You want my idea for the wage subsidy… well here it is.
WARNING: It is so simple to implement, there is no way a government would do it.
COVID-19
Keep It Simple S…ubsidy
People have said “you are quick to pick apart the wage subsidy, so what is your solution?”
So… you asked for it… here it is:
I’ve said it from the very beginning that it should resemble EI support. All they should be doing is simple.
(No this is not an April Fool’s joke… but I am hoping the Press Conference on April 1, 2020 by the Minister of Finance was)
I was fine with EI amounts… but since we have the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB)… let’s use that amount to keep it more simple.
The amount is this:
(just like the CERB). $2,000 per worker per month, taxable, and no withholdings up front
Put a ‘clawback’ amount on those that are getting it like the clawback on Old Age Security or regular EI benefits for when they file income tax next year.
The 3-prong approach to the subsidy
Prong 1 – CERB from Service Canada
Everyone should get it. Yes, everyone.
However, anyone that makes more than the EI maximum in 2020 must pay back 30 cents of the CERB on every dollar over the $54,200 EI maximum threshold when they file their 2020 taxes.
So when you file your personal 2020 income tax, if you ended up making more than $80,667 in income, you will have had to pay back the full $8,000 of CERB received on a T4E.
This results in helping everyone today, help jump start the economy when we need to and have those that get back on their feet quicker, paying some or all of it back.
If you received both the CERB from Service Canada, and the CERB through your employer, you have to pay back the amount greater than the $8,000 received, and then any other amount based on the formula above.
This will prevent or reduce the double dip.
Prong 2 – CERB through the Small Business employer
The small business (less than $15M in assets of all associated corporations) employer would also get the CERB on a per-employee basis. They already have to fill out the number of employees when they file their remittance forms, so what’s the difference?
This $2,000 flows through to subsidize the wages, and must be paid to the employees. You create a different box number to track it on the T4 slips next year for audit purposes and to make sure the employee got the money.
I know this isn’t 75%, but the 75% was a capped amount anyways. That’s why I said keep it simple.
In order to incentivize the small business employer so they don’t lay them off, treat it as a flow through, and non-taxable to the employer.
So if there are five employees at the small business, the employer will get $10,000 of CERB to flow through to the employees.
The employee’s wages will be subsidized by the $2,000 amount, and they will put the $2,000 in a different box on each T4 slip for tracking purposes.
In order to incentivize the employer to act as the flow-through for Service Canada, this $2,000 will not be subject to EI or CPP by the employer and will not be included in the taxable income of the employer.
This allows the employer to claim the full wage deduction, have subsidized payroll costs, and save the income tax amount by deducting the full payroll.
By not counting it as income, this tax and remittance savings can be viewed liked an “admin fee” for acting on Service Canada’s behalf.
On $10,000 (5 employees) this would save up to $252 in Employer EI, $525 in Employer CPP, and $900 in federal income tax.
Cost to government for employer being the administrator instead of Service Canada: $1,167.
Incentive for employer to NOT lay off the staff, $10,000 in wage costs… and $1,167 in tax savings.
Prong 3 – CERB through Large Corporations
If the employer is getting the CERB on a per-employee basis and they are a large (greater than $15M in assets) corporation or associated group, allow them to not pay employer EI or CPP on the CERB.
100 employees = $200,000 = up to $5,040 in reduced EI, and $10,500 in reduced CPP remittances as the incentive.
So the employer gets $2,000 per employee as a subsidy to cover wage costs, and does not have to do payroll withholdings on the amount, saving them a total of $200,000 + 5,040 + 10,500 = $215,540.
Or put another way, they can save $15,540 by not laying them off.
If that’s not enough incentive, then perhaps look at it being only 50% taxable, which in the example above, would reduce Federal income tax by $15,000 (using 15% general rate x 50% x $200,000)
Audit Tracing
By simplifying the process, there is less ability for abuse.
Service Canada will issue everyone a T4E with the CERB they personally received from them (no application necessary).
T4 box numbers can be reconciled by CRA on slip filing to amounts of CERB received by the employer through the PIER system.
