Don't forget to VOTE tomorrow!

[John Connor]

You should drive out I70 through Kansas and Nebraska... as far as the eye can see.

Shit... They have them in North Dakota now! North Dakota! That's freaking coal country! Coal everyfreakingwhere!

 

[Imp]

Ya, I skipped. Luckily, it didn't matter because the one I was going to vote for cleaned house anyway.

Sweet. Liberal party, I heard, said something about legalizing pot. They have a majority now, so looks like I should get into the pot industry?

 

[John Connor]

"Oh secular Canada." Morality is such a meager thing I do.




It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way–in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Yay no more Stephen Harper!

Liberal: 184
Conservative: 101
NDP: 42
BQ: 10
Green: 1

NDP and even green is down, so my guess is more people voted liberal to help get harper out, so it worked out. As much as I would have liked to see more seats for NDP I think this ended up alright, as the main thing is getting rid of Harper.

Now let's just hope the Liberals actually follow through with their promises like lowering taxes for middle class and raising taxes for rich and corporations. On the flip side, really greedy corporations might lay off people to make up the extra cost, so it's kinda a double edged sword.

 

[n7]

No more Harper, thank god.

Can't say i'm thrilled with Liberals having a majority.

Disappointed NDP did so poorly.

And fuck, do i ever live in a backwards-ass idiot-filled province. So much blue loving. :/

 

[preCRT]

So, what's the deal with Trudeau? Is he a hippy flake like his mom?

 

[Dr. Zaus]

No more Harper, thank god.

Can't say i'm thrilled with Liberals having a majority.

Disappointed NDP did so poorly.

And fuck, do i ever live in a backwards-ass idiot-filled province. So much blue loving. :/

What's the alternative, really... Calgary?

PS I know like... a half a dozen people from Edmonton:

All of them work at the University of Alberta.

Two of them I like.

 

[ninaholic37]

Damn, Green party only needed 169 more seats to win a majority. Maybe next time. Hopefully Liberals follow through with their marijuana plan so Canada will have a head start for when Green rises to power... :awe:

3. Marijuana The Liberals are promising to legalize marijuana, arguing that the current system “does not prevent young people from using marijuana and too many Canadians end up with criminal records for possessing small amounts of the drug.” Trudeau has promised to get to work on the changes “right away” if elected, but he could not offer a firm timeline. “We don’t yet know exactly what rate we’re going to be taxing it, how we’re going to control it, or whether it will happen in the first months, within the first year, or whether it’s going to take a year or two to kick in,” he said.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Green actually has a really solid platform, it's just they're so small, so it's pretty much throwing a vote away, which I hate the concept of, as if people stopped thinking that way the smaller parties would perhaps get a better chance.

But either way I'm just glad Harper is gone. Hopefully Trudeau holds his promises and turns lot of stuff around.

Even though I don't smoke pot and don't intend on starting I'll be glad if it does in fact get legalized. I just hate the idea that people end up in jail over it. If it's legalized it may also spark more interest in studying it's use for medical reasons too.

 

[MongGrel]

Shit... They have them in North Dakota now! North Dakota! That's freaking coal country! Coal everyfreakingwhere!

Funny, I thought North Dakota had an oil boom going on atm.

I doubt many coal mines there, but have only been through South Dakota in the past personally I guess.

 

[KMFJD]

Damn, Green party only needed 169 more seats to win a majority. Maybe next time. Hopefully Liberals follow through with their marijuana plan so Canada will have a head start for when Green rises to power... :awe:

http://business.financialpost.com/n...iberal-wins-signals-legalization-on-the-table

Marijuana stocks are up! He hasn't been in charge 24 hours yet and the economy is headed upward!

 

[x26]

Yay no more Stephen Harper!

Liberal: 184
Conservative: 101
NDP: 42
BQ: 10
Green: 1

NDP and even green is down, so my guess is more people voted liberal to help get harper out, so it worked out. As much as I would have liked to see more seats for NDP I think this ended up alright, as the main thing is getting rid of Harper.

