HawthorneVillager.com

Sunshine list is missing from the list.
http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/publication ... sure/2009/
Ontario belongs to bureaucrats not province residents.
We just a food for them. They are eating of our money.
Or we let them eat?

Salmonz,
I think more and more people are taking your stance, especially with the provincial government. The kicker is, these morons at the provincial level are probably going to win another majority (thanks Toronto). I'd love to see 2 term maximum's at the provincial and federal level like they do in the states. Hey ND fan, I'm not afraid to say I'm a conservative..got a problem with that? I'd love to see Hudak win the next election and get rid of all these socialists taking over government I hope it is okay that I voiced my own opinion on this.

The insurance companies are certainly making a profit, and one can reasonably argue that it is too large. However, the current 15% increase is mostly, to my understanding, about health practitioner costs rather than the usual greedy insurace companies.



I prefer not to pay taxes, or to have other people pay taxes. However, if I must pay tax, then the HST is a better form of taxation than income tax. Is there a better alternative?



As far as I am concerned, both can charge as much as the market will bear, since neither is a monopoly. This is especially true for a luxury such a television, where I would not lose any sleep over a 3000% increase in the TV bill... I would simply cancel my cable.



I despise throttling, but that is probably a market issue.




We have a recourse, it is known as an election.



Income splitting generally favours the rich. My wife works, so we have to pay for child care. We also do not get to spend as much time with our children. I am not sure why I should subsidize somebody who gets to stay home all day and be an unproductive member of society. (Note that I mean that in a GDP type of way. Staying home is certainly hard work, but if we have income splitting then those families where both people work will be giving money to those where only one works, and I'm not sure how that is either fair or beneficial to society)

Obviously, some lower income people also are part of single income families, but their taxation rate is much lower so they would not save nearly as much from income splitting. The family that gains the most from income splitting is the one where one member makes $120k a year, the other stays home and provides free child and house care.

My opinion for this last item is certainly not universal, but my point is that income splitting is not an outrage on the same level as the health premium or the EHealth scandal. Nobody thinks that wasting money on EHealth was a good thing, but I imagine that a number of us are not in favour of income splitting.

(Also, the pensioner argument does not sway me, since they do not gain an economic advantage by being a single pension family, so it is acceptable that they split)



I did, I hope you don't mind

Can’t say I agree with all your rants (I believe the HST is the right thing to do as it’s a better tax then what it replaces), but I agree we need a lot of reform in Government.

The kicker with all of this is that there is nothing you can do about any of it. Broadly speaking, the Government reflects the public, and there is no appetite for serious reform. People say they want serious reform, but any time they are presented with it, they run screaming for the hills.

Federally, the liberals wouldn’t be any different than the Conservatives. They are both going to raise your taxes, and neither is going to implement any meaningful reforms to rein in government. Maybe if the Cons got a majority we would see some changes, but I doubt it.

Provincially, you might get something out of Hudak similar to the Mike Harris years, but the unions will fight tooth and nail to obstruct any serious reforms. Get ready to see a lot more strike activity, which people will eventually tire of, and then toss them out for someone like Dalton, who will just roll everything back to the way it was again.

I don’t think you’re ever going to see any fundamental changes such as reforming healthcare/education, abolishing the CRTC, dismantling dairy quotas, integrating Aboriginals, and killing the unions stranglehold in the public service - unless people are ready to embrace some radical changes. The reform party took a crack at it and were soundly rejected. You could vote Libertarian, but that party doesn’t seem to be serious about trying to become a contender. They don’t run candidates in most ridings, and you can’t even donate to them online. Their platform is overly philosophical, and needs a dose of reality before I can see anyone taking them seriously.

To cap off your list of 16 things horrribly wrong,

Living in a freshwater and oil abundant, safe, global-friendly democratic nation, with equal access to government services, consumer choices, education, employment, and personal freedoms: Priceless (I hate to go all 1997 on you, but it seemed to fit).

I understand the frustrations, but I guess I don't mind all the nickel-and-diming since there are ways to work within the rules of the system to come out ok in the end.
No government is perfect by far... even Hazel's got her issues.
Millions of people can't eat or get fresh water, or wake up to sunrise instead of gunfights and missles, and we're upset about our TV bill going up by 10 bucks

On one side of the coin, if nobody complains, then waste and corruption will skyrocket, so I applaud you for being educated and concerned.

