics like Education, health care, justice & social services.

We can do better without all the fear mongering.

Ontario's population grew by 16% from 2002-2017

Spending increased by 55% during that same time frame.

Do you find this acceptable?

Ontario Revenue in 2002 was $68 Billion (PDF). In 2017 it was $140 Billion.

Si it’s disingenuous to complain that expenses increased by 55% without mentioning revenues increased bu 205% over the same period. Why would spending remain the same as it was under the last conservative austerity regime?

Si it’s disingenuous to complain that expenses increased by 55% without mentioning revenues increased bu 205% over the same period. Why would spending remain the same as it was under the last conservative austerity regime?

Ironically the curriculum Ford repealed for purely ideological reasons without any basis in fact or reason was in fact the product of one of the largest consultations of its kind and included the participation of over 4,000 school parents.

And let's face it, the curriculum was brought in for nothing more than ideological reasons.

You mean the one that got the approval of fewer than 1400 of those parents? That's less than 35%. And let's face it, the curriculum was brought in for nothing more than ideological reasons.

The Ontario Premier said just 1,638 people were consulted on the curriculum after the plan had already been developed, a figure he called “disgusting.” Mr. Ford appears to have drawn the statistic from a 2015 Toronto Sun article about a Freedom of Information request that found that just 1,638 out of about 4,000 parents contacted to provide feedback had taken the time to complete the online survey.

You mean the one that got the approval of fewer than 1400 of those parents? That's less than 35%. And let's face it, the curriculum was brought in for nothing more than ideological reasons.

Have a link to support that?

Cause this is what I have.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/ ... urriculum/

....As part of its consultations on the elementary health and physical-education curriculum, which includes sex-ed, the former government sought feedback from 4,000 parents – chosen by principals from representatives on the school councils of every elementary school – in the fall of 2014.

The Liberal government also conducted earlier consultations and focus groups with students, teachers, faculties of education, universities and colleges, in addition to other stakeholders. More than 70 health-related organizations submitted reports and more than 2,400 people provided feedback on the draft curriculum, according to a 2014 news release.

Sam Hammond, president of the Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario, said the outreach was unprecedented. “The consultation process for that document was probably the largest, most extensive consultation process for any piece of curriculum ever developed in Ontario.”

In other Ford mismanagement news: After 6 years of careful consultation, securities regulators were moving to ban hidden fees that investment firms take from peoples accounts.

True to form, with zero consultation, study or notice or even thorough explanation, Doug Ford sides with financial corporations against the public interest.

Corporate rule is back in Ontario. This time its front man is an angry idiot who dropped of community college in his first semester and thinks he can rule by decree and doesn’t owe anyone an explanation.



https://www.bnnbloomberg.ca/personal-in ... -1.1137844

How the Ontario government has betrayed investors

What in the world is Vic Fideli thinking?

In case you don’t recognize the name – and most people won’t – he’s the still-wet-behind-the-ears Finance Minister of Ontario.

CARP, which represents Canada’s 50-plus community, has expressed ‘grave concerns’ over Vic Fedeli’s decision to block a proposed ban on certain fund fees.
CARP, which represents Canada’s 50-plus community, has expressed ‘grave concerns’ over Vic Fedeli’s decision to block a proposed ban on certain fund fees. (COLE BURSTON / THE CANADIAN PRESS)
He hasn’t even been in office three months and is presumably still trying to catch up on all his files. But he thinks he knows enough to shoot down six years of work by Canada’s securities regulators while at the same time making a mockery of his party’s “For The People” slogan.

Let me back up a little here. When it comes to regulating our securities industry, Canada is a patchwork quilt of jurisdictions. Each province and territory has its own securities commission or the equivalent, with different priorities and dynamics. The federal government has been trying for years to combine them into a coherent national securities regulator, with zero success. No one wants to relinquish their fiefdom.

But they all get together under an umbrella organization called the Canadian Securities Administrators (CSA) in an effort to harmonize the country’s rules relating to capital markets to the extent possible.

One of the issues the CSA has been working on in recent years is updating our hidebound mutual fund industry and reducing the costs to investors. Those costs are among the highest in the world.

