Letter to the Editor – Ken Smith of Cornwall Ontario – Reigning in corporate tax cuts – April 14, 2011

The Quebecor Sun Media news chain, including our Standard-Freeholder, has circulated another dubious story on basement corporate tax cuts.
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Jim Hendry, editor of the Peterborough Examiner, has issued a new piece “Lower corporate tax cuts are an economic winner” for the multi-corporate news agency.
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Hendry cites Stephen Harper’s claim that the most recent $6 billion corporate tax cut will “generate 100,000 new jobs and $30 billion in investment to expand production.”
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I guess we should just take Harper’s word on that, given his shining record on accountability.
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Since the 2008 recession began 64,000 part-time jobs were created, replacing a decline of 11,000 full-time jobs. Stats Can reports a net increase of only 53,000 jobs between October 2008 and March 2011.
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And yet Harper proposes an upcoming leap to 100,000 new jobs with the latest $6 billion giveaway. The previous $54 billion of incentives to the largest corporations did not stimulate recognized job growth. So how is the current $6 billion reduction supposed to jumpstart our economy?
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How are large corporate banks and insurance companies going to stimulate Canada’s industrial revitalization and grow our production sector? The Harper job leap is a dangerous leap of blind faith.
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Hendry enlists economist Stephen Gordon’s view that falling worldwide machinery prices indicate a Canadian corporate investment in equipment.
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The Globe and Mail shows corporate cash reserves, since 2008, have increased by $83 billion. While spending less on new machinery as a percentage of GDP since lower tax rates began 10 years ago.
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Also, most corporate recipients are multi-national, using some of the funding to create jobs outside our country.

“What’s happened is this money was either paid out in profits or they are just sitting on it, which is not what you want in a recession,” explains David MacDonald of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

So, Mr. Harper, how many times can you flog a dead horse?
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5 Comments

  1. It is not a 6 billion dollar give away, they will just charge each business a little less. I am sure that could be easily paid for by one year of no salary increses and only replacing some positions. There is over 100,000 government employees. And yes, I have gone for more than one year without a raise.

    The incentive to GM has been paid back has it not? Restructuring that company saved jobs. But I am not sure the stimulus was to jumpstart the economy, only keep it going till better times from our trading partners was online.

  2. Volkswagen selects Tennessee for new auto plant , check the head story. It is what happens when governement invests money.

    Oh and taxes in Tennessee are how much??

  3. The last VW I bought was a ’65 Beetle. Does anyone actually still buy VWs anymore?

  4. ah Furtz nice post and so on topic.

  5. VW has a plant in Puebla, Mexico and supplies VW’s in different models. They employ over 15,000 employees at the Puebla plant. They still make Beetle engines in you ever need one.

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