Chapter 4
Chapter 4 Article
Title: New year tax reductions won’t make anyone rich
Source: Eric Beauchesne, CanWest News Service
Starting next year, all Canadians will have less tax taken off their paycheques, some more than others. This tax relief more than offsets the current increases in payroll taxes. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation says that the new employment tax credit will increase to $1,000 for the 2007 tax year, up from $250 in 2006. They further add that low-income individuals, earning less than $25,000 annually, will benefit the most from the jump in that credit. Next year, Canadians will pay more payroll taxes and the lowest personal income tax rate will rise to 15.5 per cent, from 15.25 per cent. However, it’s less than Finance Minister Jim Flaherty has been claiming. While employee EI premium rates will drop by seven cents to $1.80 per $100 of insurable earnings, the maximum insurable earnings will rise to $40,000 from $39,000, this will result in a mere 1.3-per-cent reduction in premiums from 2006 levels. Also, as the employee premium rate remains at 4.95 per cent of insurable earnings, the ceiling on those earnings will rise to $43,700 from $42,100. As a result, the net payroll tax bill will increase by $70 per worker because the EI tax reductions will be consumed by a higher EI threshold and rising CPP payments, and this will reduce the overall income and payroll tax savings. Those savings will amount to $126 for someone earning $15,000, $82 at an income of $35,000, $106 at $45,000, $106 at $60,000, and $126 at $100,000. For a two-earner family of four with an income of $80,000, the reduction in both federal and provincial income taxes will range from $940 in Alberta to $861 in Saskatchewan. For a one-earner family of four with an income of $80,000, the savings will range from $1,545 in Alberta to $964 in Quebec. Without doubt, families with young children will benefit the most because they will be given $100 each month for each child they have under the age of six.
In a way, I think this is our government’s way of distributing wealth and financial equality. Although this is a compensation for many of the cutbacks that we’ve been having these past years, I think this Canadians will be better off this way because they will benefit directly. Taxes are lowered, and in addition, money will be given out to Canadians to support their families. On the other hand, with all these benefits that we will receive, it will take us longer to pay off our national debt. Therefore, we may be the generation that will have to pay off the debt with our payroll taxes, instead of our parents, unfortunately.
Chapter 3
Chapter 3 Article
Title: PREMIER ANNOUNCES $29M FOR NEW UCFV CAMPUS
Source: http://www2.news.gov.bc.ca/news_releases_2005-2009/2007AE0001-000025.htm
On January 16, 2007, Gordon Campbell announced that more than $29 million will be set aside to purchase 34 hectares of land in order to build a trades and technology centre for the University College of the Fraser Valley’s new Chilliwack campus as part of B.C.’s first full-service education park. Campbell believes that it is important for us to improve our competitiveness and productivity through education and training. He adds that the creation of this new centre will help us meet the demand for highly trained, skilled workers in many areas. The centre is scheduled to open this fall with new classrooms, labs and shops, and 690 training spaces. UCFV’s land purchase will be approximately the size of 50 football fields, and will serve up to 12,000 students. This education park will be joined by the Justice Institute of B.C., the RCMP and the World Trade University. The school district and UCFV are preparing to enhance the K-12 and post-secondary systems to boost student participation and completion rates at all levels. According to Advanced Education Minister Murray Coell, the expanded space will accommodate twice as many UCFV students at the Chilliwack campus to meet the educational needs of B.C.’s fastest-growing area by the year 2010. In addition to investing in land and new buildings, the Province is funding 1,700 new student spaces at UCFV as part of its 25,000-seat expansion plan. The post-secondary seat expansion is part of the government’s goal to make British Columbia the best-educated and most literate place in North America.
Chapter 3 focuses on government involvement. In this article we read that our provincial government, Gordon Campbell, is contributing a large amount of money to education. For reasons like this, it is better for education to be controlled by the government. With government control, I think it’s the best interest of the government for students to get the best education. However, with privatized control, I think the people in charge will be more interested in making a profit for themselves. Another disadvantage for privatized control is that they have control over their tuition prices. If
all schools decide to raise their tuition costs a few extra dollars, it’s difficult for us to do anything about it since education is a necessity.
