Letters to the editor

Although this is a problem we must face, it’s scarcely a permanent problem.  By 2040, the ratio of pension costs to GDP will drop to 2.93%.  By 2060, it will drop to 2.35%, a fraction less than what it is today.

During the peak years of increased pension costs, 2030-2040, OAS pensions will cost taxpayers about $13.5 billion more per year than they cost today. 

That's a lot of money, but look at what we currently spend on subsidies to the oil and gas industry $1.4-2 billion per year; and what we'll spend in future on corporate tax cuts, about $11.5 billion per year; an expanding prison system about $9.5 billion to build new ones or retrofit the old, and an increase of $4.75 billion per year in operating costs; and new fighter jets, $29.3 billion to build and maintain 65 of them over the next 30 years.

Whereas pension money helps citizens who are old and frail, ends up back in the community where it's spent, and is an essential expenditure, the same cannot be said of the money spent on oil and gas subsidies, corporate tax cuts, prisons, and fighter jets.

When Prime Minister Harper tells us that something must be done about rising pension costs, don’t imagine for one minute that we need to start hacking for all our worth today, that we need to hack into budgets that have been set aside for equally essential entitlements, or that we need to hack two years off the pension entitlement of every Canadian from coast to coast to coast.

We know where we can find the money to pay for our pension system, and we need to tell Prime Minister Harper that we know.

Dianne Varga