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The Canadian Bar Association came out formally against the Liberal tax changes, even though lawyers are mostly unable to use the threatened loopholes themselves. This might have seemed like a paradox until one thought it through for a minute. When a financial advisor does the math on the arrangements a high earner ought to make, some lucky lawyer gets to execute the creation of the necessary corporations, and to bill for it.

The Canadian Bar Association came out formally against the Liberal tax changes

The CBA is counted on by the public for disinterested advice on the socially optimum form of the law. At a bare minimum, it ought to have considered staying out of the debate, since it found itself in a situation savouring so much of mere guild self-interest. Instead (I learn from my friend Dale Smith), it is greeting complaints from members and other lawyers’ groups with the excuse that it belongs to “the Coalition for Small Business Tax Fairness,” which opposes the Liberal changes, and has no choice but to sing along with the rest of the choir. One reasonable conclusion would be that the organized bar has no business being part of such a “Coalition.”

In this class war—which is shaping up as a fight over whether taxation is the benign “price we pay for civilization,” or a necessary evil to be restricted—the lawyers are facing some dissension in the ranks. (This dichotomy, unfortunately, does not leave much room for the relatively detached, amoral Economist Party position.) There are signs physicians might be divided too. A couple of weeks ago I made gentle fun of the medical profession on Twitter for talking so much about income inequality as a public health issue while baying for the right to have their own incomes taxed at corporate dividend rates—ones unavailable to a mere employee in any trade.

But the Canadian Press reported Monday that some dissident doctors appear to be aware of the contradiction, and are supporting the Liberals against the wild, doom-fraught talk of the Canadian Medical Association. This will only make the autumn’s most interesting political struggle more so. Any combat veteran will tell you it is not easy to win war without unit cohesion.

National Post