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Affordable housing advocates say young Canadians who remain shut out of the housing market are the collateral damage of policymakers unwilling to make big moves to cool pricing.
Article content Robinson suggested the fault lay with the federal government, which omitted paid sick leave from its budget, delivered Monday “I was disappointed that the federal government chose not to do that and we’re going to encourage them to move forward on that,” she told reporters. “It is the best way to go. It is the most efficient way to go.” The buck-passing probably has to do with the undisclosed cost of paid sick leave. Plus a reluctance by politicians to pick up the tab themselves or pass the bill along to pandemic-battered employers. Another surprise in the B.C. NDP b...
Budget talking points mislead media and Canadians While I celebrate this historic breakthrough, I’m still frustrated that Ottawa’s messaging inclines media to report that child care funding is its biggest increase in Federal Budget 2021. It isn’t. Increases to Old Age Security (OAS) absorb far more taxpayer dollars – although this fact is buried in the fine print, as it has been for many years. Table A1.6 of the Budget shows that the Government of Canada plans to increase spending on OAS by $22 billion a year as of 2025 compared to what was spent in 2020. That’s three times more...
There are also sizeable increases for K-12 and post-secondary education, as well as money earmarked to respond to the opioid crisis and for increased mental health and addictions services. At the same time there’s a $2-billion drop in revenue, a big part of which is a drop in corporate income tax (down $1.4 billion) that’s partially offset by increased revenue from the carbon tax (up $300 million) and property tax (up $646 million). There’s also a big drop in projected transfers from the federal government, mainly because of one-time pandemic-related support year that isn’t being rep...
VANCOUVER -- A housing partnership program designed to create affordable housing units for "middle-income households" in B.C. got a $2 billion boost from the province Thursday, just days ahead of the release of a new provincial budget. HousingHub, which is a division of BC Housing, is a program that provides low-interest loans to private developers and other community groups that are repaid once housing projects are completed. In exchange, the savings are passed on to renters and buyers through purpose-built affordable housing units. For private developers, the program provides constru...