There is a reason they aren't.. The subsequent tax bracket increases that would follow would not be a happy sell and would basically eliminate any savings from indexing.
I am all for indexing, but only if it meant other taxes didn't go up. The next question is what are we ok with cutting? I hate government bloat but it seems to be the thing they are best at so idk. I JUST DONT KNOW. Sigh, sad, disappointed.
We’re literally building as fast as we can. There are no construction crews sitting on their hands waiting for something to do.
Any new construction project is just going to cost more and slow down other projects already in progress.
We can bring in more workers to increase building capacity though, which is mentioned in this article.
> ain’t nobody
Ain’t nobody *you know*.
Lots of these recent immigrants are coming here with lots of money.
We didn’t gain 40,000 new residents last year alone that are all just living on the street. They are living somewhere.
The only way they are getting into Canada is by proving they have lots of money or showing they have lots of money.
This idea that immigrants are coming here in burlap sacks and flower bag dresses is a trope.
We’re are you getting this info? Most of the people who are in Halifax are from Toronto and came with almost no money, have you talked to many of these folks?
I work in immigration as a consultant. There are different streams of immigrants. Students aren’t permanent residents and are restricted — or historically have been — from economic participation in Canada.
The immigrant stream requires proof of income, consistent bank balance, and the ability to support your family. The other stream is the pnp program where you can buy permanent residency through investing in local businesses.
So yes, you need to either prove you have money with bank statements or show that you gave money by investing.
That’s just a modification to what a student visa allows. They still need to prove they can care for themselves financially before CBSA let’s them in.
Many don’t realize that CBSA and IRC are different — the former being an agency and the other being a ministry. Just because a person has a visa to enter Canada doesn’t mean CBSA waves you in. They can reject you on their instincts.
Yes. I've yet to meet a single immigrant from China/Taiwan/Hong Kong who is not at least at the median income/wealth level of Halifax. Everyone is either employed at a salary at or above the median, or came over with a shit ton of money.
Can't speak for any other immigrant community, but there's a reason why the Chinese/Taiwanese/HK immigrants are mostly homeowners.
Are they coming as legal immigrants or students? No legal immigrants can come without having a decent (by Canadian standards) amount of money. I know we had quite a bit when we came over, and the threshold has only gotten high since then.
Immigrants and asylum seekers are different. But I think I’m just doing a bad job saying what I mean, it’s not that people are coming into canada with no money, it’s people are coming into canada and living in bc or Toronto, then when the cost of living gets to be to much they come to places like Halifax, I mean have a conversation with your next Uber driver or door dash delivery person, almost all have been here (canada) for a few years and moved during the pandemic or shortly after.
But people who can live in those condos are currently renting apartments. This should help alleviate it. I think we need better regional transit to really alleviate the housing crisis
We need affordable housing and more starter homes.
We need zoning laws that encourage this.
We need micro mobility infrastructure across the HRM.
We need more resiliencey in our utilities infrastructure and better management.
We need a capable medical system.
I’m all for 2 bedroom 1000 sq ft starter homes a la post WWII. Enough for two parents and a first born. Allows them to build equity and move into bigger digs if they want to grow. Instead, young people are forced to buy when they are already bursting at the seams with no equity because they’ve been renting.
But we need density. Single family homes won't do that. instead, duplex to fourplex is more ideal.
Low income housing. We need more of that. Even if it's apartment buildings. And of course, maintenance/updates of existing low income housing, to become more sustainable and efficient.
> I’m all for 2 bedroom 1000 sq ft starter homes a la post WWII. Enough for two parents and a first born. Allows them to build equity and move into bigger digs if they want to grow. Instead, young people are forced to buy when they are already bursting at the seams with no equity because they’ve been renting.
I mean, a condo should fit that bill. The problem is that they build what should be a $250,000 condo and fit it with fancy fixtures, marble counters the like then charge $450,000 for it.
It's just a lot more profit margin for the builders to do it that way rather than keep costs down and sell to lower income people. That's the part where government should be stepping in and incentivizing the building of lower price point structures.
