[martin14]

Freakinoldguy Freakinoldguy:

Fair enough.

I just listened to a rant from my nephew inlaw who claimed that the boomers have ruined his business because they don't spend enough money in the economy and hoarde it all just so his generation can't get it.

It went on and on but he seems to forget that his lifestyle choices have played a major role in driving him and his business into the hole it's in now. You can't do a 200,000 dollar reno on a home that doesn't need it, buy a new trailer, own a boat, a Cadillac SUV, 2 trucks, vehicles for the kids, take twice yearly holidays with the whole family, send your kids to special schools and go out on the town every night if your business doesn't generate enough income to pay for it.

Yet in his mind the boomers all have millions of dollars and won't spend it because if they did he'd be wealthy. The best part was that he said boomers can't drive anymore and shouldn't be on the road, yet he owns an auto repair business, go figure. I don't know who he thinks will bring their cars in to be repaired if the largest generation in history is denied the right to drive.

So when it's all said and done, you are right about people being hypocrites and self centered age and gender not withstanding.

The boomers didnt get what they have by blowing it left and right.

A lesson lots of people still need to learn.

[Zipperfish]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

Totally missed this completely false nugget.

Chretien left us with 46.7 billion dollars FURTHER in debt when he left office according to our friends at the CBC.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/interactives/canada-deficit/

According to that link,
- Chretien inherited a $38,5B deficit in 93-94 and left office with a $10.6B surplus.
- Martin inhertied a $1.4B surplus and left with $13.2B surplus.
- Harper inherited a $13.8B surplus and ran a 23.5B deficit in 2011-2012.

From the Liberal Party website:

[andyt]

What happened to those 9 billion dollars between Chretien and Martin? (in case this isn't clear, shouldn't the figure that Chretien left office with be the same as Martin inherited?)

[bootlegga]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

bootlegga bootlegga:

Yeah, that's why Chretien reduced the amount of federal debt by almost $100 billion while in office...

Totally missed this completely false nugget.

Chretien left us with 46.7 billion dollars FURTHER in debt when he left office according to our friends at the CBC.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/interactives/canada-deficit/

I don't know where you're getting your numbers, but the Canadian Taxpayer Federation's website notes;

$1:

Canada’s federal debt grew steadily between 5% and 10% per year until 1975 when it began to explode; growing for the next 12 years at more than 20% per year. It broke the $100 billion mark in 1981 and the $200 billion mark in 1985. While the growth slowed in 1988, our federal debt continued to climb, breaking $300 billion in 1988, $400 billion 1992, and $500 billion in 1994. It peaked in 1997 at $563 billion.

Between 1997 and 2008, it slowly declined to $458 billion. After that, it all changed. Our federal debt grew by $5.8 billion in 2008-09, by $55.4 billion in 2009-10, $34 billion in 2010-11, $31 billion in 2011-12. It's expected to grow by $21.1 billion in 2012-13. Further, it's expected to grow until 2015-16. In just three years from 2008 to 2011 all the debt repayment ($105 billion) of the previous eight years was completely wiped out.

Canada's debt re-passed the $500 billion mark at 3:37:16 AM on November 25, 2009.

http://www.debtclock.ca/index.php?optio ... &Itemid=42

That is $105 billion paid down from 1993 to 2008. Obviously Chretien (and the Liberals) weren't running things in 2006, 2007, or 2008, which is why I said almost $100 billion - because I do know that Flaherty paid the debt down by around $10-15 billion in those two fiscal years.

Furthermore, the graphic on the CBC page you linked to notes that debt was at about 75% of GDP when Chretien took office and was down to about 50% of GDP when Martin was ousted. I don't give the Liberals all the credit for that, but GDP increased substantially during the Internet boom in the late 90s, but dropping the debt-GDP ratio was still fairly significant IMO.

Either way, the Liberals in the 1990s did pretty well on the debt issue. Sure there were lots of other problems with their time in office (sponsorship, defence spending, etc) but financially, I think they did a pretty good job.

Harper and Co. have done okay, particularly on the issue of income trusts. However, I think they could have done better - especially on the GST cuts, which I think shouldn't have happened during a boom - they should have been more graduated over time so that it didn't hurt federal revenues so much.

