本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛新税案通过，NDP的拥护者，大多是低收入的，头一个就要受影响，因为300亿CAPITAL LOSS肯定造成税收减少，国库收入减少，那就要消减福利！
看完议会听证会的数据，才有资格讲这个议题：
To the surprise of absolutely no one, Finance Minister Jim Flaherty offered no new documentation supporting tax leakage in his testimony to a House of Commons Finance Committee special hearing last week. To the surprise of absolutely everyone, he was boxed into admitting that the effective Canadian corporate tax rate was 6.9 percent.
That blows the level-playing-field argument; 6.9 percent and 31.5 percent aren’t even the same sport.
Were he able, Flaherty would have produced silver-bullet numbers on leakage and lost productivity. What he offered was more of the same times two--in some cases times 10.
Day two of the hearings featured Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge. Dodge’s comments fit the “all income trust economy versus zero income trust economy” frame the Conservatives have essentially been forced to defend, and headline writers for the major media outlets played along. But take a look at his prepared statement, reminiscent as it is of the tightrope walking of a recently departed North American central banker.
Dodge provided a lot of cover for Harper, Flaherty and the Conservatives in his testimony before the special committee Thursday, plenty of headline-worthy snippets and all-ships-in-the-same-direction endorsements. Intentional or not, Dodge pulled off a great imitation of noted political sophisticate Alan Greenspan, spinning enough “gray area” on which to build a 10-year transition window and an energy-patch exemption.
Dodge narrowly defined the BoC’s interest in the matter:
I should start by making clear where the Bank of Canada’s main interest in the income trust sector lies. Our interest in income trusts relates to the efficient functioning and health of Canada's financial system…
...[W]e are naturally interested in developments in financial markets, such as the evolution of the income trust market, that have the potential to affect financial system efficiency.
Last year, before Halloween, Dodge spoke positively of trusts’ impact on the financial system. Dodge then referred to that one study his shop produced directly addressing trusts, the June 2006 edition of the Bank of Canada’s Financial System Review:
...we noted that limited evidence suggests that income trusts can enhance market completeness in a couple of ways. First, income trusts can provide diversification benefits to investors, because trusts can have different risk-return characteristics than either equities or bonds. Second, the income trust structure appears to allow some firms improved access to market financing. So, insofar as income trusts allow investors to achieve risk-return benefits that they could not otherwise achieve, and serve as a source of financing to firms that might not otherwise have had access to markets, it can be said that income trusts enhance market completeness, and therefore support financial system efficiency.
The Financial System Review also noted that accounting and governance standards aren’t the same for trusts as for corporations. This is certainly a legitimate area of concern, one raised by an organization of pensioners. “The federal government should not be giving tax incentives for seniors to purchase an investment that is risky and does not have a proper investor protection regime in place,” the National Pensioners and Senior Citizens Federations said in its brief to the Finance Committee. Even this “support” for the government’s action highlights the government’s clumsiness. Trusts and investors would certainly welcome a discussion on reporting requirements as part of a package that doesn’t kill them.
Dodge spoke directly to issues the BoC had studied and on which he had sufficient knowledge to comment, pointing out that they hadn’t looked at the long-term impact on the Canadian economy.
These are the aspects of income trusts that we at the Bank have looked at and on which we are best able to comment. Of course, there are very important public policy questions related to income trusts that fall outside the Bank's mandate. The Bank has done no specific research on how the income trust structure affects economic performance, or would affect the future productivity of the Canadian economy.
In closing, Dodge left a lot of room for an industrious policymaker to craft a proposal that preserves market efficiency and satisfies investor demand within a framework that properly exempts certain assets and businesses.
While we at the Bank have not done any research on how the rules of the tax system could be designed so that they do not give inappropriate incentives that would bias the choice of firms to operate either as an income trust or as a corporation, the changes proposed by the government last October would appear to substantially level the playing field. For the income trust sector to deliver efficiency benefits through the enhancement of market completeness, it's important that the tax system provide a level playing field.
Dodge’s observation that Flaherty’s proposal levels the playing field is factually true, in the sense that no sane manager would kiss off 31.5 percent of income as opposed to 6.9 percent. Trusts will convert back, and everyone will play on the same field.
It’s not hard for anyone unconstrained by a bad debating position to see that an exception for energy producers could be appropriate, or a 10-year transition window may also serve the public interest.
Liberal finance critic John McCallum signaled his party’s intention to continue the debate, noting that the central bank boss admitted that income trusts enhance financial markets by allowing investors to diversify their portfolios and by easing access to capital markets for businesses that might not otherwise get financed. “I've never heard a less qualified endorsement of a government by a central bank governor,” McCallum said. “The central bank governor works for the government, he cannot possibly say the government is wrong.”
As for the politics, Harper can’t flip-flop on the flip-flop. He’s already lost some of his straight shooter sheen trying to win votes--morphing on the environment and climate change, failing to address healthcare wait times as promised. Trapped in Harper’s majority gambit, Flaherty is like John Iselin to the prime minister’s Mrs. Iselin, shouting different numbers in different directions, answering no question in particular.
On one important thing all relevant parties would agree, politics aside. There are certain assets, business plans and management teams suitable for the income trust structure. Most are not. (Funny enough, the market weeded out a good number of nonhackers. Go figure.)
There’s a great story in financial market efficiency, investor choice and useful exploitation of vital resources buried under the headlines and the political hide-covering.
And the trust tax issue may have exposed a subtle change in the investor class--it’s bigger and a lot more diverse than, obviously, the Conservatives in Canada realized. It's ironic that a left-leaning party in a liberal country could lead the way in carving out an asset class that makes use of natural resources and at least partially addresses a pressing demographic problem.
The Liberals have already offered a broad hint that they’ll carry the ball as far as they consider it a political asset. It just so happens that the longer that’s the case, the more pressure will build for them to follow through with a legislative change, should they take power. National polling suggests a tight race, with neither the Conservatives nor the Liberals showing the makeup of a contender for majority control. But if they don’t have to toe a minority government party line, Conservative backbenchers should certainly have more leeway to vote their conscience.
The Liberals still have a lot of room and time to exploit Flaherty’s oversimplifications and Dodge’s accommodations. A new government has been, and continues to be, the best hope for a tax holiday extension and an exception for energy trusts.更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net