B is for Budget

The government has fallen because of the budget, at least in part, even though the budget was actually not announced this week.

To continue with our discussion of yesterday regarding the gravy train our politicians are riding let’s take a look at what our MPs, MLAs and other elected folks reap, all at taxpayers’ expense. I quote from a website:

“One out of five MPs in the House of Commons can boost their chances of receiving a lucrative pension by preventing a fall election and ensuring the current Parliament survives at least until July 2010, reveals a survey by Canwest News Service.

The survey examined the number of MPs who were first elected in June 2004 and are less than a year away from having the six years of service required to qualify for a government pension that can kick in at age 55.

It found that 74 MPs with several years of experience could find themselves without a pension, if they fail to hold onto their seats, and in the same boat as those elected for the first time in the 2008 election.

But if there is no election before next summer, 36 Conservatives, 16 Bloc Quebecois MPs, 14 Liberals and eight New Democrats can qualify for a pension that would give them at least $25,000 a year based on the minimum MP salary that now stands at $157,731 per year.”

How would you like to have a pension of $25,000 – over and above your old age pension and CPP (the combined average is about $12,000)? Any disparity in these numbers? Triple what an average Canadian gets and that is only what we see out of the taxpayers’ pocket. Most of these MPs have other sources of income in addition to these taxpayer funded pensions, and many also end up double and even triple dipping for pensions.

Somehow we average folk have to BUDGET our money to try to scrape together enough savings to buy in to an each year. According to Statistics Canada, a mere 31% of eligible tax payers actually made a contribution for the 2007 tax year. The average contribution to a RRSP was $5,412 but the median contribution was only $2,780. That’s the sad average that people can manage to save. Those numbers won’t bring you up to $25,000 per year.

Meanwhile the federal budgets talk in billions of dollars for this, that and the next thing. How much of the federal budget funds CPP? Tomorrow.