Eight months into fiscal year, recession and its aftermath exert heavy toll on spending and revenue.
Ottawa's budgetary deficit has ballooned to over $36-billion two-thirds into the fiscal year as the recession and its aftermath exert a heavy toll on spending and revenue, the federal Finance Department said Friday.
The latest Finance Department accounting shows that the government experienced another $4.4-billion shortfall in November, bringing the deficit eight months into the fiscal year to $36.3-billion
That is night and day from where the government stood last year, when it was clinging to a $39-million surplus.
James Morton
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2 comments:
So can we get some analysis of where the money has gone, what ahs caused the deficit?
I mean, we all knew there was going to be a deficit - the Liberals were among the loudest in calling for deficit spending last year (so it's pretty callow to be criticizing the deficit this year).
So the only legitimate criticism must be that the spending (or shortfall) was improper, that it isn't helping, or that it's going to the wrong people, or that it's the result of mismanagement.
Liberals railing at the Conservatives for the deficit is hypocritical. They should stop.
Approximately half is due to drop in revenues ($18B). The other half is due to increased routine spending (moderate in the case of transfers to other levels of government and higher to individuals due to EI) to the tune of about $5B and "stimulus" to the amount of about $13B.
I can't figure out what beef it is people think they have with the government, unless they think more should have been spent. It's a non-story. The coalition goal was to stick to the G20 target which would have amounted to $30B of spending. At $18B with a few months to go, we're well below that.
lrC
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