Ontario is paying $1.35 Billion in interest on its huge public debt monthly. With interest rates going higher the public will be required to pay more at the gas pumps, through sales, personal income, and business taxes. These past 15 years the Liberal administrations of Peterson, and Wynne, along with the present-day Conservative Administration of Doug ford have escalated the provincial debt, adding onto it annually. These political parties can offer many excuses for this escalation, but seemingly few suggestions on how to bring the debt under control.
If you work for the public sector lookout. All administrations will search for ways to bring the debt down, and will always fall upon the public worker’s necks like vultures circling a dying animal. You see, political parties want to be reelected or elected, and telling the electorate that there is no other way to significantly reduce the debt other than raising taxes can not simply happen. Will not be allowed to happen. Elected Officials do not want to be harbingers of bad news. They want and need photo shoots of themselves declaring to the public about the millions they will be investing in this or that program. No one wants to be the first to declare that public coffers need to be closed and re-imagined. Thrifty Politicians are not a common commodity in Canadian Politics.
The Liberals pass their financial responsibilities onto the Municipal Governments. The Provincial Governments have their hands out to the Federal Government. Local Governments are terrified of the prospect of increased land taxes where they truly should be. Estimates in Toronto range from an increase of 5-9.8% annually. Look to America, where City Councils often do not increase their property taxes, and where cities often run on financial exhaust fumes, closing or privatizing local services like fire departments, EMS, garbage collection, and police departments. 2022-2023 will bring the public and private sectors to be at odds with each other. One cannot exist without the funds provided by the other. After all, we all are users and providers of these funds and the services provided.
The debt cliff has risen to $408 Billion and rising daily. It is estimated by Ontario’s Government that it will be above $438 Billion by 2024. How do you pay this debt off? Ontario’s credit card interest rate will surely increase soon enough. Ontario’s nonpublic debt is a further $8.8 Billion. Will Ontario’s Government be able to withstand this indebtedness for long? Will the Federal Government, also highly indebted, come to the rescue?
All Governments need to learn how to live within their means. A definitive choice for the better is to prioritize those expenditures required immediately and in the future. The Commies had one thing right. Planning for the future by all public governments makes financial sense. Also, the public needs full transparency, knowing where their taxes are being allocated.
Steven Kaszab
Bradford, Ontario
[email protected]