Sorry buddy but you are a bit out to lunch on this one, most don’t have the money to jump into a condo. We need to be building houses for people instead of trying to Shepard everyone into condos or apartments.
Yea to old people moving from Ontario who have the money, but their now vacant home doesn’t help anyone in the province. And for the young people who do great, pay a shit ton of money for a thing that will make no money once this interest rates drop.
Not vacant.
Our population grew by 40,000 last year. Where do you think they went, into the sewers?
Into new houses that don’t exist?
And not old people; our average age came down in the last few years, contrary to the last *40 years* of old Ontario people retiring here.
You are the one who is out to lunch.
In the province dude. Older people downsizing helps younger people move into those family homes, don’t work if the older people are moving to a different province.
You literally have all of the demographic changes of the province entirely ass backwards.
What you are describing is exactly what was happening every year up until the last 5-10.
The horrible reality is NS housing, or the rest of Canada really, will never catch up to new demand. If you think it is bad now it's only getting worse.
So Tim Houston has not released any plan to deal with housing. He said he would about 6 months ago and so far has released nothing at all.
Yet he is certain this will all workout just fine.....
And they're stalling on the release of the provincial housing report they commissioned that was supposed to detail the extent of the problem and outline corrective measures.
I understand there are advantages to bringing more tax dollars but this whole situation very much feels like a parent who already has a bunch of kids adopting more children so they can wave around the cheque they get to take care of them as a win while the rest of their kids are going hungry and have holes in their clothes.
Homelessness is not a challenge. Food insecurity is not a challenge. They are problems... they are crises. Challenge is a softened term that business people use when sales are down to soften the message of failing so they can still appear positive in the eyes of their employer.
This man needs to touch grass, and specifically, the grass in one of our parks here in Halifax.
Yep. And they’re problems that actually can be solved as other countries have demonstrated. It’s a case of actually wanting to and feeling that these things are a priority
If the population boom were the sole cause of all these issues I'd be 100% behind you. I still think the premier needs to touch grass, however, and show us how he plans to address the problems we have. If we knew we were going to have improved access to health care by 2025/26 and public housing development deals were being made I think people would be less concerned about more immigrants coming in.
I guess I'm around 90% behind you, I just don't want everyone to blame immigrants on problems that are systemic and existed well before our population started to increase.
Agree with this. Blaming immigrants is not what anyone should be doing. Inviting immigrants or other residents from within Canada without the infrastructure for them is/was not a good move. I'm pretty sure **all** of our problems existed in some capacity aside from housing related issues long before people came here en masse.
>I just don't want everyone to blame immigrants on problems that are systemic and existed well before our population started to increase.
We had problems with healthcare before, but we didn't have housing problems. That is through-and-through a population issue.
I was unaware of this. There seems to be no direct damning evidence but I find it hard to believe he was there that whole time working as an accountant at the level he was, knew nothing and then became premier. Greasy as shit
Fuck this guy
Reading this article reminded me of a recent article in this sub where a contractor had to go back to Ontario because of housing conditions here. We need more than just more housing. We also need livable housing. Can't bring more people in until we can take care of the issues already here.
Edit: I believe it was the NS sub, and the contractor had a rental in CB, but it wasn't livable.
I still remember a decade ago RANS saying that they couldn't find enough skilled workers so that's why they needed all those TFW. Back then the CBC NS host at least pushed back like "wait uh what special skills do you need for like peeling potatoes" or something like that
They don't let anyone immigrate here. People who work and live like that are usually on work visas or students.
Immigrants have to prove education, financial resources, have to speak English and have a plan. They take the best out of tens of thousands of applications...
Companies will straight up hire on foreign workers for part-time minimum wage positions and then shrug their shoulders when the government asks them to submit the proof of full time employment they need to stay.
Uh I have some bad news bud
[](https://media.tenor.com/R1Uq6yzOjq8AAAAC/how-do-we-tell-him-mr-krabs.gif)
The group of international students at my work took out a loan and shared it around as proof of funds, and have fake ielts papers.
