While, this years federal budget is predictably dour, each year the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives presents an alternative budget which is of late has been a much better read. I like the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, although far from challenging capitalist discourse, they are one of the few mainstream organizations in Canada that offer concrete tangible policy alternatives to the standard neo-liberal line spouted by seemingly everyone. (A surprising fact given their name).
Here are a couple factoids, concerning this years federal budget strait from the CCPA. Remember these the next time Steven Harper says that there is no money to pay for essential social programs:
- Canada is one of the top 15 military spending nations in the world, and our current spending is higher than Cold War levels
- The current budget includes at least $5 billion in corporate tax cuts, even while Canada has some of the lowest corporate tax rates in the OECD.
If you want to read more here is the link to the CCPA's annual "alternative budget. " After reading something like this its amazing to see the lengths that the government goes to not do useful/helpful things and instead focus on reducing the size of government, cutting corporate taxes, and facilitating private profit to maintain its bone headed, ideological, and patently false agenda.
http://www.policyalternatives.ca/sites/default/files/uploads/publications/reports/docs/AFB%202010%20Budget%20in%20Brief.pdfAlso, in a hopelessly bureaucratic vein, I am appalled at the budget documentation provided by the federal government. At the very least they should provide a year over year comparison, as well as a detailed list of expenditures by department/object. This information exists and should be provided to the public. I will hope that it is on its way as I have far to much sympathy for the work involved in preparing this kind of documentation.
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