On the other side, there is too much good in this country to enjoy, to waste that much energy on being upset at government spending and practices that really aren't all that bad on the global scale.
Again, this is only my opinion, and I'm glad there are other people out there that are as concerned as you about these gov't issues.

Very good post ... good discussion indeed! But aside from ranting and posting here ... can we do something? Can we bring some kind of revolution that governments at all levels listen to residents of Ontario/Canada and work for them ... rather than work against them and for corporate people like big insurance companies, banks, gas/oil companies etc?

I am in Atlanta, GA these days ... and every gas station I go to has a different price for gas ... some differ in single digit cents, but others differ in double digits ... that's what I call competition where consumers win ... and corporate people can work to earn their profits ... unlike in Ontario where no matter how far you drive (within city and/or suburbs) ... all gas stations have same freaking price for gas ... no competition.

When a small cell phone/internet/cable companies gets started, the big fish eats them by purchasing their shares and/or whole company, again no competition ... which keeps consumers from enjoying benefits and good pricing ... we are forced to get a product from a retailer who we know is selling at a higher price, but we can't do anything about it ... because there are not much choices available in the market ...

But again my question is, what can we do as a citizen of Ontario/Canada? Our government will do absolutely NOTHING, because they know, people of Ontario/Canada will say or do nothing ... they will just rant for a little while, and then forget about it ...

As an example, we set our minds about gas prices that increase/decrease on daily basis ... when prices are in high 90 cents ... and then a sudden drop of 5-7 cents happen, we get happy saying ... wow ... gas price has dropped ... grab the deal ... but we dont think that the actual price should have been in 70 cents range (we are over paying), but we have been brain-washed in a way by the corporate market that we think drop of price is actually good deal for us! LOL ... poor us!

I don't blame governments for all this, I blame myself, you and other citizens of Ontario and whole Canada for electing these MPs, and MPPs who don't do anything for us ... but we still elect them thinking they'll do something for our betterment.

Dalton broke promises one after another, but we Ontarians did nothing, but elected him again !! So he said ... wow, these fools are doing nothing to protect themselves, and whatever I do ... is not bothering them ... so lets continue screwing them over

We have to do something more than ranting ... otherwise, all these rants will be archived in forums, and internet pages, and will become waste of few kb space on someone's hard drive ... they will do nothing!

Just my few cents ... and my thoughts ... see one again I wasted my cents here ... LOL

PS: Overall good job for bringing in awarness by posting facts in the posts above, I really hope ... I really do hope that people will take action against it, rather than thinking ... someone will action for them!

Knave...How can you say income splitting favours the rich?
A one income family earning 150k a year has take home pay materially less than a dual family making the same amount. Why should they pay more in taxes?

The problem with this country is lefties like you who consider anyone making more than 100k a year rich. By the time the Peoples Republic of Canuckistan gets ahold of your income to re-distrubute it to Quebec, the east coast, civil service what's left? Subsidize someone to stay home? The so called rich subsidize the entire friggen country. The top 5% of income earners pay 60% of the taxes.

Why do you think there is such a large underground economy in this country. Why do you think most of our best and brightest choose to work abroad? Big government - high taxes.

What would be "fair and beneficial" in this country would be to charge a flat 20% income tax on everybody, no writeoffs, get rid of Revenue Canada, privatize everything you can possibly privatize and set public sector employees pay and benefits via a competitive market.

Work for the government by chance Knave?

Great topic. Too bad it caught me as I was leaving for a meeting. But let me tell you something. We can all complain how bad things are, and that we are paying more and more. I'm 100% agree with all of this. BUT!!!!! You know what..... YOU need to make a move to improve your lifestyle through ways of sheltering your taxes in a legal but more creative ways. The answer is simple; you have to become self employed. Yes, I know what many of you will think right now. "Dmitri get out of here, I have a family to feed I cannot stop working and do something else"
Let me tell you. You don't have to. In today's environment there are ways to reduce your income taxes without starting something new. This is called "I'm ready to take a smack across my head" MLM business. Believe me or not, by joining good MLM business, you not only open new opportunity for you to make some residual income, but also save money in taxes. Because the moment when you join MLM, you are self-employed, and all tax deductions: Insurance, Gas, Partial interest on your mortgage, internet, cell phone, restaurants etc becomes tax deductable.