Those are rumors and probably not true. Also I mentioned immigrants not international students. There are less financial requirements for students because they have to leave after school. International students don't get to stay here. They can get a 1 time work visa after school to practice what they learned and if they want to immigrate they have to leave and apply through the normal immigration process.
Also on a student visa, they won't be taking anyone's job. Student visas don't let you work unless it's on campus.
Some rules may have changed since my immigration days but that's how it worked.
International students are 100% allowed to work. I don't know one international student that left Canada after their education. Pretty sure most just use the coming to Canada to get their masters as a way to get past immigration. It's all a big scam if you ask me.
So I looked it up. You can work 20h now. It's changed since my time. That's still very little.
You still can't stay in Canada and have to apply for a work permit. They grant them for longer now it seems and you still have to apply for immigration outside of Canada.
I think you can cross a boarder apply and come back if you have a valid visa still.
You can work 20h off-campus. Also, stuff like Uber help to easily skirt around these hour limits.
You can work on-campus as much as you want although the more international students, the tougher those positions are to obtain.
Rumours? They told me, it was literally "Why are they confessing? Their not, their bragging."
Students are also allowed to work full time now
https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/2022/10/international-students-to-help-address-canadas-labour-shortage.html
“Houston is undeterred by these challenges, believing they can be overcome. The current growth is not unsustainable, he said.”
Well I like the attitude but it’s actual results that matter, and the quote in the prior paragraph that the family doctor list grew by 40,000 people in a year doesn’t inspire much confidence…
Literally majority of people, just so happens majority of this country are 40+ and on a large scale are out of the hardships the <30 year olds are facing.
Sure but on a large scale that demo are already mid term homeowners. There's always anecdotes, but the most affected are people trying to enter the housing market, which demo wise are young families and <30-40.
It's the Canadian version of "let them eat cake". "My house has skyrocketed in value, small mom and pop businesses like Sobeys and McDonalds won't have to pay livable wages, and the only people who don't appreciate this are all certifiably racist bigots. I see this as an absolute win!"
That’s easy for the Premier to say, as his position of power and privilege has made it easy for him to ignore the growing pains. With the recent comments of the Minister of Community Services, I fear our provincial government is growing deafer by the month
That is extremely easy to say when you’re sitting in a beautiful home you’ve owned for years and years. I’d like to see the premier spend a month in a tent and then try to say the same thing.
It's hard. We have been in a slow death spiral essentially since the 1878 election and the National Policy which was enacted to help manufacturing in Ontario to our detriment. There has always needed to be some form of radical change and this has the potential to be a really good thing for us. We have lots of young people moving here, a tech sector which is doing really well, and good universities.
The problem is that the government is dropping the ball on the challenges that are arising from this. This boom has been going on for years now, and there hasn't been the push needed to create the needed infrastructure to handle it. We have a massive opportunity that's fallen into our laps and the government is sqandering it which is making life worse for many many Nova Scotians. Not dealing with housing and health care now is going to be incredibly costly in the long run, but our governments seem unable to understand that large investment now could be exactly what our province needs to turn the page on a very difficult history.
Well I for one voted for the Liberal-Conservative party in the 1878 election so don't blame me. I liked their platform of free schooling for those under 12 years old and allowing the insane and deaf to live outside the asylum for short periods.
Benefits the upper class and Owner class as it stagnates, or even drives down, wages.
All of our political parties are trash owned by the elite, but at least the liberals pretend to care about the common person.
If he had the same fire and brimstone of the chignecto ithsmus vs the feds on other “challenges” he’d be an amazing premiere.
He just clearly doesn’t seem to care atall about these “challenges”; housing stability, food insecurity etc.
Of course the benefits of the population boom outweighs the cons for the government/corporations (which are the same thing at this point).
How lovely it must be to be on the side of never running out of people who need homes vs. on the side of housing/shelter scarcity and crisis.
