EDMONTON—Alberta Premier Danielle Smith says her government has heard “loud and clear from Albertans that the federal equalization program is unfair and must be changed or abolished.”
The program is federally funded from general revenues, largely raised through federal taxes, with no contributions from provincial governments.
The present system uses a formula to determine each province’s fiscal capacity, which represents the tax revenues a province could raise if it were to tax at the national average tax rate.
A province’s fiscal capacity is determined across five revenue categories: personal income taxes, business taxes, consumption taxes, property taxes, and natural resource revenues.
In the news release, Smith said the position paper is a starting point for a national conversation. It proposes reforms that the Alberta government maintains would encourage provinces “to adopt pro-growth policies to reduce their dependence on federal transfer payments.”
Alberta’s proposed approach would use an agreed-upon definition of revenue to calculate the revenue-to-GDP ratio that represents the national average tax rate.
“Each province’s fiscal capacity per capita would be calculated by applying the national average tax rate to its GDP per capita and comparing it to the national standard,” says the news release.
The paper also recommends gradually lowering the standard from 100 percent of the national average to 95 percent.
‘Over Equalized’
Alberta held a referendum in October 2021 in which 61.7 percent of those who voted said “yes” to removing the equalization section from the Constitution.The province listed what it sees as some of the issues with the current equalization program, including that it is too complex, lacks transparency, and can reduce incentives for provinces to grow their own wealth.
Alberta suggests that some provinces are “over equalized.”
“In 2023-24, the Equalization Program will disperse almost $24 billion, however, only $21.6 billion is needed to bring the fiscal capacity of receiving provinces to the national average,” said the news release.
The paper also said improvements to the equalization program must be accompanied by policies that drive economic growth.
History
In 2018, the federal government under the Liberals extended the current equalization formula until 2024 by burying this plan in a budget implementation bill, without provincial consultation.According to a statement from Saskatchewan Finance Minister Donna Harpauer, her province raised the issue again at a meeting with federal, provincial, and territorial finance ministers in early 2023.
“A number of provinces wished to be further consulted, and it is disappointing that the federal government would move forward with these changes without further consultation,” the statement said.
As part of an omnibus budget motion tabled in the House the week of April 19, the Trudeau Liberal government, 200 pages into the document of 400-plus pages, signalled an intention to extend the use of the current equalization formula for another five years, until 2029.
At a November 2022 message to Albertans, Smith said the equalization program sent billions of tax dollars “into a black hole of federal bureaucracy and vote-buying arrangements” in other parts of the country.
“These continual federal attacks on our economy and provincial rights cannot be allowed to continue,” she said at the time.