Spending restraint is key to achieving a balanced federal budget over the next five years and should form part of Ottawa’s March Budget. This Backgrounder demonstrates how to limit the rise in the federal debt by prudently reining in spending growth rather than raising taxes, so that past and...

Governments are major employers, and usually provide defined-benefit (DB) pension plans with full inflation indexing and generous early retirement provisions. Hence, changes in thinking about, and accounting for, the costs of DB pension plans have major implications for government finances. Both...

The pension plans of federal government employees are relatively generous and badly underfunded, with the Pension Plan for Members of Parliament (MPs), which covers members of the House of Commons and the Senate, standing out on both counts. The MP plan promises much higher retirement incomes...

Advocates of an expanded Canada Pension Plan as a response to Canadian concerns about low incomes in retirement too often promote it as a plan with guaranteed benefits that are fully funded. The CPP looks like a defined-benefit plan, but it is not. Most of its benefits are targets contingent on...

Fiscal pressures and sovereign debt concerns around the world are intensifying scrutiny of government finances. Even in Canada, where these pressures and concerns are less acute, federal and provincial fiscal controls could be better. Some Canadian governments still present budgets to their...

Cities are the most visible level of government for most Canadians, providing services such as waste collection, policing and transit. Yet their budgets are the most opaque of any level of government. Municipalities generally use accounting in their budgets that does not match what they use in...

Ottawa has an opportunity in the 2010 Federal Budget to improve retirement saving prospects for many Canadians. In a paper released today, the author outlines straightforward, no-regrets ways Ottawa can facilitate more saving and make cost-effective risk-pooling available to the majority of...

A rapidly aging population means the Atlantic provinces face the prospect of shrinking workforces as early as 2010. To stem the population pressures of tomorrow, a suite of policies – such as those that boost workforce participation and others that prefund demographically sensitive government...

Government-mandated cartels in eggs, dairy and poultry products impose high costs on consumers and harm Canada’s standing in international trade. The authors offer compelling evidence of the high costs to Canadian consumers and limited benefits to farmers arising from the supply management...

Government spending overruns and missed revenue targets remain a common occurrence in Canada. Countrywide, spending overruns by the federal, provincial and territorial governments over the past decade exceeded $70 billion, limiting debt reduction and tax relief in earlier years, and materially...