Quote:
Originally Posted by GreaterMontréal
yes and no, if Alberta had a PST , you would not have the same problem. The oil royalties could be an additional source of revenue for the province.
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The big problem is that the provincial government annually pins its budget to a predicted oil price for the year (this year was over $90 a barrel I believe) rather than basing spending on a low oil price (say, $50 a barrel for example) and putting the rest into long term savings like the Heritage Fund. The Klein government was able to deliver budget surpluses on oil prices as low as $9 a barrel in 1998. Since Klein left, there has been no fiscal discipline whatsoever in this province.
