December 2015
Fiscal Monitor for April – October 2015
The federal government posted a deficit of $0.9 in October 2015, reducing the surplus for the first seven months of 2015-16 to $0.6 billion, up $4.6 billion from the same period in 2014-15. There has been a significant reduction in the year to date surplus, from a high of $5.2 billion reported for the April to July 2015 period to only $0.9 billion for the April to October 2015 period.
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Improving Transparency and Credibility
In the last two weeks, Finance Minister, Bill Morneau, has come under a lot of criticism over the economic and fiscal projections in his November Update and the costing of the middle-income tax cut and the new high-income tax rate. We offer a few suggestions, which would address these criticisms while improving the transparency and credibility, not just of the budget process but the election process as well.
Read MoreBUDGET CONFUSION
If Canadians had wanted a Conservative government obsessed with deficit elimination, they would have elected one. Instead, they elected a Liberal government that committed to running the government’s finances in a “realistic, sustainable, prudent, and transparent manner”.
Read MorePBO POURS COLD WATER ON MORNEAU’S ECONOMIC AND FISCAL UPDATE
The Parliamentary Budget Officer (PBO) released his assessment of Finance Minister Jim Morneau’s first Update of the Economic and Fiscal Projections (Update), concluding that that the economic and fiscal projections were overly optimistic, especially in the outer years. This raises the question of whether the Finance Minister will be able to balance the budget in 2019-20 if the Government attempts to fully implement its election promises.
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