Those same boxes can be reconciled to specific individuals on tax filings to see if there were any that should repay.
Amounts greater than $8,000 received by anyone will need to be repaid.
Those with income over the EI Maximum amount, will have to repay some or all of the CERB back when they file.
If you don’t agree… well… the specific repayment formula can be figured out later… we have a year for that. We need the money in the public’s hands now though.
In Conclusion
These incentives and recapture mechanisms will reduce the likelihood of layoffs in low-margin industries like hospitality since $2,000 a month goes a long way to covering those wages; it will “Flatten the EI Curve” (trademark pending – not really… but I like saying it)
It would get everyone back working quicker after this is done by maintaining the connection to employers, and get the economy kick-started with cash injections at the front of this thing, rather than the end.
In the end… you have employers flowing the $2,000 through to the employee on Service Canada’s behalf as a no-withholding amount and a nominal cost to the employer to administer it, rather than Service Canada processing hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of individual applications.
If they are a small business, they actually get a tax savings by being the administrator and helping Service Canada in the process.
If they are a large business, they can have a good chunk of payroll costs reduced by not having to pay EI and CPP on the amount, and perhaps tax savings.
In the end, every worker gets $8,000 over 4 months just to buy everyone time and we have Flattened the EI Curve.™
Biography of Cory G. Litzenberger, CPA, CMA, CFP, C.Mgr can be found here.
From LifeSiteNews
The Liberals’ Vaccine Injury Support Program is accused of mismanaging a $50-million contract with Oxaro Inc. and failing to resolve claims for thousands of vaccine-injured Canadians.
Conservatives are calling for an official investigation into the Liberal-run vaccine injury program, which has cost Canadians millions but has little to show for it.
On July 14th, four Conservative Members of Parliament (MPs) signed a letter demanding answers after an explosive Global News report found the Liberals’ Vaccine Injury Support Program (VISP) misallocated taxpayer funds and disregarded many vaccine-injured Canadians.
“The federal government awarded a $50 million taxpayer-funded contract to Oxaro Inc. (formerly Raymond Chabot Grant Thornton Consulting Inc.). The purpose of this contract was to administer the VISP,” the letter wrote.
“However, there was no clear indication that Oxaro had credible experience in healthcare or in the administration of health-related claims raising valid questions about how and why this firm was selected,” it continued.
Canada’s VISP was launched in December 2020 after the Canadian government gave vaccine makers a shield from liability regarding COVID-19 jab-related injuries.
However, mismanagement within the program has led to many injured Canadians still waiting to receive compensation, while government contractors grow richer.
“Despite the $50 million contract, over 1,700 of the 3,100 claims remain unresolved,” the Conservatives continued. “Families dealing with life-altering injuries have been left waiting years for answers and support they were promised.”
Furthermore, the claims do not represent the total number of Canadians injured by the allegedly “safe and effective” COVID shots, as inside memos have revealed that the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC) officials neglected to report all adverse effects from COVID shots and even went as far as telling staff not to report all events.
The PHAC’s downplaying of vaccine injuries is of little surprise to Canadians, as a 2023 secret memo revealed that the federal government purposefully hid adverse effect so as not to alarm Canadians.
Of the $50.6 million that Oxaro Inc., has received, $33.7 million has been spent on administrative costs, compared to only $16.9 million going to vaccine-injured Canadians.
The letter further revealed that former VISP employees have revealed that the program lacked professionalism, describing what Conservatives described as “a fraternity house rather than a professional organization responsible for administering health-related claims.”
“Reports of constant workplace drinking, ping pong, and Netflix are a slap in the face to taxpayers and the thousands of Canadians waiting for support for life altering injuries,” the letter continued.
Regardless of this, the Liberal government, under Prime Minister Mark Carney, is considering renewing its contract with Oxaro Inc.
Indeed, this would hardly be the first time that Liberals throw taxpayer dollars at a COVID program that is later exposed as ineffective and mismanaged.
Canada’s infamous ArriveCan app, which was mandated for all travelers in and out of Canada in 2020, has cost Canadians $54 million, despite the Public Health Agency of Canada admitting that they have no evidence that the program saved lives.