[OnTheIce]

Zipperfish Zipperfish:

According to that link,
- Chretien inherited a $38,5B deficit in 93-94 and left office with a $10.6B surplus.
- Martin inhertied a $1.4B surplus and left with $13.2B surplus.
- Harper inherited a $13.8B surplus and ran a 23.5B deficit in 2011-2012.

From the Liberal Party website:

Notice how the Liberal graphs and numbers consistently don't go back further than 1997? That's probably because they ran a deficit of 113.8 billion in 4 years prior.

bootlegga bootlegga:

I don't know where you're getting your numbers, but the Canadian Taxpayer Federation's website notes;

The numbers are actually from the government itself and they don't lie:

Chretien Budget Deficit Numbers(In Billions)

1993: -38.8
1994: -36.6
1995: -30.0
1996: -8.7
1997. +2.9
1998: +5.8
1999: +14.2
2000: +19.9
2001: +8.0
2002: +6.6
2003: +9.1

Total: -47.6 Billion

It's impossible to pay down 100 billion in debt when you ran a deficit of 47.6 billion.

Technically speaking, Chretien did pay off 75.2 billion but before that, he ran up a tab of 113.8 billion hence the balance remaining above.

They did a fantastic job of getting our finances in order, there is no doubt about that, but it's time we stop ignoring the pre-1998 era and acknowledge that it was a tough time and we did incur a lot of debt.

[Regina]

Why do none of these posts consider the global recession that hit the world and the other global economies that are on the verge of collapse. So far we've been nearly unscathed yet out largest trading partner is still struggling. I don't think any of those numbers and graphs are even comparable. Nothing is the same....good or bad.

[OnTheIce]

Regina Regina:

Why do none of these posts consider the global recession that hit the world and the other global economies that are on the verge of collapse. So far we've been nearly unscathed yet out largest trading partner is still struggling. I don't think any of those numbers and graphs are even comparable. Nothing is the same....good or bad.

Because, according to some, we should have been prepared for the global recession and the major bank collapse in the US.

[Wada]

A cub scout knows you should be prepared!

[Curtman]

Regina Regina:

Why do none of these posts consider the global recession that hit the world and the other global economies that are on the verge of collapse. So far we've been nearly unscathed yet out largest trading partner is still struggling. I don't think any of those numbers and graphs are even comparable. Nothing is the same....good or bad.

Why did Harper state unequivocally that there will be no deficit, only one year before the largest deficit in Canadian history? Everyone else saw it coming. Even the GST cut by itself would have put us in deficit. The PBO that Harper hired was saying there was a structural deficit before the recession hit.

[OnTheIce]

Curtman Curtman:

Regina Regina:

Why do none of these posts consider the global recession that hit the world and the other global economies that are on the verge of collapse. So far we've been nearly unscathed yet out largest trading partner is still struggling. I don't think any of those numbers and graphs are even comparable. Nothing is the same....good or bad.

Why did Harper state unequivocally that there will be no deficit, only one year before the largest deficit in Canadian history? Everyone else saw it coming. Even the GST cut by itself would have put us in deficit. The PBO that Harper hired was saying there was a structural deficit before the recession hit.

So Harper was wrong. We all know that.

Politicians, economists and analysts all over the World are wrong consistently because the economy and it's future are educated guesses.

Even if he stated it was coming, it would have hit us just the same. Nobody predicted the collapse of the banks with our largest trading partner and nobody expected us and other Countries to spend billions to stimulate the economy.

[Curtman]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

Curtman Curtman:

Regina Regina:

Why do none of these posts consider the global recession that hit the world and the other global economies that are on the verge of collapse. So far we've been nearly unscathed yet out largest trading partner is still struggling. I don't think any of those numbers and graphs are even comparable. Nothing is the same....good or bad.

Why did Harper state unequivocally that there will be no deficit, only one year before the largest deficit in Canadian history? Everyone else saw it coming. Even the GST cut by itself would have put us in deficit. The PBO that Harper hired was saying there was a structural deficit before the recession hit.

So Harper was wrong. We all know that.

Politicians, economists and analysts all over the World are wrong consistently because the economy and it's future are educated guesses.

Even if he stated it was coming, it would have hit us just the same. Nobody predicted the collapse of the banks with our largest trading partner and nobody expected us and other Countries to spend billions to stimulate the economy.

The structural deficit was created prior to the collapse. You've missed the point again.

