Here’s why young Canadians are pessimistic about the federal government

A new poll shows that the share of Canadians feeling pessimistic about the federal government has reached a new high. This should come as no surprise. Years of poor policy has left Canadians with a stagnant economy and declining living standards. And despite the Trudeau government’s recent focus on younger generations, young people appear the most pessimistic of all.

According to the poll conducted by Nanos, 39.8 per cent of Canadians feel “pessimism” towards the federal government—representing a seven-year high. On the flip side, 7.6 per cent feel “satisfaction,” a seven-year low.

More broadly, 68.7 per cent of respondents reported negative feelings (“anger” or “pessimism”) towards the federal government while just 16.3 per cent reported positive feelings (“optimism” or “satisfaction”). The remaining 15.0 per cent either weren’t sure or were simply disinterested.

Again, it’s not surprising that the majority of Canadians report negative feelings about Ottawa, in light of the Trudeau government’s fiscal and economic mismanagement.

For example, due to record-high spending, the Trudeau government will run its tenth-consecutive budget deficit in 2024/25 at a projected $39.8 billion. These deficits have contributed to a remarkable rise in federal government debt since Prime Minister Trudeau first took office. From 2014/15 (the Harper government’s last full year) to 2024/25, federal gross debt is expected to have approximately doubled to $2.1 trillion. And the Trudeau government has no plans to change course. Deficits are expected to continue until at least 2028/29, and projections suggest gross debt will increase an additional $400.1 billion over the same period.

What have Canadians gained from all this spending and debt?

Through the implementation of sweeping programs such as $10-a-day daycare and national dental care, the Trudeau government has expanded its role in the lives of Canadians. But because the government has chosen to use taxpayer dollars to provide services that were already offered privately, many Canadians have less choice of how to best to use their hard-earned money due to the imposition of higher taxes. Indeed, 86 per cent of middle-income families now pay more in taxes than they did in 2015, adding to the cost of living.

At the same time, Ottawa and some provinces have spent tens of billions on corporate welfare with the promise that it will promote economic growth. But over the last decade the economy has posted its worst performance since the 1930s, and Canadian living standards have been in a historic decline since mid-2019.

Finally, the burden of government debt and poor economic prospects may be why younger generations are feeling the most pessimistic. Indeed, among survey respondents aged 18 to 34, 41.3 per cent were “pessimistic” about the federal government while just 5.3 per cent were “satisfied” (the largest and smallest shares, respectively, relative to all other age groups). Despite the Trudeau government’s rhetoric about “generational fairness,” younger generations face a disproportionately higher tax burden in the future due to debt accumulated today. Meanwhile, according to long-term projections, Canadian living standards will fall further behind comparable countries (including the United States, Australia and the United Kingdom) over the coming decades.

Canadians are worse off today than they were 10 years ago, and should expect higher taxes and relatively little improvement in their living standards in coming years due to poor government policy. Is it any wonder they’re feeling pessimistic?

Authors:

Jake Fuss

Director, Fiscal Studies, Fraser Institute

Grady Munro

Policy Analyst, Fraser Institute

Related Topics:#FederalGovernment #FraserInstitute #GradyMunro #JakeFuss CanadiansPessimistic

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Ottawa’s avalanche of spending hasn’t helped First Nations

Published on November 19, 2024

Todayville

From the Fraser Institute

By Tom Flanagan

When Justin Trudeau came to power in 2015, he memorably said that the welfare of Indigenous Canadians was his highest priority. He certainly has delivered on his promise, at least in terms of shovelling out money.

During his 10 years in office, budgeted Indigenous spending has approximately tripled, from about $11 billion to almost $33 billion. Prime Minister Trudeau’s instruction to the Department of Justice to negotiate rather than litigate class actions has resulted in paying tens of billions of dollars to Indigenous claimants over alleged wrongs in education and other social services. And his government has settled specific claims—alleged violations of treaty terms or of the Indian Act—at four times the previous rate, resulting in the award of at least an additional $10 billion to First Nations government.

But has this avalanche of money really helped First Nations people living on reserves, who are the poorest segment of Canadian society?

One indicator suggests the answer is yes. The gap between reserves and other communities—as measured by the Community Well-Being Index (CWB), a composite of income, employment, housing and education—fell from 19 to 16 points from 2016 to 2021. But closer analysis shows that the reduction in the gap, although real, cannot be due to the additional spending described above.

The gain in First Nations CWB is due mainly to an increase in the income component of the CWB. But almost all of the federal spending on First Nations, class-action settlements and specific claims do not provide taxable income to First Nations people. Rather, the increase in income documented by the CWB comes from the greatly increased payments legislated by the Liberals in the form of the Canada Child Benefit (CCB). First Nations people have a higher birth rate than other Canadians, so they have more children and receive more (on average) from the Canada Child Benefit. Also, they have lower income on average than other Canadians, so the value of the CCB is higher than comparable non-Indigenous families. The result? A gain in income relative to other Canadians, and thus a narrowing of the CWB gap between First Nations and other communities.