Now let's just hope the Liberals actually follow through with their promises like lowering taxes for middle class and raising taxes for rich and corporations. On the flip side, really greedy corporations might lay off people to make up the extra cost, so it's kinda a double edged sword.

Congratulations Canada Elected a Socialist/Communist!!

 

[iCyborg]

Now let's just hope the Liberals actually follow through with their promises like lowering taxes for middle class and raising taxes for rich and corporations. On the flip side, really greedy corporations might lay off people to make up the extra cost, so it's kinda a double edged sword.

I voted, the polling station is inside my building, pretty convenient.
I really didn't want to see Liberals winning, not to mention majority government. I practically don't like any of his economic promises:
- Lower income taxes for middle class, fine, but I'd rather have TFSA limit stay at 10K, so all-in-all, I lose. I'm really not sure why Liberals think that only the wealthy can afford to save $10K/yr...
- Promising to run the country at deficit. When did this become something to be proud of??
- Increasing the taxes for the wealthiest - the highest marginal tax rate in Ontario is 50%, it's fairly high even when compared to Western Europe. It doesn't affect me (right now anyway), it just seems like a cheap shot, it's only like 2% of the voters, and the masses love when the rich have to pay, it doesn't matter that they already pay a lot more...

Not that I'm a big fan of Harper government, or even NDP's program. I was really hoping for a non-majority government no matter who forms it...

This first-past-the-post is a bit stupid - e.g. in my riding there's no point voting for NDP, they're never close really. This year was no exception, they got 7%.

 

[Imp]

I voted, the polling station is inside my building, pretty convenient.
I really didn't want to see Liberals winning, not to mention majority government. I practically don't like any of his economic promises:
- Lower income taxes for middle class, fine, but I'd rather have TFSA limit stay at 10K, so all-in-all, I lose. I'm really not sure why Liberals think that only the wealthy can afford to save $10K/yr...
- Promising to run the country at deficit. When did this become something to be proud of??
- Increasing the taxes for the wealthiest - the highest marginal tax rate in Ontario is 50%, it's fairly high even when compared to Western Europe. It doesn't affect me (right now anyway), it just seems like a cheap shot, it's only like 2% of the voters, and the masses love when the rich have to pay, it doesn't matter that they already pay a lot more...

Not that I'm a big fan of Harper government, or even NDP's program. I was really hoping for a non-majority government no matter who forms it...

I would have preferred a minority Liberal government working with the NDP.

As for the TFSA and highest marginal rate... It's not a big deal to me. I will probably never hit the highest marginal rate on income, but if I do, it would likely only be done through my investments. But if my investments were capital gains or Canadian eligible dividends, the inclusion rate should be 0.50 anyway -- my maximum tax on investment income would then be 25%?

Also, TFSA carries more risk than I like. As far as I know, you don't get taxed on income in there. However, the 15% withholding tax on US dividends would still be applied but with no tax credit from what I know of. And any capital losses would just disappear -- I got nailed by this earlier in the year playing with COS.

 

[iCyborg]

I'm not sure why you think TFSA carries more risk. The risk is down to the investments, TFSA vs non-registered is just the matter of taxation.
Yes, 15% US witholding taxes still apply, and you can't recover them. But in a nonregistered account, you would need to pay dividend income at full marginal tax rate minus the 15% witholding tax that you can claim here, so you will still probably pay quite a bit more. Plus, all the capital gain is taxable.
And you can distribute funds a bit, e.g. stocks/funds with high dividends in non-registered, bonds in TFSA. This is assuming you've maxed out TFSA and still have money to invest, otherwise, one should always max out TFSA.
Capital losses are gone, but even with non-registered you can only offset them against capital gains, so you need to be net positive to get full use of them, and in that case you're again better off with TFSA.

