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OTTAWA — The cornerstone of the Liberal campaign platform was a pledge to grow the economy and create jobs by putting more cash into the hands of middle-class Canadians through aggressive new tax measures.

But that policy pillar — to be supported by higher tax payments by the country’s biggest wage earners — could be crumbling, less than three months post-election.

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That’s because delivering on the promise, intended to be “revenue neutral,” is proving much more costly than envisioned when Justin Trudeau was elected prime minister on Oct. 19.

For starters, the hoped-for economic climb-back from the oil-plunge-fueled recession in the first half of last year is sputtering and could stall, or possibly go into reverse — undermining Ottawa’s ability to spread the wealth by providing average wage earners with more untaxed dollars to spend or save, or both.

Also troublesome, Trudeau’s tax regime for 2016 and beyond could actually lead to a mini-exodus of the country’s top-income professionals — those with annual salaries above $200,000, the threshold for the new, high-income tax bracket — whose taxes would be needed to cover the gap created by the tax cut given to Canadians earning between $45,000 and $90,000 a year.