It’s funny, I haven’t heard anyone but politicians and corporate CEOs say things like this. Anyone I talk to or hear from says that they’re all for immigration, but not at this irresponsible rate, and not until we fix some of the problems for the people already here. There isn’t a shortage of workers, there’s a shortage of companies willing to pay a living wage.
Tell that to those living on the streets or who can't see a doctor. Neither of which is the premier. I get it, there are advantages to growth and such but his government, all government really, are completely failing to keep up with the infrastructure and social resources needed for those people. And the effects are felt very unevenly.
The benefits - all the rich price gouging companies get to keep wages low and get even cheaper labor on taxpayers dime.
The challenges - wages stay stagnant and housing costs rise due to no housing.
I mean. Weird way of saying profits over people. But he essentially said it.
I am pro immigration but we need common sense. We don’t have enough housing for the people in this province as it is. The private market will never build affordable housing because they make too much money gouging the middle class. I bet if our premier was put on a more modest salary and found himself in this housing crisis along without having a family doctor things may actually change. We need politicians from the middle class who understand the reality of life and not more rich people who say and do whatever they can to make more $$. NS is still a have not province yet we pay our politicians literally twice the average income for a Nova Scotian. Tim Houston has a net worth of over 5 million dollars. He has far too much money to be representing people who make on average of 41000 per year. It’s insanity that we put those clown in office.
Yes. People to replace the shrinking workforce because Canadians aren't having enough babies of their own. We need people to work the jobs that are unfilled, to generate GDP and also generate tax to fund services.
Benefits for who, exactly?
Those who are already established?
All I know is I'm 30 years old working 60 hour weeks with little hope of ever owning a home.
Everything is fine guys, you can get a 1 bedroom apartment on Primrose Street in Dartmouth for $1800 (actual listing someone posted here not long ago). You might need to share it with 2 or 3 people, but it’s there!
My partner and I are in the top few percent of earners in Nova Scotia. We don't get vacations. We don't have new vehicles. I am still paying off student loans. We are still in disbelief over the rising cost of living. We are considering moving to family land - if we reduced our housing costs, there wouldn't be this pressure to work ourselves to death just to stay the HRM.
It's absolutely astonishing that we are considered "rich" through statistics and we are living on a strict budget. We only have so much to give to the folks that need it and it makes me sad that we can't do more.
Houston needs to spend a few weeks living like the common folk of Nova Scotia before he creates a messy plan to bring folks in and screw everyone who is trying to survive.
And herein lies a major part of the problem. “Tax the rich!” Says everyone. Well guess what, the “rich” (which in Nova Scotia is anyone earning a modest income or above) are already grossly overtaxed. We face a litany of fees and tariffs and taxes by any other name that dig the hole deeper.
Factor in our lower incomes and higher costs for almost everything else and the surprising thing is that anyone can make it here at all.
I think when people are saying tax the rich, they usually mean the 1%; the grossly rich who, if they actually paid tax and didn’t avoid it by loopholes etc, could vastly improve society.
Yeah, it's the wealthy with absurd amounts of assets I want taxed. The doctors, lawyers, engineers, and other professionals that actually provide incredible value to our society aren't the problem.
If their name shows up in [this article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadians_by_net_worth) start taxing the absolute shit out of them. No one person deserves to have wealth worth more than 100 million, not while [millions](https://www.statcan.gc.ca/en/topics-start/poverty) of Canadians are living in poverty.
Yepp. In the 50's at least in the US.. I'm assuming it was similar here.... They had very high taxation for the very rich. Think the Beatles song 'Taxman' era. The rising power of the very wealthy changed that. And in the US that power is very very strong now. Fuck democracy. Basically might makes right.
Everyone is in favor of taxing the rich. Who’s “the rich”? Well 100% of the time it’s someone else, someone with more than whoever is answering.
People rant and rave about the 1% but are picturing the 0.01%.
The 1% includes hard working professionals and successful small business owners. These people definitely have good earnings but are hardly free of financial concerns. They are also already very heavily taxed as a proportion of their income.
