After delivering a $4.5 billion corporate tax cut, Jason Kenney’s Blue Ribbon Panel on Alberta’s Finances proposed that Alberta’s expenditures are much too high. Chaired by Janice MacKinnon (who oversaw draconian cuts that shut down 52 rural hospitals in 1993 as NDP Finance Minister in Saskatchewan), the report recommended a $600 million cut to Alberta’s operational spending and a four-year freeze.

Trevor Harrison, director of the Parkland Institute, joins Team Advantage to discuss an alternate blue-ribbon report he recently co-authored, Cutting Through the Blue Ribbon: A Balanced Look at Alberta’s Finances.

How does Alberta’s economy stack up when compared to other provinces and the Canadian average? How does Alberta’s debt compare to the balance-books of other provinces? Are Alberta’s expenditures really out of line? What would happen if Alberta used stable revenue streams (taxation!) to finance its expenditures, and used its non-renewable resource revenues to fund the necessary transition? All this and more…