So no price freezes or control. A rebate to ensure that Loblaws and their ilk continue to bring in record profits every year by using their monopolies to gouge Canadians.
throwitawaytothesea on
This will please nobody. Low-income people don’t understand money over time and working people struggling to afford groceries and other essentials will get no help whatsoever.
_DotBot_ on
Means testing is just a horrible long term policy.
It pushes people to stay in the “low income” threshold so they can keep on getting more and more of the benefits that the Feds have added in recent years.
Meanwhile it punishes people who fall into the middle class threshold who end up with no help at all.
If the government wants to prevent a populist backlash against welfare and benefits from eventually happening, they need to stop means testing. Make sure everyone gets a cheque or deposit, akin to the logic behind Universal Basic Income.
BC is evidence of this. The Carbon Tax failed dramatically because only the low income got a rebate. Everyone else felt penalized by it, and discontent grew quite rapidly.
dogoodreapgood on
Can we make it a rule that MPs must declare when they or their campaign managers are lobbyists for grocery chains every time they talk about grocery prices? In the House, when they jump on CTV or CBC…every time.
HunterGreenLeaves on
It’s not a grocery rebate. It’s an increase to the GST rebate; that rebate is available to people with a below average net income.
I think it’s confusing to attach it to the GST rebate. That suggests that it’s supporting the purchase of food that has the GST on it – generally processed food.
That said, it means an increase to the lowest income households. If it were being done as a decrease in the lowest tax bracket it would benefit everyone. This is more targeted.
No_Magazine9625 on
The issue with this is that the qualification threshold for the GST rebate (around 43k) is so pathetically low that it excludes far too many people within the working class that are heavily impacted by rising grocery prices.
The cut off for a full time employee is – you don’t get this if you make over $20/hr – which barely clears minimum wage.
Avelion2 on
including steps to fix structural problems with Canada’s food supply chain, and improve competition
This is what i’ll be looking at, if it has some substance I’ll be impressed.
red3iter on
This is the equivalent to me going to the hospital to get a gunshot wound removed — and them instead giving me a pink Hello Kitty band-aid. Without addressing the root causes of this fuckery (greedflation, price fixing, and monopolies in the grocery sector), we’re going to continue to bleed out. To our deaths. I saw that little tidbit about addressing “structural issues” in the system — I’ll be very interested in that. However, seeing that this is coming from Mr. CEO, I’m not expecting anything meaningful.
expendiblegrunt on
I am generally in favour of cash for low income people but “grocery rebate” is up there among the dumbest public policy ideas I’ve ever heard, and this is the era of Trump
9 Comments
So no price freezes or control. A rebate to ensure that Loblaws and their ilk continue to bring in record profits every year by using their monopolies to gouge Canadians.
This will please nobody. Low-income people don’t understand money over time and working people struggling to afford groceries and other essentials will get no help whatsoever.
Means testing is just a horrible long term policy.
It pushes people to stay in the “low income” threshold so they can keep on getting more and more of the benefits that the Feds have added in recent years.
Meanwhile it punishes people who fall into the middle class threshold who end up with no help at all.
If the government wants to prevent a populist backlash against welfare and benefits from eventually happening, they need to stop means testing. Make sure everyone gets a cheque or deposit, akin to the logic behind Universal Basic Income.
BC is evidence of this. The Carbon Tax failed dramatically because only the low income got a rebate. Everyone else felt penalized by it, and discontent grew quite rapidly.
Can we make it a rule that MPs must declare when they or their campaign managers are lobbyists for grocery chains every time they talk about grocery prices? In the House, when they jump on CTV or CBC…every time.
It’s not a grocery rebate. It’s an increase to the GST rebate; that rebate is available to people with a below average net income.
I think it’s confusing to attach it to the GST rebate. That suggests that it’s supporting the purchase of food that has the GST on it – generally processed food.
That said, it means an increase to the lowest income households. If it were being done as a decrease in the lowest tax bracket it would benefit everyone. This is more targeted.
The issue with this is that the qualification threshold for the GST rebate (around 43k) is so pathetically low that it excludes far too many people within the working class that are heavily impacted by rising grocery prices.
The cut off for a full time employee is – you don’t get this if you make over $20/hr – which barely clears minimum wage.
including steps to fix structural problems with Canada’s food supply chain, and improve competition
This is what i’ll be looking at, if it has some substance I’ll be impressed.
This is the equivalent to me going to the hospital to get a gunshot wound removed — and them instead giving me a pink Hello Kitty band-aid. Without addressing the root causes of this fuckery (greedflation, price fixing, and monopolies in the grocery sector), we’re going to continue to bleed out. To our deaths. I saw that little tidbit about addressing “structural issues” in the system — I’ll be very interested in that. However, seeing that this is coming from Mr. CEO, I’m not expecting anything meaningful.
I am generally in favour of cash for low income people but “grocery rebate” is up there among the dumbest public policy ideas I’ve ever heard, and this is the era of Trump