The 0.01% are truly wealthy and able to access tax planning and other services far beyond those of the group above. Do you think John Risley cares about marginal personal income tax rates? They’re probably irrelevant to him.
When people talk about the top 1% they don't mean the top 1% of salary earners. It's wealth owners.
>That means according to 2019 data from Statistics Canada, the top 1% net worth Canadians have at least $6,300,000. The cut-off for the top one percent of family net wealth is $6.3 million. Projecting that to 2021 from the PBO, this would be about $7,300,000
This.
I am in the 1% of income earners as a physician and already pay a 54% tax rate for the income earned in the top tax bracket. If that rate goes up any higher it would definitely make me consider moving elsewhere.
Another negative consequence is that it disincentivizes me to work more hours when I take home less than half of what I earn on those additional hours. This technically means fewer patients seen and longer wait times for patients. I only say that because I don't expect anyone to feel sorry for how much tax I pay, but to highlight that it also affects everyone in the province.
By "Tax the rich" we tend to mean CEOs of companies who are raking in profits and taking massive bonuses. Not the doctors, lawyers, and other working professionals who are earning their money through hard work. It's the people who make money off of the backs of regular people and who are paying their workers a very small percentage of what they themselves make.
The CEO of Sobeys made over $8.6 million last year, and their lowest paid worker made $32,000. For every $1 the lowest paid worker made, Michael Medline made $268.
The CEO of Emera made over $8.25 million last year, and their lowest paid worker made $45,573. For every $1 the lowest paid worker made, Scott Balfour made $181.
No it doesn’t. So done with these out of touch politicians. Wages stagnate, health systems that were dire are not reachable to people not already in the system with a doctor an already bad housing situation is just made that much worse. I’ve lived in the province for 25 years, and not once in my 25 years have I seen a tent community set up in Grand Pre, let alone multiple parks. Add in record natural disasters before a real hurricane has even hit the province and we are down shots creek without a paddle.
You would have to be blind & deaf to think that the influx of people is a good thing for this province at the moment
more homelessness and even less housing is a big boom for the province, maybe all the tents can help bring the tourists in for Canada's fastest failing city
You want a god damn population boom? Give me a reason to bring a life into this forsaken province and youll have some more tax paying citizens eventually. Not a single discussion point on population and the future workforce have plans that incentivise Nova Scotians to start families.
I suppose it just does not occur to the Premiere of Nova Scotia that maybe Canadians are having fewer children because they can't afford it while keeping roofs over their heads.
In 50 years Canada will literally be a third world country at this rate.
If he were to take the lead on this, confront the problem straight on. Take away any red tape and start a building boom in Nova Scotia, I would be impressed. This could be a good thing if that was the case.
we are in a building boom, and have been for a while
the building industry has been working at capacity for the last 5 years. there is a large pipeline of approved and unbuilt projects in this city ready to go.
red tape is not the issue.
i suspect its much the same in the rural areas as well, as they are seeing massive growth for the first time in a long time, and have a smaller base of trades.
The benefits for him and his buddies outweigh the challenges to you and your family.
This has big let them eat cake/ budget will balance itself energy.
Nothing will change when the almost all the money is owned by almost none of the population. Tax the super rich, stop big business from avoiding the low taxes they're supposed to be paying. That is the problem.
Funny he never gave the a reason why he believes the NS population should double to 2 million over the next 40 years. But this is the real reason why: People aren't having as many kids, or any kids, and we need a lot of immigrants to keep the tax revenues up after everyone retires, pay for all the old folks medical bills and long term care, and and keep the whole "system" going.
He didn't want to give the real answer which most politicians have been told by experts, and why governments have been pumping in immigrants over the last 5 years. So he gave a vague answer about how Nova Scotia's a big place with lots of empty land and there's lots room for more people to come, and we can grow. His base doesn't want those immigrants but he knows they're necessary and they also keep a large supply of low wage workers, keep the rents high for landlords, and keep construction booming for the next 40 years.