I consider myself financial savvy person, and believe me I would never tell something if I did not see this is working. My father: who happened to be a financial planner and real estate investor owning around 100 units showed me that average income of 60k can save several thousands in taxes just by joining good MLM business.
So if they will increase insurance do you really care now? No, because you can deduct more from taxes. Internet, who cares, I will write it off. Sometimes we have little power when it comes to government decisions, but by working their own system we are able to turn tables around. I’m self employed so I write things off anyways, but for someone who work for an salary this is a great way to start saving on taxes.

_________________
Dmitri Ivanov
Mortgage Broker
Lic # M09000265
Office: 905 876 4751
Cell: 905 691 6706
Fax: 905 693 1858
email: dmitri.ivanov@migroup.ca
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It was only a few years ago where we DID have competition at the pump. Prices would vary from one station to another, and would change throughout the day. And what did people do? They freaked out. They perceived it as price gouging. Why am I paying more for gas at 8:00 AM then at 8:00PM?! People don’t understand that this is how free markets/competition work. People were essentially paying the lowest possible price at all times, but people perceived it as gouging.

So what did the Gas industry do? They got together, agreed to allow one to set the price (Petro Canada), and the rest would follow. This reduced the volatility of the prices. They now change once per day. However, you pay a higher overall price – 5-10 cents a liter higher, then when prices were volatile.

And guess what? Nobody complains about price changes any more. People would rather pay a higher stable price, then a lower volatile price. There is some interesting research on this behavior if you Google it.

I dunno why people keep voting Liberal...I know I didn't...

I agree, I thought that I was being very polite, and it was annoying to have some label smacked on me. This is especially true given that the label is not even appropriate. Socially, I'll concede that I'm a bit of a leftie... but economically, I am quite the opposite.

That said, if you make over 100k, then you are rich. I happen to do fairly well myself, but the median income in Canada is substantially below 100k. Again, I would prefer that other people pay tax instead of myself, but I must concede that justice demands that I pay more than an "equal" share, since I do earn more than the average salary.




I was going to say the same thing. It could either mean that the top 5% are paying too much in taxes... or it could mean that the top 5% are earning too much money relative to the rest of the population. It is often said that 90% of all statistics are misused or made up on the spot.



You didn't miss a thing, but I get the impression that Greg likes the personal attack more than the logical.

I love your idea, but we all know it will never happen here. The best reform in taxation right now would be a shift to consumption tax instead of the focus being on income tax. How else are we going to make the baby boomers pay for their decades of irresponsible spending? This is why I can't understand the reduction of GST!!? I like it...mind you...but it's the wrong direction. Spike consumption tax, lower income tax, encourage people to save, and make the massive group of over 60s pay taxes to support their health care. Let face it, if they don't do something like this, we are NEVER going to be able to suppot the boomers AND ourselves in 10-20 years.

I can tell you why it happened. The conservatives ran an election on income tax cuts, and lost (to Paul Martin). Seeing that that was not an election winner, they took a stab at the GST and won.

Ultimately, we get the government we deserve.

So long as people base their vote on unimportant/emotional issues, or even ignorance of the facts, politicians will exploit them to get elected. Sometimes I wonder if we would be better off testing voters on their knowledge of the issues before we allow them to vote.

If we do that, most of the polls will be empty.

I really enjoyed to read comments here. Bad problem but nice comments.

I also would like to add another point to “the list” after reading about single income families comments.
I was really disappointed to hear about Dolton’s last initiative to have sponsored by government (paid by us) child care.
I’m not against of it actually. More and more people these days have to work at low paid jobs. And booth parents too.
But in our situation then I have five people depending on my income while our family taxed as single person income. The income tax benefits are nothing but joke for single income families.
It kills the most natural way of raising children and stimulates childfree style of “living”.

I also seek and tired about this "save for retirement BS" all over media and every time we are banking too. How do I save if even at public education we have to pay for our three children and if our public medicine is not free at all and if I’m constantly ripped off by increasing of taxes and overspending of taxpayers money to keep the sunshine list getting more and more brighter?
They (provincial and federal) government only say – please, have more children, in fact they say - who cares if you have three of them already - just pay your taxes to feed us as if it is no children at all.


I also don’t understand why they (municipal and region governments) promoting of increasing of population density. Have you seen families with three children in condolandia? I haven’t seen many. Almost none. May be one, two children maximum. This is destructive strategy as well for sustainable population in Canada.
It leads us to 100% of immigration dependence, but it has very questionable policies and results.
http://www.fraserinstitute.org/research ... /6939.aspx