Newsletter

One Comment About Taxation – The April 28, 2026 “Spring Economic Update” –  It’s Ugly   I spent the day of Canada’s Spring Economic Update standing in the Cathédrale Saint-Vincent in St. Malo, France, with my 82-year-old French mother and my sister. The cathedral holds the tomb of Jacques Cartier. A plaque over the tomb, in translation, reads:…

One Comment About Taxation – Canada Doesn’t Need More “Tax Coupons”   *note – I wrote this section before the April 28, 2028 “Spring Update” – you can find my comments on the Spring Update in the Economics section below.   When I was a young boy, I would watch my Mom diligently read the…

One Comment About Taxation – Canada’s Budget Process is Not Cool   There’s a scene in the 1988 comedy The Naked Gun where Leslie Nielsen’s Lt. Frank Drebin waves his arms in front of a fireworks factory that has just exploded and calmly tells the horrified crowd: “Nothing to see here, please disperse.”   I’ve often thought…

One Comment About Taxation – Canada Doesn’t Need to Build Traps to Keep its Successful People and its Youth in Canada   I’m not claustrophobic but put me somewhere with no exit route or way back and something shifts. In my youth, if the job I had was a dead end, I left it. Underwater cave diving…

One Comment About Taxation – Canada’s Accounting Profession is Critically Important For Proper Tax Administration   I was chatting with a colleague last week about tax season. “We’ll get it done” he said. “But given the shortage of qualified teammates, it’s going to be tough. But at least we don’t have the chaos of the last three years…

One Comment About Taxation – Canada Needs to Resist Building “Fences”   My bichon Shih Tzu – Enzo – loves to wander. He’ll find any opportunity to take off, requiring me to chase after him.  We’ve had to install a GPS-enabled wireless fence. It works – the fence keeps Enzo in but not because he wants…

One Comment About Taxation – Canada Needs to Support Our Oilsands – With Good Tax and Economic Policies   I grew up in Fort McMurray, AB, long before it became a political talking point. For me, it was home and the spirit of community was everywhere: we’d celebrate the “Blueberry Festival” in the fall, spend the…

One Comment About Taxation – We Need Better Economic and Taxation Policies For Our Youth   Happy St. Patrick’s Day! I hope you’re wearing green while reading this. The man behind the celebration did not become a legend overnight. St. Patrick’s influence in Ireland – and worldwide – developed slowly over decades of perseverance, patience and long-term thinking.…

One Comment About Taxation – The “Dad Tax” Lesson Governments Keep Ignoring   When my kids were younger, I used to impose what they jokingly called the “Dad tax”. If we went out for dinner and they ordered something that looked particularly good, I would demand a small sample as my tax for paying the…

One Comment About Taxation – To “Break the Glass” on Productivity, We Must Fix the Capital Gains Lock-in   A number of years ago, when I was leading our firm, I was frustrated. We were very busy but we weren’t moving forward as quickly as we should have been. We had too many “good ideas.”…