Today, the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives released the Alternative Federal Budget 2013: Doing Better Together, a project which CUPE proudly supports.
Budgets are about choices that reflect a government’s values and priorities. The Alternative Federal Budget(AFB) shows us what the federal government could do if it decided to seriously tackle Canadians’ largest social, economic, and environmental concerns.
This year’s AFB shows how growth-killing austerity can be replaced by a plan that strengthens the economy, leads to a better quality of life for all Canadians, and eliminates the deficit by 2016.
This year’s Alternative Federal Budget:
- reduces poverty and inequality by investing in child care, pharmacare, affordable housing, income supports, and post-secondary education,
- tackles the ongoing crisis for First Nations housing, drinking water, education,
- implements a long term, transparent and public plan for investments in infrastructure,
- creates 300,000 jobs, lowering the unemployment rate to 6% by 2014, and
- introduces a new top personal income tax bracket, closes the biggest tax loopholes, and introduces a withholding tax on tax havens.
The full budget document, a budget-in-brief, and infographics are available in both English and French. For more, visit www.policyalternatives.ca/afb2013.