Details regarding the app and the government contracts surrounding it have been hidden from Canadians, as Liberals were exposed in 2023 for hiding a RCMP investigation into the app from auditors.
An investigation of the ArriveCan app began in 2022 after the House of Commons voted 173-149 for a full audit of the controversial app.
From LifeSiteNews
Attorney General Pam Bondi has ended the federal prosecution of Dr. Michael Kirk Moore for giving ‘patients a choice when the federal government refused to do so.’
The Utah plastic surgeon who issued fake COVID-19 vaccine passports to help patients get around COVID vaccine mandates will no longer be prosecuted, U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi announced Saturday.
During the COVID pandemic, Dr. Michael Kirk Moore Jr. and employees at his Salt Lake private practice developed a plan to provide patients who objected to being forced to take the vaccine with ineffectual, harmless saline injections instead and give them COVID vaccination cards that would satisfy (since rescinded) mandates to take the shot as a condition of employment, public facilities, mass gatherings, and more.
For his efforts, he was indicted for allegedly “endanger[ing] the health and well-being of a vulnerable population” and “undermin[ing] public trust and the integrity of federal health care programs.” The government also accused him of doing so for profit, but several sources attested off the record that Moore not only issued the cards for free but actually refused offers of compensation.
“They broke no laws and harmed no person,” the defendants’ legal team said in 2023. “Dr. Moore, specifically, abided by his long held Hippocratic oath to First Do No Harm. We believe he and his co-defendants will be found innocent of all charges.”
Last month, LifeSiteNews reported that Moore’s trial was set to begin on July 7, which could have potentially ended with him facing 35 years in jail and a $125,000 penalty. Supporters of the doctor had expressed worry that the change in presidential administration had not yet halted the prosecution.
Over the weekend, however, Bondi announced that at her direction it has now done exactly that.
“Dr. Moore gave his patients a choice when the federal government refused to do so,” she said. “He did not deserve the years in prison he was facing. It ends today.”
There is a large body of warning signs against the shots, which were developed in record time by the first Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed initiative.
The federal Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) reports 38,709 deaths, 221,030 hospitalizations, 22,331 heart attacks, and 28,966 myocarditis and pericarditis cases as of June 27, among other ailments. U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) researchers have recognized a “high verification rate of reports of myocarditis to VAERS after mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccination,” leading to the conclusion that “under-reporting is more likely” than over-reporting.
An analysis of 99 million people across eight countries published in the journal Vaccine “observed significantly higher risks of myocarditis following the first, second and third doses” of mRNA-based COVID vaccines, as well as signs of increased risk of “pericarditis, Guillain-Barré syndrome, and cerebral venous sinus thrombosis,” and other “potential safety signals that require further investigation.”
In April 2024, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC) was forced to release by court order 780,000 previously undisclosed reports of serious adverse reactions, and a study out of Japan found “statistically significant increases” in cancer deaths after third doses of mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccines, and offered several theories for a causal link.
In January, a long-awaited Florida grand jury report on the COVID vaccine manufacturers found that while only a miniscule percentage of the millions of vaccinations resulted in serious harm based on the data it had access to, such events do occur, and there are “profound and serious issues” in pharmaceutical companies’ review process, including reluctance to share what evidence of adverse events they did find.
In May, Trump administration U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary and vaccine chief Dr. Vinay Prasad announced that there would no longer be blanket recommendations for all Americans to receive the shot, but the “risk factors” it would still be recommended for include asthma, cancer, cerebrovascular disease, chronic kidney diseases, a handful of chronic liver and lung diseases, diabetes, disabilities such as Down’s syndrome, heart conditions, HIV, dementia, Parkinson’s, obesity, smoking, tuberculosis, and more. Health & Human Services (HHS) Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. subsequently announced COVID vaccines will not be recommended to healthy children or pregnant women.
The Trump administration has approved a new mRNA-based COVID-19 vaccine from Moderna, suggesting the federal government’s overall view of the shots will remain favorable, albeit without mandates of any kind. At the same time, it does require mRNA COVID shots to carry a new warning about the danger of heart damage in young men.
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