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"From the Left"
The 1998 Guelph Tribune columns
March 25, 1998
In an overwhelming display of good sense, city councillors decided
to take control of this year's budget process out of the hands
of the Finance and Administration Committee. Only two councillors,
Dan Schnurr and Phil Cumming, were opposed. They are both members
of the committee, and wanted to use it to cut city services rather
than increase taxes. Even their Tory cronies around the horseshoe
recognize that there is no sense tilting at the taxation windmills
after what Mike Harris did to them. But our two municipal Don
Quixotes continue to do chase their impossible dream, refusing
to recognize reality, even when it threatens to knock them off
their horses.
A couple of weeks ago, Lynda Prior was one of them. Actually,
she still is. She's just a bit subdued now as she recovers from
a case of foot in mouth disease she caught after taking some bad
advice. Prior wanted to throw a lot of hard working city employees
out of work. She didn't really care about the devastation this
would wreak upon their families, as long as her own property tax
didn't go up. Prior is unrepentant about this callous disregard
for the people who keep our city running, but she has abandoned
the fight. She can see that the $2.5 million shortfall from provincial
down loading is an insurmountable barrier. Prior has now set her
sights on a 3.5 per cent tax increase. Even this can't be accomplished
without further cuts to city services. Odds are that we will end
up with an increase closer to 5 per cent.
This whole budget exercise shows the true results of the trickle
down economics preached by right wing politicians and their financier
pals. This theory, in its simplest terms, says that cutting taxes
puts more money into people's pockets. This money gets spent.
The spending results in increased employment in the manufacturing
and service sectors of the economy. The increased employment puts
even more money into people's pockets. It is a simple minded solution
to complicated problems, and, not surprisingly, it doesn't work.
The only thing that has trickled down is pain. Any money that
working families could have saved through Harris's tax cut will
be lost through city taxes and user fees. In the meanwhile, child
poverty continues to rise as families struggle with the cruel
realities of neo-conservative economic policy. Instead of money
trickling down onto the heads of the poor, it is flooding up to
the already wealthy. While the poor become poorer, the rich get
richer.
A tax cut could have been possible, if a fair taxation system
had been put in place by higher levels of government. A measure
as simple as the Tobin tax, devised by a Nobel prize winning Harvard
economist, could have eliminated the deficit quickly and painlessly.
This tax would put a 0.2 per cent levy on all international financial
transactions. A tremendous amount of wealth is made in the international
money markets, and none of it is taxed. With the Tobin tax, the
bond traders would still do very well for themselves while being
forced to contribute something towards easing the social chaos
they cause.
Unfortunately, neither the Liberals nor the Conservatives have
the political will to do this. As a result, our city councillors
have to operate in an environment where they have very few options.
Given the realities within which they must make their choices,
a tax freeze is politically and morally impossible.
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