[bootlegga]

OnTheIce OnTheIce:

bootlegga bootlegga:

I don't know where you're getting your numbers, but the Canadian Taxpayer Federation's website notes;

The numbers are actually from the government itself and they don't lie:

Chretien Budget Deficit Numbers(In Billions)

1993: -38.8
1994: -36.6
1995: -30.0
1996: -8.7
1997. +2.9
1998: +5.8
1999: +14.2
2000: +19.9
2001: +8.0
2002: +6.6
2003: +9.1

Total: -47.6 Billion

It's impossible to pay down 100 billion in debt when you ran a deficit of 47.6 billion.

Technically speaking, Chretien did pay off 75.2 billion but before that, he ran up a tab of 113.8 billion hence the balance remaining above.

They did a fantastic job of getting our finances in order, there is no doubt about that, but it's time we stop ignoring the pre-1998 era and acknowledge that it was a tough time and we did incur a lot of debt.

It's well known that they ran deficits the first few years in power - that was largely a legacy of the Mulroney government and poor global economy. If you're going to say Harper is largely blameless for increasing debt in bad economic times (which is totally fair), then you have to do the same for Chretien.

The fact is that Chretien was able to do something nobody else had done in decades - start paying down the debt and stop the constant stream of deficits. Those billions they paid back saved taxpayers billions more in interest. That's a success no matter how you slice it.

Finally, you have to admit that the one thing the Liberals did do very successfully was to reduce the debt to GDP ratio significantly (75% down to 50%) - also the first time it's been done in decades.

Compare our debt to GDP ratio with others in the G-8 and it's so low it's almost laughable. Some nations are well over 100% in that regard.

So go ahead and smash the Liberals for deficit spending, but you're a hypocrite if you don't apply the exact same standard to Harper and Co.

[Lemmy]

Given the degree of success the Liberals had, and the overall strength of the economy, under Chretien and Martin, I consider it a major FAILURE that the entire debt wasn't repaid. They had the opportunity to do the right thing and use all of that surplus money wisely, but chose not to. The Conservatives have been less-skilled at running the economy during their times in office, so we kind of expect them to be fiscal fuck-ups. But in this case, I think the Liberals fucked up worse for not doing more when they had the opportunity. That's the big failing in the myth of "Paul Martin: Finance Minister Extraordinaire."

[bootlegga]

Regina Regina:

Why do none of these posts consider the global recession that hit the world and the other global economies that are on the verge of collapse. So far we've been nearly unscathed yet out largest trading partner is still struggling. I don't think any of those numbers and graphs are even comparable. Nothing is the same....good or bad.

I fully recognize it and I don't blame Harper for running a deficit during a recession. If anything, it makes sense. The criticism I have is that he slashed almost $10 billion from revenues during a boom - that by itself almost created a structural deficit and left the government with nothing to cut when the recession hit.

For those who say, "How was he supposed to know a recession was coming?" I reply - "He's supposedly a trained economist and most of them (everyone I've ever talked to) seems to acknowledge/understand the economy operates in cycles - boom, bust, recovery, boom, bust, recovery, etc."

I learned that in high school social studies - why doesn't a person with an economics Masters degree know that?

Hell, if he doesn't believe that, all he has to do is look at the global economic history over the past century or so - it always followed that cycle.

The question isn't "IS a recession coming?", the question is "WHEN is a recession coming?"

Standard economic theory (Keynesian IIRC) is to keep taxes high and spending low in a boom (like the Liberals did) and drop taxes and increase spending in a recession. Harper did the exact opposite due to partisan beliefs and so left the government in a bind. For someone who is supposedly trained as an economist, it's unbelievable.

[bootlegga]

Lemmy Lemmy:

Given the degree of success the Liberals had, and the overall strength of the economy, under Chretien and Martin, I consider it a major FAILURE that the entire debt wasn't repaid. They had the opportunity to do the right thing and use all of that surplus money wisely, but chose not to. The Conservatives have been less-skilled at running the economy during their times in office, so we kind of expect them to be fiscal fuck-ups. But in this case, I think the Liberals fucked up worse for not doing more when they had the opportunity. That's the big failing in the myth of "Paul Martin: Finance Minister Extraordinaire."

I wonder if it would have been possible to pay the entire debt back - but I do agree that they could have paid more than they did.