Finally, after six years of debates, consultations and arguments, the CSA seemed to have arrived at some solutions that would significantly benefit investors. Then, out of nowhere, Fideli shoots it all down.

On Sept. 13, the CSA put forward a plan for public comment that would end what it terms the “conflict of interest” in deferred sales changes (DSC) on mutual funds and terminate the practice of forcing investors to pay fat fees for “advice” that they never receive.

Almost immediately, Fedeli issued a statement dumping cold water on the whole idea. He claimed that, if implemented, it “will discontinue a payment option for purchasing mutual funds that has enabled Ontario families and investors to save towards retirement and other financial goals.”

Really? This rationale is so twisted, and so out of line with Premier Doug Ford’s populist agenda, that you have to wonder what vested interests have been whispering in Fedeli’s ear. There are all kinds of cheaper investment options out there, ranging from no-load mutual funds to ETFs.

Deferred sales changes seem attractive at first glance. You pay nothing up front to buy mutual fund units. However, if you sell within a certain period of time – usually five to seven years depending on the company – you’re hit with a sales commission, which can be as high as 6 per cent.

If you’re a financial advisor, you love selling DSC funds. You get an upfront commission on the sale of as much as 5 per cent, plus you earn annual trailer fees of 0.25 per cent to 1.5 per cent for as long as the client owns the fund. Those trailer fees are effectively deducted from any profit an investor earns. Even more frustrating, you still have to pay them even if the fund loses money.

If a security is performing badly, most people will consider selling. But in the case of DSC funds, there’s a major disincentive to bailing out – the sales charge such action would trigger.

When you boil it down, the only people who are guaranteed to make money in this scenario are the advisor and the fund company.

Another abuse the CSA wanted to address was the payment of trailer fees to discount brokerage firms. Discount brokers are not allowed to offer advice to clients – they can’t suggest you buy or sell any specific stock or fund. Trailer fees are supposedly paid to compensate an advisor for advice offered. If there is no advice, therefore, the investor is paying for nothing.

Questrade is the only discount broker that rebates all trailer fees (less a $29.95 monthly processing fee) to their clients, having implemented the practice in 2009. The rest keep the money, and the client is the poorer for it.

Opposition to Fideli’s position is starting to build. CARP, which represents Canada’s 50-plus community and has 300,000 members, released a letter expressing “grave concerns” with the government’s action and urging the minister to change course.

“Without these needed CSA reforms, people, markets and the government will all lose,” the letter said. “Ontarians will not be able to save, invest or fund their retirements effectively. Financial markets will continue to be skewed at a time when efficiency and effectiveness have never been more important.”

Why the Ford government would take this position is a mystery. It flies in the face of everything the Premier claims he stands for. Unless it changes course, the CSA plan is dead since the Ontario Securities Commission is by far the most powerful member of the group.

Fideli should pay attention to the growing concerns and reconsider his ill-advised opposition to the CSA proposals. Unfortunately, based on the inflexibility we have seen from the Ford government to date, that probably won’t happen.

Gordon Pape is editor and publisher of the internet Wealth Builder and Income Investor newsletters.

Ford vows Ontario government will get rid of Liberal labour reforms

https://www.thestar.com/politics/provincial/2018/10/02/ford-vows-ontario-government-will-get-rid-of-liberal-labour-reforms.html

No, I agree with you on that. But the difference is a guy with 140k salary has a built in mortgage payment, and could probably reduce unnecessary spending enough to save enough money to have that mortgage gone in 5 years, 10 max. We can't do that as a province. And I see what you're saying that running a deficit isn't always a bad thing. Sometimes things happen that call for it, but I think the mentality of "who cares how much debt we have" is short sighted at best. I'm by no means a slash and cut conservative, but I am a "lets not spend dumb amount of money on dumb things" kind of conservative. There are certainly services we need and should be continued to have funding, even if it puts us in a deficit, because in the long run, we'd be fucked with out them. But few of those things require substantial funding every year. Running a deficit for a couple years and bringing things back in line once the funding isn't needed is the correct way to do this. Kind of like how you might need to drop 15 grand on an HVAC system for a house, but you don't need to do that every year. But we do need to take a hard look and what we don't need.