Wynne would be smart to reverse useless corporate tax cuts

What’s the smartest move to make if you’re premier of a province facing a $20-billion deficit? Cut corporate taxes by $2.4-billion a year, of course! At least, that’s the way neo-Liberal Dalton McGunity saw things back in 2010.

Thankfully, after a 6-month opportunistic prorogue of Parliament a year ago, he’s finally gone. But his right-wing anti-tax legacy still lives on.

Corporate tax cuts create jobs!!

The ridiculous claim that corporate tax cuts “create jobs” has been thoroughly debunked. But what most Canadians don’t realize is that Canada has the lowest effective corporate tax rate among ALL major economies. Our rate is half that of China’s for Christ-sake!

According to KPMG’s international guide for business relocation:

Corporate income taxes are lowest in Canada (7.3 per cent effective corporate income tax rate), France (14.7 per cent), and China (14.8 per cent).

At the other end of the scale, effective corporate income taxes exceed 30 per cent in Japan (31.5 per cent), Brazil (36.1 per cent), and Italy (37.6 per cent).

These effective income tax rates are significantly lower than the nominal tax rates in most countries due to the inclusion of various tax incentives, including R&D tax incentives, in these calculations.

In yesterday’s National Post, neo-con Scott Stinson lamented that Wynne is likely to reverse these failed tax cuts to pay for her transit plan. If true, that would be smartest thing the Ontario “Liberals” have done in a long time.

Self-serving ideology

Corporate tax cuts are just more failed free-market ideology that is entirely self-serving to businessmen and the rich.

Thirty years of these free-market reforms have caused debt and inequality to soar, forced people to work more for less pay and benefits, and triggered a global free-market meltdown we have yet to recover from 5 years later.

It’s well past time Liberals started acting like centrist liberals again by fighting corrupt neo-con ideology instead of helping con men like Mike Harris and Stephen Harper destroy the country with it.

BTW, here's a funny related site: People for corporate tax cuts!