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People in the west (most of them, theres always loonies) don't believe the average person out east has some conspiracy to take all our money, it's the government.
For example, since 1960 Alberta has lost over 200 billion in equalization money to other provinces, quebec has gained over 200 billion. The amount this year that alberta is loosing is 8 billion.
When you consider the GDP of Alberta is just over 90 billion, thats almost 10%.
The charest government in quebec was just elected, one one of the things they are looking to do is get more equalization payments, squeezing even more money out of alberta, and making us loose our heritage trust fund (a fund that gets us through times of low oil prices, it's a buffer)
When you look at it, only two provinces give out equalization payemnts, ontario and alberta, and alberta gives out twice as many payments as ontario.
The TD bank resently relased a report stating the the calgary edmonton corridor is the richest in Canada, at 40% above the national average
However, that regions per captita earning are only 4.7% above national levels.
wages are 2% higher.
afer tax income is only 6% higher.
Wheres this 40% going?
Now with all this money flowing out of alberta, You'd think we'd have some chance to influence Canada's politics, but we really don't.
We try and do something in the province that the federal government doesn't like, they threaten to withhold tax money from us, even if it's things that other povinces have already done (adding the option of private health care for one).
The majority of Albertans don't want to seperate from Canada. (70%) however, we see Quebec threatening and whining, and basically getting there way, so we view it as the only possible solution now.
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