I’ve got the Costco Mastercard and it looks pretty comparable. Phone/ purchase protection, travel insurance, etc.. Costco is 2-3% on some purchases and 1% on everything else, though you can only spend the cash back at Costco. Maybe if I took the time to pick between each I could average an extra 1/2%. More choice is always good though and this helps squeeze other issuers to get more competitive.
I think it’s easier to qualify for the Costco card though than the no fees for the WealthSimple one.
Been a little while since I looked up the utility rates, but last I remember gas is about 1/7 the cost of electricity in Saskatchewan. Makes it hard to justify heat pumps for heating in most places. Hope the technology continues to improve and it’ll be a more sustainable option when we have a more sustainable grid.
I’m torn. With broadcasting there’s an argument that the bandwidth is publicly owned so there should be some oversight in the content that’s transmitted. Mandating Canadian content here seems okay, kind of like how we control .ca domains and have some say in who gets to use them. For streaming though it seems to be private infrastructure, it’s been built using public funds, but the people running the infrastructure aren’t really making decisions about the content it caries. They just lease it out to anybody with minimal oversight. It’d be kind of like mandating that some% of phone calls need to be Canadian content.
Then again, we do control the .ca domains so we might argue that foreign companies using them should make some effort to carry or promote Canadian content. Get too restrictive though and companies just shut down the .ca domain and make us use the .com version which we can’t really control.
Sure, but to some extent you could say the same about any necessity. Groceries, clothing, healthcare, etc.. Then we could extend that to the things that are required for those necessities, transportion, natural resources, sections of the labour market, etc.. Maybe housing does actually have a larger gap between input costs and market rate, and it's probably the single largest expense for most and particularly those at the lower end of the income scale so it's good place to start making changes.
If we trusted most people to manage their budgets we wouldn't need things like EI and CPP, people would just be setting aside enough to cover that. People also need time to build those emergency or planned upgrade funds so telling someone who's only been on their own to make sure they have enough se aside to cover a major repair isn't very practical.
I would argue that landlords provide a service in providing a relatively predictable monthly cost of housing. On any given month a homeowner(and/or landlord) could have anywhere from $0 to thousands of dollars of unexpected expenses, things like a major appliance failing or plumbing/electrical issue. Plus there’s intermittent expanses that can be planned for, things like replacing shingles or proactively replacing an appliance approaching its end of life.
It also seems like a market with relatively free competition, given that the cost of purchasing a rental property can be relatively low compared to opening another kind of business. It’s relatively low risk since most of the expense is an appreciable asset, but also relatively low return (historically and over an extended period) than other market investments. Many would actually come out ahead by renting their home and putting the equivalent of what would go to toward their home’s equity into something like a mutual fund.
I think the biggest issue is just lack of good options at the lower end of the housing market. So much new construction is above the average home pricing because that’s where the builders are able to make a reasonable return. The more affordable properties are usually older units, often with significant issues. The Canadian government seems to be on the right track to getting more affordable units built. We don’t need more 1500+ ft^2 units, we need more units in the 500-700 ft^2 range. Something that a single person or young couple with minimal possessions can use as a starter home to build equity. Even if it gets bought by someone to use as an investment property, it can still have a relatively affordable rent while still providing a landlord a reasonable return on their investment.
More affordable units also reduces demand for the currently available units, bringing down prices for the mid-range market as well.
That’s an issue, but it’s not the whole issue. You’re not going to get a reasonable home down to the price of a budget vehicle. It’s not just home prices alone that have gone up over 60 years, it’s most essential goods combined with stagnating wages that means people need to spend a greater portion of their of their income on basic essentials and don’t have as much left to save for future big purchases.
Don’t get me wrong, homes need to be more affordable, but arbitrary reductionist ideas like let’s ban landlords don’t really work.
Some other ideas might be to increase minimum wages, yes this increases inflation but the people at the lower end of the wage scale still come out ahead. Have a crown corp for housing, even if it needs to be subsidized. Give people affordable and reasonable quality options and make private industry have to compete against that. Some better benefits for tradespeople, like lower the exemption on the trade tools tax credit to make construction more affordable. Though there’s a weird thing that happens where companies bring in big crews of apprentices for cheap labour and then lay-off the journeypeople so they don’t have to pay Journeyperson wages. I guess this keeps costs lower, but it’d be nice to see something combat this so there’s better job prospects for people that complete their apprenticeships.
Housing is one of the most expensive purchases most people will ever make. Are you saying everybody must be able to commit to that to have a place to live?
Reminder that “engagement” is likely a major factor regardless of whether it’s agreement or not. Commenting that you disagree with something is the same as commenting agreement as far as the algorithm is concerned. Ignoring things that you don’t want to spread seems like a good way to combat this, but that leaves you with the “echo chamber” issue. If we only engage with things we agree with then our ideals are never challenged and we don’t have an opportunity to improve. Seems kind of damned if you do damned if you don’t.
For a regular personal loan it might be close. I can say over the last year my TFSA did a little better than the rate on my line of credit, but that’s just an anecdotal data point. Where it usually makes more sense is something like having a mortgage, which is generally a lower rate, making the minimum payments on a long amortization period and using any extra cash to invest. For a minimal risk investment like GICs and such the return is minimal. For a longer horizon, more volatile equity investments will do better, but also more risky for short term gains.
Is there anywhere else that’s switched to proportional representation, run-off voting, or similar from FPTP? How does it affect things like regional representation. Seems like it creates instances where the candidate from some ridings gets a seat with fewer votes than the other candidate. I think the urban/rural divide is only going to get worse as technology leads to more migration to urban areas even though it’s the rural population that’s taking care of the fundamentals in our economy.
I’m not sure how effective it is, but it seems like CRA has been tightening up on some kinds of business expenses, or at least my previous employer interpreted it that way. When people have things like company vehicles or phones, or get comparable benefits from work the value of those things being used for non-work related purposes is taxable. That’s also why there’s standards for things like mileage or per-diems so people can be compensated for realistic expenses, but not use it as a way to avoid income taxes.
We should also be careful about how we close some “loopholes”. Like it makes sense that a person can mortgage their personal property and use that to fund their business. It also makes sense that they can claim the interest on that mortgage as a tax deduction since it’s kind of a business related expense. It feels different when someone with a net worth less than a million does that compared to someone worth more than a billion, so I don’t think it’s closing the loophole altogether but putting limits like only claiming interest on something like $300k of debt (or something close to the average amount owed on a home of an average valuation).
I’ll also add that the idea behind reduced taxation on capital gains is it encourages people to invest in businesses and grow the economy. That makes sense economically. Canada also does better than some places(USA) in this way because capital gains are considered realized and paid on death so there’s not really a way to avoid them altogether, at best you’re putting it off for 60ish years. We also have things like the TFSA, which allows us to invest without being subject to capital gains tax. A person able to max out their RRSP/TFSA/CPP contributions would have a very comfortable retirement, while people earning significantly more have more limited options in deferring/eliminating their tax burden.
Isn’t the WealthSimple card a Visa though? Costco only takes Mastercard so you wouldn’t be using it there. Costco card is 3% on Costco gas and restaurants, 2% on other gas and Costco.ca. For me that’s a big part of my spending.
Now if someone doesn’t do Costco then the WealthSimple card is probably a better option than lots of other cards. Particularly if they qualify for not paying the monthly fee.