Chapter 2
Chapter 2 Article
Title: Electricity rates may rise 7 per cent
Source: http://www.canada.com/victoriatimescolonist/news/story.html?id=0b3ffa10-ac51-4e22-96b2-db08bc6c2ffe
During the upcoming fiscal year, B.C. Hydro will fall short of revenue by a large amount. The company expects for their net income to reduce by more than 80 per cent by April 1. As a result, Hydro might compensate for this loss by raising the current cost of electricity by seven per cent. This would raise the average homeowner’s monthly electricity bill by about $4.50. This idea is not for certain, but the company is seeking for a way to increase their profits. Hydro is required by law to make a 13.5-per-cent return on equity to give to the provincial treasury; but they will not be able to meet this requirement unless the company makes adjustments to their price rates. Hydro will file for a rate increase to take effect starting on June 1. However, it was discovered that Hydro is wording its rate application in such a way that would allow for them to go back later and make the increase retroactive to April 1. B.C. Hydro stated that the province’s growing dependence on imported electricity is the main reason why they need to increase the rates. Approximately 14 per cent of B.C.’s annual electricity supply is purchased in the U.S.. The reason for this being is because B.C. has not added any major new power source since 1984.
Chapter 2 focused mainly on supply and demand. In this article, the two terms had an effect on the resource electricity. This resource is definitely inelastic since it powers a large portion of things that we use in our everyday lives; there is really no alternative to electricity. B.C. Hydro knows this. It is hard for us to complain if the company decides to slightly increase the price rates for electricity consumption. Until a superior high-tech source of power is created to replace electricity, the demand for it will always remain high. The article also tells us that our province does not create enough electricity for us to use, which is why we must purchase it from the U.S.. This means that we still have a high demand for electricity, but we don’t have the supply to meet our needs. Therefore the supply of electricity costs more because we are purchasing the resource from another country.
I think electricity will remain as a very important resource to us for the next few decades. This is why I think that we should create more electric-power sources. Currently, we have to pay extra cash to receive electricity from the U.S. I think we would eventually save money if we invested our money into building new major power sources so that we could at least support ourselves without having the need to purchase electricity from elsewhere. As well, we could even profit from selling more electricity to other countries.
Chapter 1
Chapter 1 Article
Title: 'Employees becoming scarce resource"
Source: http://www.canada.com/theprovince/news/money/story.html?id=2a5c1084-b430-4187-9d80-bcfab5937205&k=15621
Canada’s unemployment rates have been at its lowest level in thirty years. Vancouver labour economist Roslyn Kunin says that "Employees are becoming the scarce resource." She adds that employers are in desperate need of workers, therefore employers will have to treat their staff with top priority. According to Statistics Canada's labour force report, Canadian employers hired almost 97,000 workers last month, even though economists predicted only 20,000 job positions would be available. Although we had a slight decrease in employment rates, rumour has it that B.C. has a very healthy employment market and more people looking for jobs. Overall, Canada’s unemployment rate, of 6.1 per cent, has actually been at its lowest since 1974. Furthermore, more jobs were created in Canada last month than in the much larger U.S. labour market. This huge increase in employment also raised the value of the Canadian dollar by more than a cent. Unfortunately, because of this matter, it was suggested that the Bank of Canada continue to raise their interest rates to cool down inflationary pressure in the economy, which will reduce consumer spending and make it more expensive to borrow money.
Chapter 1 focused heavily on scarcity. In this news article, we see that there are many job openings that are not being taken. Therefore it seems that employees are a scarce resource; there isn’t an unlimited number of people, neither is there an unlimited supply of people that want to, and are able to, work in a certain job position. Employers must compete against each other for future qualified employees, since there are so many available jobs. In this article, the situation is that there is a large demand for employees, yet there is such limited supply of suitable people to take the job position.
I’ve actually heard about this circumstance from before. In addition to the many current career opportunities, I hear that many of the baby boomers will be retiring at the same time that we will be pursuing our careers. This will hopefully work as a double advantage in helping our generation find jobs. I was also informed that some employers are so desperate for workers, since they have been becoming scarcer, that they will even hire trainees who are in the midst of their post secondary education, and educate the trainees themselves.
