Globe and Mail: Surprise! Ottawa underestimates surplus

[Newsjock]

Oh, to have such problems here.
http://globeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20050822.wslurp0822/BNStory/National

Canadian Press

Ottawa -- The federal piggy bank is swelling with strong early revenues, as Ottawa's surplus so far is larger than Finance Minister Ralph Goodale projected for the entire year.

Newly released figures show that in the first three months of fiscal 2005-06, Ottawa recorded a surplus of $4.8-billion — including a $1.7-billion surplus in June alone.

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[marmar]

1. Surpluses... ?

We haven't seen any of those since... the Clinton administration.

[AndyTiedye]

2. Remember When The US Was Running a Surplus?

and the economy was booming,
and we were at peace,
and we had a real President.

[getmeouttahere]

3. Now THAT's how you run a country!

Congrats Canada! And just think, they accomplish that while paying for socialized medicine, among other things.

[Bluebear]

4. I remember those. What was it, oh, 5 years ago? nt

[achtung_circus]

5. The Liberal Party catches a lot of grief

from the cut tax people, for daring to run a surplus. They say that it is proof positive that the Liberal Party is tax and spend.

Well, I'd rather have a surplus than a deficit and what the Conservative Party and the Fraser Institute always, somehow leaves out of their press releases is that we still have debt, the accumulated deficits over the years.

What the Liberals do is estimate "conservatively" and when the accrue a surplus they put it against the debt, saving future interest charges, or they put it into programs.

Oh, I forgot, programs run by the government are a bad thing. They include health care, infrastructure, defense, etc. etc.

Things are by no means heaven in Canada, but having money to address problems beats NOT having money to address problems.

[tanyev]

6. Well they need to pick a country and invade it.

That will take care of that surplus real quick. Oh, and give the people some tax cuts at the same time. Yessir, that'll do it.