Calgary Herald April 4, 2011 - A new Leger Marketing poll commissioned by the Montreal Economic Institute found that half of all Quebecers do not think their province benefits from Alberta's prosperity. Apparently, they have not heard about equalization payments.
Introduced in 1957 to promote comparable public services across the nation, equalization has actually resulted in better public services for recipient provinces like Quebec, the largest net recipient of the cash transfers. According to the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, equalization has resulted in gold-plated social programs and services for Quebec, including subsidized utilities and day care, more health-care workers per capita and tuition rates that are half of most other provinces.
In 2010-11, Quebec will receive $8.5 billion from Ottawa (via the "have" provinces of Alberta, B.C. and Ontario). Quebec's share is the most of any province, totalling $1,093 for every Quebecer.
By comparison, Alberta has contributed a net $102 billion to the federal treasury since 2004 alone. The Frontier Centre argues that equalization promotes inefficient government spending and a lack of accountability in recipient provinces like Quebec.
David MacKinnon, a former senior bureaucrat, bank executive and chief executive of the Ontario Hospital Association, noted last year that the Frontier Centre's findings bring into focus the failings of a massive, wasteful, program that shifts $40 billion to $50 billion each year from highproductivity jurisdictions to those with low productivity and economies dominated by massive inefficiency, like Quebec.
The Ontario Chamber of Commerce more recently criticized the equalization program.
Alberta's prosperity, and that of the other donor provinces, has been very good to a Quebec population ignorant of the facts.