Don Drummond has an op-ed in today’s Toronto Star concluding:
Federal and provincial governments and the Canadian business sector should [establish] monitoring mechanisms that will permit regular reports to Canadians on whether the Canadian corporate tax revolution is producing benefits for them.As an advocate of corporate tax cuts, he believes that such benefits exist. I am more skeptical and have long been making the arguments that Drummond seeks to counter. (A couple of years ago, he and I debated the issue of lower Canadian corporate taxes transferring revenue to the American treasury.)
However, I completely agree that we need a concrete evaluation of the promised benefits, rather than just accepting dubious claims that “a consensus in the literature” supports corporate tax cuts. Indeed, I had proposed that the Parliamentary Budget Officer undertake such evaluations a couple of years ago.
- Erin Weir is Senior Economist with the International Trade Union Confederation and a CCPA Research Associate.
