Deficits not so bad???

Maybe we shouldn't be so afraid of a deficit?

Don't hurt provinces to stave off deficit: premiers

Canada's premiers have asked the prime minister to find ways to prevent a potential deficit that would not harm the provinces and territories.

Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty said he doesn't want the federal government to balance its future budgets by downloading expenses.

"I hope that collectively we'll be able to suggest to the prime minister that he... not pursue through some ideological slavishness a balanced budget agenda that at the same time has a real impact hurting Canadians," McGuinty told reporters.

"I think the first principle again has to be: do no harm."

McGuinty also said Ottawa shouldn't pull back funding for health care and education in favour of preventing a deficit.

"Infrastructure projects are important to us, continuing to fund health care and post-secondary education, those are important to us," he said.

"I think the first thing we need to do together is ensure that any policies we might deploy don't further harm Canadians and Ontarians."

McGuinty is considering whether his own province could run a temporary deficit as a way to avoid cutting major services, although he conceded it might be politically unwise.
"You don't have a lot of choices," he said.

"I'm not sure I've heard an economist lately -- and these are economists, not politicians -- who are saying they are adamantly opposed to running a temporary, cyclical deficit."

Full story here:

http://news.sympatico.msn.ctv.ca/Canada/ContentPosting?newsitemid=CTVNews%2f20081020%2fPremiers_meeting_081020&feedname=CTV-NATIONAL_V3&show=False&number=0&showbyline=True&subtitle=&detect=&abc=abc&date=True