Canada

The government of Canada has announced its plans for a temporary tax break by exempting GST/HST on certain items during the holiday season from Dec. 14, 2024 to Feb. 15, 2025. The legislation to enact the tax break has cleared the House of Commons and is now awaiting Senate approval.

Another key economic concern is the potential for “price stickiness,” where businesses fail to pass tax reductions onto consumers.

Some businesses will likely see a boost in sales, however. Since all types of restaurant foods — dining in, takeout or delivery — will be covered by the tax break, restaurants will have a unique opportunity to attract more customers.

There will be winners and losers from this tax policy, with the benefits disproportionately favouring higher-income earners. Wealthier households, who are less affected by inflation, are better positioned to take advantage of the tax break by spending more and saving more. These families will be able to more easily adjust their purchasing habits, such as stockpiling a year’s supply of baby diapers during the tax-free period. It’s important to note that many essential grocery items, like produce and milk, are already tax-free under Canada Revenue Agency rules. The tax break will cover taxed items like carbonated drinks, candies, snack foods and alcoholic beverages. This means higher-income households, which spend more on discretionary items, stand to gain the most from a reduction in sales tax benefits.

This holiday tax break could exacerbate economic inequity — contrary to its stated objective. Taxes play a key role in reducing inequality, and any changes to the tax systems should consider that. Unfortunately, this GST reduction appears to fall short.

Moreover, the benefits are not distributed evenly across Canadian provinces and territories. Consumers from provinces with HST will not pay any taxes for the items listed in the policy, but those with standalone provincial sales taxes will still have to pay that tax. Alberta, which only charges GST, will be tax-free.

Overall, B.C. was given a “B” grade by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business in its annual report, released in July, on the status of interprovincial trade, but a dispute with Alberta over direct-to-consumer wine sales earlier this year indicates there is still room for improvement.

Jairo Yunis, a B.C. Business Council policy director and former director of B.C. and western economic policy at CFIB, said one example is that trucking in the province is essentially facing a five-per-cent tariff to bring goods into Alberta or other jurisdictions in Canada.

“There was an analysis done by the Macdonald-Laurier Institute, months ago, that calculated the average internal trade cost for the trucking industry in B.C. was around five per cent,” said Yunis.

“I know that there is a working group looking at a pilot project to mutually recognize all these standards and regulations across all provinces. So that’s definitely something that would remove some of these internal trade barriers in some of those sectors, specifically trucking.”

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/34674387

Toronto's Michael Jarman wins 2024 Microsoft Excel World Championships in Las Vegas

Archive/mirror: https://archive.ph/vrr89

When Micaela Sawyer saw the photo of a weak, emaciated dog shuddering in the snow, she hoped desperately it was her Murphy.

The 18-month-old labrador, with a dulled red coat and legs riddled with injuries, was unmistakably the dog she and her partner, Jim Barnes, had raised as a puppy, she said.

For more than 50 days, Barnes and Murphy had been the focus of an extensive search in the wilderness of western Canada after they vanished in mid-October.

But incredibly, after weeks of hope and despair, Murphy was home at last.

“He is badly injured, with major swelling, puncture wounds (possibly from a dog or coyote), a broken front paw, and scabs all over,” Sawyer wrote on Facebook, sharing an image of a dog, his right paw in a bright red cast. “His behavior has changed too, from a quiet, independent dog to one who barks at every sound and howls when I leave the room.”

Killing of Canadian Sikh linked to highest levels of India’s government

Laurie Adkin, a professor emerita of political science at the University of Alberta, told The Maple that she regards Trudeau’s performance on climate as a “crushing disappointment.” “The idea is just to keep the economy running as it normally does, without there being any substantial cost to capitalists,” said Adkin. “I think it’s pretty clear that this is unsustainable, both socially and environmentally.”

In his November 2024 report, Environment Commissioner Jerry DeMarco revealed that Canada has only reduced CO2 emissions by seven per cent since 2005, meaning the government has “only six years left to do essentially 20 or 30 years worth of reductions.”

Mere months before introducing the carbon tax legislation, Trudeau purchased the Trans Mountain Pipeline expansion project (TMX) from Kinder Morgan for $4.5 billion after the company threatened to back away from the project. By the time the expansion opened in May 2024, nearly tripling the amount of tar sands bitumen shipped to the B.C. Lower Mainland for export, its price tag had increased to $34 billion.

Trudeau’s support for ongoing fossil fuel expansion, Mertins-Kirkwood added, reflects a “knot that the government’s trying to tie itself into,” in which it attempts to cut CO2 emissions for domestic consumption while expanding fossil fuel production, displacing the emissions generated from increased production onto other countries. While Canada’s domestic emissions have decreased in recent years, Canada’s National Observer recently reported that emissions from the oil, gas and coal that Canada exports, which aren’t covered by Canada’s emissions reduction commitments, have increased by 58 per cent since 2012. “We are actually fuelling climate change on a global scale through our exports,” said Adkin. “The first thing we should actually be cutting back in terms of a phase out is exports, but that’s not on the agenda.”

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/16021036

Archived copies of the article:

• archive.today
• ghostarchive.org

EDIT: ok yeah a click for this turd it too much, here's a link of an article about it https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/us/governor-justin-trudeau-trump-revists-canada-should-become-51st-state-of-us-joke/articleshow/116162191.cms

Probably the first article in a while that clearly outlines WHERE the negations are at and what each side wants.

Montreal Public Health says hundreds of people may have been exposed to measles between Nov. 23 and Nov. 26. during and after a recent NATO conference held in the city.

It says one of the participants, who had not been vaccinated against the disease, received a measles diagnosis after returning to their home country and would have been contagious while in Montreal.

The health agency has listed the following locations as places of exposure:

• Palais des congrès between Nov. 23 and Nov. 25.
• A private event at Cirque Éloize, located at 417 Berri Street, between 7 p.m. on Nov. 24 and 1:30 a.m. on Nov. 25.
• Humaniti Montreal Hotel from Nov. 23 to Nov. 26.
• Trudeau International Airport on Nov. 26 before 5:09 p.m.
• Toronto Pearson International Airport on Nov. 26 between 4:38 p.m. and 9:18 p.m.
• Air Canada flight AC417 from Montreal to Toronto on Nov.26 — the airplane left at 3:09 p.m. and landed at 4:38 p.m.
• Air Canada flight AC890 from Toronto to Rome on Nov.26 — the airplane left at 7:18 p.m. and arrived at Rome's Fiumicino Airport on Nov. 27 at 9:40 a.m.

Seriously? There are Christmas lights and nativity scenes all over the place. Christmas decreasing and Christmas trees. Fucking Mariah Carey.

These right wing propagandist pearl clutching concern ttrolls are a fucking scourge on Canadian society.