Quebec gets transfer payments. Quebec doesn’t develop the same resources that Alberta uses to essentially pay for those transfer payments. Quebec then says no to pipelines.
Before we continue will you at least acknowledge this is true? Whether it is ‘paranoia’ is another matter.
It’s true, but only trivially so.
No, it develops different resources that also contribute to the national economy. Petroleum extraction isn’t the only method of generating wealth.
Your idea of trivial is different than mine.
$15-20B more money goes out of Alberta than comes in.
Quebec
Population share ~22.5%
Federal tax revenue share ~20% (below pop. share)
Federal spending share ~24% (above pop. share)
Equalization (2023-24) $14 billion (largest recipient)
Developing their LNG reserves would at least show an effort to change the equation. Or adding their hydro into the equalization calculation would also show they were interested in fairness…
Yep, us conservatives in Alberta weren’t able to do what Quebec has found a way to do everyday. But we should happily keep paying because it is ‘trivial’, right?
Why single out Quebec? I’m sure the numbers are imbalanced in all ten provinces. But the facts do not support “because they’re against us.”
I have no idea whether BC contributes more or less than we take back. As long as our tax money is being used to improve things for everyone, I don’t care about provincial lines.
That’s really the point.
If anyone did want to bitch about provincial lines, then the next thing they ought to bitch about is county lines within their province. Then municipal boundaries within their county.
Real soon it turns into “Did I individually send in more tax money than the government spent on me personally?” If not, the cries of “unfairness” are deafening.
Of course as a matter of logic it’s impossible for the government to spend more on every individual than they tax from every individual. At least not and maintain the same level of government debt.
The percentage of tax revenues coming out of the city I live in in Ontario is MUCH higher than the percentage of our population of Canada, but I’m not bitching, because I live in a city where people are unusually wealthy. Which is why that happens.
I could move to a city where people are poorer, but how would that make ME better off?
So don’t bitch about it, right? Don’t expect other provinces to fix the issues that cause the disparities? Got it.
You want money, understood. We want to make it. So remove those things that get in our way and prevent projects from proceeding. Not much to ask for for what we contribute.
This is like having roommates who ask for a break on the rent, in perpetuity, and then expect to dictate house rules.
Why would I bitch about being well off?
Sorry, I don’t quite grasp why I should complain about living in Burlington, a rich city. I would much rather live here than in a poor city. Brantford is a much shittier place, but why is that advantageous for them?
If there is a Canadian motto it would be ‘Good enough’.
I asked a question; do you have an answer? “Good enough” isn’t a logical response to my point. I don’t look around me at my wealthy area and say “good enough,” that makes no sense. I say “this is a very nice place to live, and people here are doing really well. Hell, some of them are driving Bentleys and Maseratis.” Why would I say “good enough”?
It wasn’t a critique of you, we settle for ‘good enough’ when we should be aiming higher.
The fact that you are comfortable and live in a nice place makes it easy to default to “good enough” . You’re not forced to act or improve. But that breeds complacency, especially when compared to countries that are aggressively pursuing growth or reform. Which is why we are 37 out of 38 of OECD countries in Real GDP per Capita.
Why GDP per Capita is not a good economic measure; https://policyoptions.irpp.org/magazines/april-2025/numerator-denominator/
But I’m not defaulting to “good enough.” That isn’t even close to the point I’m making. Of course I want to see improvement. Who’s saying “Good enough”?
I’m trying to figure out your point. This is pretty much the opposite of what you have been saying all along. Now you don’t want people to be wealthy, because it breeds complacency and doesn’t force them to act or improve. So wouldn’t siphoning off some of the excess wealth help, while simultaneously helping the people who DON’T have excess wealth? It seems that by levelling the field, we’d make things better for everybody, materially for the poor and, I guess, morally for the rich.
Oh no, not the Real GDP per Capita!, you should definitively live shittier lives so the GDP per Capita goes up, who needs universal health care when you can have more GDP per capita than other countries?
Actually settling for good enough is better than aiming higher, the planet cannot support billions of humans “aiming higher”.
Isn’t that the opposite of what you want to do in politics? We need to improve the morality of the poor and have the rich pile up the wealth they deserve.
Tell us yours then. That the liberals tell you every thing is peachy isn’t a metric, BTW.
What the article failed to mention is that the high amount of immigration allowing in lower skilled people isn’t the same as the past when higher qualified people naturally got higher salaries. And what you failed to remember is that these new arrivals are now Canadians who are making lower salaries. All of which need homes and support and all the other things that Canadians expect.
Alberta per capita dropped recently but at the same time the population increased by over 3%.
I’m against wealth distribution that maintains status quo governance rather than be used to make better decisions that might be hard politically.
If all we’re doing is topping up government coffers when they don’t demonstrate efforts to improve their competitiveness then resentment is the result. It isn’t a hard concept.
A bit of history on the independence movement in the west and why people are frustrated.
