Lately, ordinary citizens, voters and taxpayers are beginning to worry about something that usually only ‘dismal scientists’, i.e., economists, care about: our alarming federal and provincial deficits and exploding national debt.
While putting an economy into lockdown was assuredly going to reduce tax revenues and increase transfers to individuals and businesses to ameliorate the devastation thus wrought, it only became clear this summer the extent of the fiscal damage: a federal deficit of $343.2 billion for the current fiscal year ending next March, and a federal debt exceeding one trillion dollars, or just under 50% of GDP.
Much as politicians will try to deny it, they will inevitably start to think about how to bring in more money, which has to come from individuals and businesses (which are also, ultimately, owned by individuals).
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