Tag Archives: Canada

News

Burger King leaves U.S. 35% corporate tax rate for Canada’s 15% corporate tax rate

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Prime Minister Stephen Harper
Prime Minister Stephen Harper: all your base are belong to us!

Wow, I really hate Burger King, but this latest move leaves me very confused. Maybe I have to eat there now?

The Chicago Tribune reports on it.

Excerpt:

Canada has become the latest frontier for U.S. companies fleeing the high cost of business, spurred by low corporate taxes and a policy that keeps international earnings out of the clutches of the Internal Revenue Service.

Burger King, the second-largest U.S. burger chain, agreed to acquire Oakville, Ontario-based Tim Hortons on Tuesday for about C$12.5 billion ($11.4 billion) in a deal that creates the world’s third-largest fast-food chain and moves its headquarters in Canada. It’s “not fair” that companies can renounce their U.S. citizenship by filling out paperwork, a White House spokesman said Monday.

The deal for Oakville, Ontario-based Tim Hortons follows Valeant Pharmaceuticals’ merger with Canada’s Biovail in 2010, which sparked the latest so- called tax-inversion wave.

Burger King is unlikely to be the last U.S. company to consider moving north even as President Barack Obama and his aides try to curb the practice, tax experts say. In addition to avoiding U.S. taxes on global earnings, companies like Burger King can take advantage of Canadian tax rates that have been cut by about a quarter in the past eight years.

“We have now made it a lot more attractive for companies to say Canada is a good place to set up shop,” said Jack Mintz, director of the University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy.

[…]Lower corporate taxes may also be an attraction for foreign companies. Canada began cutting its federal corporate tax rate in 2001 under the previous Liberal government. Prime Minister Stephen Harper then took up the baton, dropping the rate in several steps to 15 percent in 2012. Combined with provincial rates averaging 11.5 percent, Canada’s rate of 27 percent is now the second-lowest in the Group of Seven countries behind the U.K.’s 21 percent, according to auditing and tax firm KPMG.

Canada’s combined rate is still above the 24 percent average for the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, according to the report.

Low corporate tax rates helped the country rise to second place in a Bloomberg ranking of best countries for doing business in January, behind only Hong Kong.

“We are proud that our low tax environment in Canada attracts businesses,” Carl Vallee, a spokesman for Harper, said by email on Monday.

The U.S. corporate tax rate is the highest in the world. It warms my heart to think that corporations are moving out to Canada. And I hope they take the jobs with them, because that’s the only way people will learn to elect presidents who understand economics. Our leader is out of his depth trying to run this country, and is only able to his economic failures by borrowing trillions and trillions of dollars from our children. Anybody can appear competent if they borrow and spend that much money, but it’s a bubble, just like the housing bubble his party caused. Canada’s prime minister has a BA and MA in economics – he actually knows how economies work. We could have picked someone qualified, but we didn’t.

I fully expect Obama to whine like a little girl about this, and call Burger King “unpatriotic”. This is loser talk, because he is a loser. The limit of his knowledge of economics is that he makes snarky speeches insulting people who disagree with him. Why did we elect this stand-up comedian? Is that what a President is supposed to do?

News

In Canada, goose eggs are protected, but unborn children can be killed through all 9 months

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Eagle eggs are protected, unborn babies are not
Eagle eggs are protected, unborn babies are not

From Life News a story not about eagle eggs, but about goose eggs – in Canada.

Excerpt:

Though majestic in flight, [geese] have become a nuisance in recent years, and with a birth rate hovering around 5 goslings per year, new methods of population control are being explored.

One such method is egg addling.

This practice, which is detailed on Environment Canada’s website as well as The Humane Society of the United States, is a process whereby geese eggs are gently removed from the nest, coated in vegetable oil and then returned to the nest. The purpose of the oil is to prevent the embryo from developing any further. Essentially, it blocks the transfer of oxygen and other gases through the shell.

The reason this practice is highly successful is because the female goose will continue laying on the eggs for a lengthy period not realizing they will never hatch. Alternatively, if the eggs are removed and destroyed, she simply will lay more eggs nearby and nullify any attempt to decrease the population. In both the United States and Canada, anyone wishing to engage in the practise of egg addling must first retain a permit from authorities.

One of the steps in the process of addling is to place the eggs in a bucket of water. If the egg sinks it is considered humane to coat it with oil. On the other hand, if the egg floats it is understood to be past 14 days of incubation which means the embryo is now viable and it would be inhumane to kill it. Regardless of your views of Canada geese, it is understandable there are some guidelines on when and how their pre-born goslings can be killed.

Juxtapose these regulations with the complete lack thereof when it comes to unwanted humans. The contrast is difficult to ignore.  We have rules based on compassion to prevent people from killing a viable pre-born gosling, but no rules whatsoever when it comes to people killing unwanted pre-born people.

In Canada there are multiple ways to legally end the lives of viable fetuses; some of which are barbaric and cruel. In 2010 there were over 10,000 abortions past 13 weeks gestation in our country. These pre-born children suffered through the inhumane procedure of being torn limb by limb from their mother’s womb. Almost every other civilized nation and the vast majority of European countries provide fetal protection after 13 weeks gestation. Is this because these countries are paternalistic and oppressive? No, it’s because they care about human rights.

Canada is a very secular country, so their abortion law is very much in favor of allowing the strong to kill the weak legally through all nine months of pregnancy. Canada has no federal law governing abortion.

Keep in mind that abortion in Canada is 100% taxpayer-funded. Everyone who pays taxes there is indirectly forced to take part in this practice.

 

 

 

 

News

Ontario Law Society bans graduates of Christian university from practicing law

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Political map of Canada
Political map of Canada

The government-run leftist CBC reports. (H/T Kevin)

Excerpt:

The Law Society of Upper Canada has voted 28 to 21 against the accreditation of Trinity Western University’s proposed new law school in B.C.

The vote means graduates from the B.C. university would not be able to practise in Ontario.

“Benchers took this issue very seriously, and did not find it easy to reach a decision,” said the Law Society of Upper Canada’s treasurer, in a written statement.

“As members of the legal profession, we recognize the entrenched values of Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms, and Ontario’s Human Rights Code, including the right of equality and the right to freedom of religion, and the foundational nature of those rights to our democracy.”

Trinity Western University students must sign a strict Christian covenant governing behaviour, including abstaining from sexual intimacy “that violates the sacredness of marriage between a man and a woman.”

Critics say the covenant essentially bans anyone in a gay relationship from enrolling in the school.

Earlier this month, the West Coast Legal Education Action Fund, a non-profit organization founded to ensure women’s equality rights under the law, argued against the university law school’s accreditation in B.C.

It’s important to note that Canada was one of the first countries to legalize same-sex marriage, so they are a sort of crystal ball for us to see what happens when a country does that. In my opinion, when people say “I am for same-sex marriage”, what they really mean is that if you disagree with them on that, then you need to be forced to agree with them, or else. That is what happens when the definition of marriage in society changes and dissent becomes a crime. Just ask Frank Turek or Brendan Eich how tolerant the gay left is of different views.