As a Canadian tax policy commentator, I am troubled when U.S. policy proposals are reflexively promoted by some in Canada, without necessarily examining whether the underlying rationale applies in this country. For example, the wealth tax proposals advocated by Democratic primary candidates Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders were developed in the U.S. context of persistently severe income and wealth inequality. Similar annual wealth taxes were then proposed by two parties in the last Canadian federal election, even though income inequality in Canada, as measured by the Gini score, is mitigated by our far more progressive income taxes and government transfers.
So, I wrote this op-ed to explain why I think wealth taxes don’t make sense for Canada, and why we should not impose new wealth taxes to raise the revenues needed to dig Canada out of our post-pandemic fiscal hole.
Click here to access Professor Turner's op-ed, originally published June 12, 2020.