I wanted to thank the Gazette editorial board for voting to bring in a progressive tax to Alberta. This is the “fair” tax according to a bunch of left-leaning Think Tanks you quoted from, yourselves and probably anyone else that won’t be affected by it.
Good thing you’re not running the show. Why can we not just raise the current flat tax at 10 per cent, to 11 per cent or 12 per cent? That still means anyone making under $18,000 a year will continue to pay zero per cent. Everyone that currently pays 10 per cent will then be paying the new percentage. That way everyone shares the burden. The more you make, the more you pay seems progressive to me. It is simplistic to suggest that the person making a decent wage should pay a higher percentage since “that is fair.” Often the person making $100,000 or more per year has a non-wage earner at home. They are already paying far more in tax than a double-income family earning similar cash/year.
There seems to be a bunch of people or experts who have the best ideas on how to get a hold of taxpayers’ cash. We as St. Albertans know that too well.
There is also a plethora of ideas out there to get more tax money into the government coffers, from gasoline taxes to the dreaded sales tax.
Premier Prentice has the right idea so far: cut your own wage first. The rest should be apparent but just looking to hit one group of wage earners is not the answer. And maybe transfer payments should be looked at. We in Alberta shouldn’t have to fund daycare in Quebec when our province is having revenues drop like they have.
Tony Gull, St. Albert
