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From: dave@utcsrgv.UUCP (Dave Sherman)
Newsgroups: can.politics
Subject: Re: Governments don't create wealth, eh?
Message-ID: <5075@utcsrgv.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 24-Aug-84 10:54:20 EDT
Article-I.D.: utcsrgv.5075
Posted: Fri Aug 24 10:54:20 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 24-Aug-84 13:23:02 EDT
References: <980@hcrvax.UUCP>
Organization: The Law Society of Upper Canada, Toronto
Lines: 37

In article <980@hcrvax.UUCP> chrisr@hcrvax.UUCP (Chris Retterath) writes:
~| In reply to Dave Sherman's reply to Henry Spencer:
~| 
~| 		... it is not hard to see that the more that is taxed
~| away, the greater the disencentive to work, or, conversely, the
~| greater the incentive to hide those earnings. I collect a "baby bonus"
~| that is effectively taxed back to the government -- there is obviously
~| little value to this "benefit" to me because I keep very little of it
~| after tax, and on the other hand there is a large cost for the government
~| to pay the salaries of the staff running the baby bonus program,
~| and purchase the equipment used to run off and mail those monthly cheques.
~| And yet this is one of those fine universal social programs that I
~| am supposed to be so happy for, and that politicians tell us all
~| citizens want!
~| 

I agree with many of Chris's points, but not this one.
First of all, the maximum which can be taxed away is about 50%
(51.14% in Ontario in 1984 if your taxable income after all deductions
exceeds $59,424), so you're keeping half anyway, not "very little".
Secondly, many of the people who receive the baby bonus pay very
little or none of it back in tax.

The only way to have you not receive a baby bonus in the first place,
or only receive half as much, would be for the Wealth and Hellfire
Canada people to have records of your current income, so they know
how much to send you. It's far more efficient to recover it at
the stage of collecting income taxes, since at that point every
resident's income is being calculated anyway. It's also more certain,
since during the year you don't know what your income will be for the year.

And yes, the universality of the program is important to most Canadians.

Dave Sherman
Toronto
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