There’s an important lesson here. Tens of billions in additional budgetary spending and legal settlements did not move the needle. What did lead to a measurable improvement was legislation creating financial benefits for all eligible Canadian families with children regardless of race. Racially inspired policies are terrible for many reasons, especially because they rarely achieve their goals in practise. If we want to improve life for First Nations people, we should increase opportunities for Canadians of all racial backgrounds and not enact racially targeted policies.

Moreover, racial policies are also fraught with unintended consequences. In this case, the flood of federal money has made First Nations more dependent rather than less dependent on government. In fact, from 2018 to 2022, “Own Source Revenue” (business earnings plus property taxes and fees) among First Nations bands increased—but not as much as transfers from government. The result? Greater dependency on government transfers.

This finding is not just a statistical oddity. Previous research has shown that First Nations who are relatively less dependent on government transfers tend to achieve higher living standards (again, as measured by the CWB index). Thus, the increase in dependency presided over by the Trudeau government does not augur well for the future.

One qualification: this finding is not as robust as I would like because the number of band governments filing reports on their finances has drastically declined. Of 630 First Nation governments, only 260 filed audited statements for fiscal 2022. All First Nations are theoretically obliged by the First Nations Financial Transparency Act, 2013, to publish such statements, but the Trudeau government announced there would be no penalties for non-compliance, leading to a precipitous decline in reporting.

This is a shame, because First Nations, as they often insist, are governments, not private organizations. And like other governments, they should make their affairs visible to the public. Also, most of their income comes from Canadian taxpayers. Both band members and other Canadians have a right to know how much money they receive, how it’s being spent and whether it’s achieving its intended goals.

Author:

Tom Flanagan

Professor Emeritus of Political Science and Distinguished Fellow, School of Public Policy, University of Calgary

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Firm tied to voter registration ‘scheme’ goes dark

Published on November 2, 2024

Todayville

From left, Lancaster County Commissioner Alice Yoder, Lancaster County District Attorney Heather Adams, Commissioners Ray D’Agostino and Josh Parsons. The officials held a press conference on Friday, Oct. 25, 2024, to discuss voter registration fraud detected in the county.

From The Center Square

By Christen Smith

Everybody Votes runs an office in Lancaster County, where election workers recently found suspicious registration forms among a batch of 2,500 applications delivered last week. Investigators there said at least 60% of those reviewed were fraudulent.

The media and consulting firm linked to fraudulent voter registration forms in Pennsylvania earlier this week has gone dark as of Saturday.

Field and Media Corps – the website and social media accounts of which are now defunct – is an Arizona-based company that contracts with Everybody Votes to run a canvassing operation in Pennsylvania and other states that target low-income minority residents unregistered to vote.

The Monroe County District Attorney’s Office confirmed Wednesday that 30 registration forms contained fraudulent information, including an application submitted on behalf of a dead resident.

Everybody Votes runs an office in Lancaster County, where election workers recently found suspicious registration forms among a batch of 2,500 applications delivered last week. Investigators there said at least 60% of those reviewed were fraudulent. So far, the campaign has not been tied directly to the investigation.

Not so in nearby York County, where law enforcement continues reviewing another delivery from the operation leading up to the Oct. 22 deadline to register.

On Wednesday, the America First Policy Institute, a conservative-leaning research nonprofit, demanded a federal investigation into the company.

“Where there’s fire, there’s fire,” said Hogan Gidley, vice chairman of the institute’s Center for Election Integrity. “Thousands of instances of reported voter registration fraud have now been confirmed throughout Pennsylvania.”

He described Field and Media Corps, established in 2017, as a “high-powered left-wing organization” that may have launched similar “schemes” across the country that require state-level investigations.

“Submitting fraudulent registrations right at the voter deadline to overwhelm election officials is exactly the kind of scheme that the Department of Justice should be using their force and resources to stop,” he said.

Evidence also exists that Everybody Votes is linked to a left-wing super political action committee intent on expanding registration numbers for Democrats in battleground states.

According to public tax records shared with The Center Square, The Voter Registration Project, also known as Everybody Votes, describes itself as a public charity that helps low-income minority citizens register to vote and provides technical assistance to voter registration drives.

The organization reported $45.8 million in total revenues in 2022, a “substantial portion of which comes from a governmental unit or the general public.”

A 2023 report from Capital Research Center, a conservative nonprofit, says left-wing donors together raised $190 million for the campaign to register 5.1 million voters across the country – all in violation of federal law that bars 501(c)(3) from engaging in such activity.

The strategy, detailed in a 2019 leaked memo from Mind the Gap, the liberal super PAC in question, entices investors by promising a more cost-effective strategy to boost vote counts for Democrats – namely through voter registration drives.

The group pointed to its direct role in flipping the U.S. House blue in 2018 as “proof of concept.”

Detailed further in the report are signed tax forms from donors that link their grants to the Voter Registration Project in direct support of Mind the Gap. The Capital Research Center estimates President Joe Biden collected between 1 million and 2.7 million swing state votes in the 2020 election as a result.

Biden defeated then-incumbent President Donald Trump 306-232 in electoral college votes; the popular vote was Biden 81.2 million to 74.2 million.

Francisco Heredia, who runs Field and Media Corps, told Votebeat earlier this week he’d not heard from county officials in Pennsylvania, but would cooperate with the investigation. He said the company trains workers how to legally complete registration forms and has no tolerance for fraud.