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Both the Ontario Liberals and the Ontario NDP have promised to increase the province’s deficit if they form government in June. Even Ontario PC Leader Doug Ford hasn’t ruled out a deficit just yet. This is in sharp contrast to 2014, when all parties had debt reduction in their platforms.

With spending apparently au courant again in Ontario, it’s worth checking in on the liabilities of Canada’s largest sub-national government.

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Debt is at $311,653,000,000, and it’s still going up

According to the Ontario Financing Authority, the province owes $312 billion. This is equivalent to $22,919 per Ontarian, $26,112 per registered Ontario motor vehicle and $1.3 million per Ontario beef cow. It’s also 37.6 per cent of the province’s GDP. What’s remarkable is how quickly it’s going up. In 2011, the year the last Harry Potter movie came out, Ontario debt stood at $236 billion. On average, Ontario is shouldering more debt now than at any other point in its history. This is where provinces differ from the federal government. No matter how bad Ottawa’s finances get, they can at least take comfort that they’re still running more sustainable budgets than their Second World War predecessors.

Photo by National Post

The debt is larger than the GDP of 75 per cent of the world’s countries

Ontario has the country’s largest community of Jamaican-Canadians. If Jamaica donated its entire 2017 GDP towards paying off Ontario’s debt, they would only manage to cover six per cent of the total. Of the world’s 200 or so countries, in fact, that vast majority of them — 146 — have an annual GDP that is smaller than what Ontario owes. This list includes New Zealand, Portugal, Ukraine, Kenya and Romania.