Reduce the HSt to 11%, starting March 2011, Than down to 10% in 2012

"insight about how we can maintain B.C.’s competitive edge.”

I did not realize we had a competitive edge.

I am not interested in how to maintain it. I am interested how to improve it.

I am especially interested in how to improve it so that we pay LESS taxes rather than paying MORE taxes. To me, the latter would be counterproductive to the people of this province.

tax the bejabbers out of us baby.

Have you seen the artical on the CBC?
Whatcom County tells us that sales have increased by 600% since the HST has come to BC.
Cheers

It would be interesting to know if ANY Budgets past have ever incorporated ANY of the ideas given previous Select Standing Committees by members of the general public. People speaking only as individual citizens at these travelling hearings, and not being the spokesperson for some organisation or special interest group.

I somewhat suspect that this whole exercise is pretty much of a farce. That the next Budget will still "...dance to the tunes of Finance", and the public's input be damned. That this whole process is merely a "feel good" exercise put on by our Legislators for us; showing us that we've had a chance to "have our say". One that's really about as useful as our talking to a brick wall. Or trying to impress on a certain Premier we don't want the HST, or to wait a year for it to be removed.

I base my suspicions on both a previous personal experience, (not with this Committee, but a similar long ago inquiry ~ into the forest industry, actually ~ where the Chair commended me in a handwritten personal note for the content and thoroughness of my brief ~ and completely ignored everything that was in it in the final Report. Which, from what was in it, could well have been written before any of the hearings took place, or any called for submissions were even read!); and also on what was once publicly revealed in a similar instance with regards to changes to the Worker's Compensation Board. Where it came to light that the final Report HAD already been finalised BEFORE any public input had even been received.

All my life I have wanted to be on a "select standing committee". I own a jacket and tie. I guess I would have to sell my soul to be on one of those. How much money do they make? Probably more than I do now. Does that committee charge HST? I hope so.

I think a suit is not the basic requirement to be on the committee. I think the basic requirement is that you have to be an MLA and we all know how much money they make. :-)

http://www.leg.bc.ca/budgetconsultations

When it comes to a "Select Standing Committee appointment Harbinger,it is not about WHAT you know...it's about WHO you know!
Ya gotta have"connections",if ya know what I mean!
If the government really cared about what us peons think,they would put the peons on these committee!
Sure..like that will ever happen!
Smoke and miirors!

Every time I hear people say we need to reduce the HST I shake my head.

What in effect they are saying is we accept defeat... we accept a tax on a tax (eg CPP, EI, and employee income taxes)... we accept a hidden tax on the revenue required for employee benefits... we accept a flat tax on minimum wage employees with no basic exemption... we accept a tax on labor revenue regardless of profitability or lack there of... we accept a loss of jobs for the province as service jobs leave for Alberta... we accept our politicians misleading us in elections blunting an informed vote... and we accept their perversion of our democratic process to benefit large multinational corporations at the expense of small business and the working middle class.

What a bargain for merely giving back 1% of a tax like that... they must be laughing when they read this stuff.

For those people I can only shake my head at the logic of giving justification for such a bad tax law brought in through fraud.

The best article I've seen written on this tax was by an American.

http://capoliticalnews.com/blog_post/show/6452

First thing I would suggest is we need to cut... we are on the edge of a very big depression and the sooner our government recognizes this the better we will be.

We saw last election how our government was off by $2 Billion dollars on their deficit estimates they used for the election... and we saw how they, if we are to believe them, made a rash decision on the HST in a matter of days to make one of the most radical taxation changes in provincial history... surrendering our fiscal sovereignty in the process. We know this government has a crystal ball about as clear as mud when it comes to fiscal policy, and anything they say is likely for public consumption and not for actual policy or related to the true fiscal situation in this province.

So in spite of that I have two suggestions. One is to cut the pay, or at least prepare to cut the payroll of the provincial government... and leading by example would be a good start in light of the above paragraph.

Most importantly though... I think the government should recognize an opportunity when an opportunity exists. Basically the West has maybe ten years left before we are third world with a long hill to climb to ever get back to what we had. China has us by the balls with their control of the Rare Earth Minerals that are essential to the new economy of technology... wind power, solar power, computer gadgets, electric cars, national defense... you name it they all require Rare Earth Minerals.

China is smart, they seized control of the resource using state communist financing to pervert the market and shut down all competing mines. Now they have a strangle hold on our ability to compete in the 21st century economy. Last week China embargo'd Japan of Rare Earth Minerals over the fishing trawler dispute and Japan surrendered the next day for risk of total economic collapse. Currently China is restricting export to only 25% of production using the resource to power their own economy resulting in millions of jobs they otherwise wouldn't have. They have a clear plan and its a winner... and we will be the looser guaranteed unless something is done about it.

What can be done about it?

Well for starters the Americans just awoke to this threat and now realize they have their collective pants around their ankles. So much so that the US Congress just passed a bill to front as much loan guarantees as are required for production of Rare Earth Minerals outside of China. Its now their top national security priority.

Prince George has one of the worlds largest deposits of these minerals about 80km North East of town. If we had China's policy for this region we would in ten years have more jobs than all of Ontario here in PG alone. But we are not China, so that won't happen, but still we have an opportunity that extends beyond PG, beyond our province, beyond even our nation in the vital importance it has to global economic security... we have an opportunity where we can be the price maker and not the price taker... why should the little people be paying the taxes... why shouldn't we have incentives to induce manufacturing uses of this essential resource in our region and province... and what is our government doing to see to it that we can be ontop of this opportunity as it inevitably grows... why shouldn't we be the ones that saved the western world from economic slavery or worse?

Pentagon Loses Control of Bombs to China Metal Monopoly
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-09-29/pentagon-losing-control-of-afghanistan-bombs-to-china-s-neodymium-monopoly.html

Please feel free to rip off my idea.... oh and from what I can tell from my recent investments the rest of the world is thinking the same thing. Balaro Resource locally made 300% stock return since I recommend it on this site only a few months ago. The Chinese Japan trawler dispute has meant nothing but money to me, and why shouldn't it for you as well... hell why shouldn't the province be in the game?