COST OF LIBERAL & CONSERVATIVE SPENDING PLANS

    During an election campaign, voters must weigh the costs and benefits of the promises made by each political party. As such, voter decisions rely on the transparency—or lack thereof—of the parties. When it comes to government spending, there are legitimate concerns about how transparent the two front-running parties are being about the costs of their spending plans.

  Liberals have signalled they will introduce several new programs such as universal daycare and national pharmacare. These programs will cost billions and the government’s most recent budget indicated it intends to continue borrowing to pay for new spending. The federal deficit is estimated to exceed $150 billion this year, and the Liberals plan to add at least another $225 billion in gross debt over the following four years. Moreover, the Parliamentary Budget Officer’s (PBO) recent analysis indicated that Ottawa will not balance its budget until 2070, absent a change in policy.
    The Conservative tax and spending plan also lacks transparency. To a great extent, Tory policies mirror the policies of the Liberals by promising a decade of deficit-financed spending and no specific tax increases. Like the Liberals, the Conservatives have also not acknowledged that these commitments will simply defer tax increases to the future, sticking younger Canadians with the bill. And although the Tories promise to balance the budget by the end of the decade, they’ve offered little detail on how they’ll achieve this objective. Indeed, it appears both the Liberals and Conservatives have similar strategies—spend today and worry about paying for it later.