 

[Imp]

I'm not sure why you think TFSA carries more risk. The risk is down to the investments, TFSA vs non-registered is just the matter of taxation.
Yes, 15% US witholding taxes still apply, and you can't recover them. But in a nonregistered account, you would need to pay dividend income at full marginal tax rate minus the 15% witholding tax that you can claim here, so you will still probably pay quite a bit more. Plus, all the capital gain is taxable.
And you can distribute funds a bit, e.g. stocks/funds with high dividends in non-registered, bonds in TFSA. This is assuming you've maxed out TFSA and still have money to invest, otherwise, one should always max out TFSA.
Capital losses are gone, but even with non-registered you can only offset them against capital gains, so you need to be net positive to get full use of them, and in that case you're again better off with TFSA.

In terms of risk, I can't claim a capital loss so if I lose, I wouldn't even be able to offset a gain elsewhere. This year alone, I lost a bunch on oil stocks but made more trading the USD. Now I can't offset that gain.

I think the big issue is that I fully expect the government to raise taxes elsewhere to make up for the tax not collected from assets sheltered in TFSA accounts.

 

[Ruptga]

Congratulations Canada Elected a Socialist/Communist!!

 

[Red Squirrel]

Yeah TFSA being lowered and running a deficit seem like a silly move, but I'm all for the taxes being lowered for the middle class. Honestly I can't say I can really benefit from the increase on the TFSA anyway, the only benifit it had to me is I have to worry less about whether or not I go over the limit, as there's not really any easy way of knowing how much you actually put into it. At least not with my bank's crappy web interface. It only remembers like a month worth of transactions.

I hope they close the loop holes for the rich, not just increase their taxes though. There are a lot of loopholes that the rich can use such as putting money overseas. They need to tackle that before anything really. This applies mostly to corporations.

 

[Imp]

Yeah TFSA being lowered and running a deficit seem like a silly move, but I'm all for the taxes being lowered for the middle class. Honestly I can't say I can really benefit from the increase on the TFSA anyway, the only benifit it had to me is I have to worry less about whether or not I go over the limit, as there's not really any easy way of knowing how much you actually put into it. At least not with my bank's crappy web interface. It only remembers like a month worth of transactions.

I can check how much TFSA room I have left in my CRA online account. Not sure how often it's updated though. I keep a spreadsheet for all my finances but always make sure to not hit the TFSA limit for the year in case I screwed up and go over.

 

[iCyborg]

In terms of risk, I can't claim a capital loss so if I lose, I wouldn't even be able to offset a gain elsewhere. This year alone, I lost a bunch on oil stocks but made more trading the USD. Now I can't offset that gain.

I believe Forex isn't allowed in TFSA, so it's a bit of a special case, but if you're really worried about this type of risk, you could have similar assets in both TFSA and non-registered, and then you're always better than keeping it all outside.

Yeah TFSA being lowered and running a deficit seem like a silly move, but I'm all for the taxes being lowered for the middle class. Honestly I can't say I can really benefit from the increase on the TFSA anyway, the only benifit it had to me is I have to worry less about whether or not I go over the limit, as there's not really any easy way of knowing how much you actually put into it. At least not with my bank's crappy web interface. It only remembers like a month worth of transactions.

I hope they close the loop holes for the rich, not just increase their taxes though. There are a lot of loopholes that the rich can use such as putting money overseas. They need to tackle that before anything really. This applies mostly to corporations.

I consider myself as middle class, but I don't have a mortgage, I rent, so investing is the primary method of building equity. My TFSA is maxed out, and I have a non-reg account which is bigger than my TFSA. I did some rebalancing in March, and I'm gonna be hit with ~$2.5K in taxes next year. A couple hundred saved on taxes won't help much with that.

As for the taxes on the rich, using a simple&naive tax calculator, the taxes owed for annual income are:
50K - $8,571
100K - $26,125
200K - $72,157

I don't feel that the problem is that rich and wealthy aren't paying their share. It's more like cheap political points. And taxing them higher will only drive more of them to find loopholes.