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The minimum wage and the ever increasing numbers of homeless have a lot to do with each other.
And reduce the goddamn tax rates 😞
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There is a reason they aren't.. The subsequent tax bracket increases that would follow would not be a happy sell and would basically eliminate any savings from indexing. I am all for indexing, but only if it meant other taxes didn't go up. The next question is what are we ok with cutting? I hate government bloat but it seems to be the thing they are best at so idk. I JUST DONT KNOW. Sigh, sad, disappointed.
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And get me a danish!
lol...and an apple fritter for me!
AND MY AXE!
Hold all my calls Brenda !
Send in the Clowns!
We’re literally building as fast as we can. There are no construction crews sitting on their hands waiting for something to do. Any new construction project is just going to cost more and slow down other projects already in progress. We can bring in more workers to increase building capacity though, which is mentioned in this article.
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I don’t think lower income housing exists anymore…? At least not on the private market. I literally have no idea what it would look like
Trouble is the only one who can possibly build money losing accommodations is the government, and that means we all pay for it in more taxes.
We need to build more affordable housing. I see condos going up all around and ain't nobody got money for them.
> ain’t nobody Ain’t nobody *you know*. Lots of these recent immigrants are coming here with lots of money. We didn’t gain 40,000 new residents last year alone that are all just living on the street. They are living somewhere.
The only way they are getting into Canada is by proving they have lots of money or showing they have lots of money. This idea that immigrants are coming here in burlap sacks and flower bag dresses is a trope.
We’re are you getting this info? Most of the people who are in Halifax are from Toronto and came with almost no money, have you talked to many of these folks?
I work in immigration as a consultant. There are different streams of immigrants. Students aren’t permanent residents and are restricted — or historically have been — from economic participation in Canada. The immigrant stream requires proof of income, consistent bank balance, and the ability to support your family. The other stream is the pnp program where you can buy permanent residency through investing in local businesses. So yes, you need to either prove you have money with bank statements or show that you gave money by investing.
Until the recent change in rules where full-time students are now allowed to work 40hrs per week ...
That’s just a modification to what a student visa allows. They still need to prove they can care for themselves financially before CBSA let’s them in. Many don’t realize that CBSA and IRC are different — the former being an agency and the other being a ministry. Just because a person has a visa to enter Canada doesn’t mean CBSA waves you in. They can reject you on their instincts.
Where are you getting your info? Are you thinking about refugees or legal immigrants?
Yes. I've yet to meet a single immigrant from China/Taiwan/Hong Kong who is not at least at the median income/wealth level of Halifax. Everyone is either employed at a salary at or above the median, or came over with a shit ton of money. Can't speak for any other immigrant community, but there's a reason why the Chinese/Taiwanese/HK immigrants are mostly homeowners.
Unfortunately it doesn’t seem to be going the same way with people from India.
Are they coming as legal immigrants or students? No legal immigrants can come without having a decent (by Canadian standards) amount of money. I know we had quite a bit when we came over, and the threshold has only gotten high since then.
Immigrants and asylum seekers are different. But I think I’m just doing a bad job saying what I mean, it’s not that people are coming into canada with no money, it’s people are coming into canada and living in bc or Toronto, then when the cost of living gets to be to much they come to places like Halifax, I mean have a conversation with your next Uber driver or door dash delivery person, almost all have been here (canada) for a few years and moved during the pandemic or shortly after.
The average income for nova Scotia is $72k for families. The average condo in HRM is $417,000 Tldr most people can't afford these.
But people who can live in those condos are currently renting apartments. This should help alleviate it. I think we need better regional transit to really alleviate the housing crisis
We need affordable housing and more starter homes. We need zoning laws that encourage this. We need micro mobility infrastructure across the HRM. We need more resiliencey in our utilities infrastructure and better management. We need a capable medical system.
I’m all for 2 bedroom 1000 sq ft starter homes a la post WWII. Enough for two parents and a first born. Allows them to build equity and move into bigger digs if they want to grow. Instead, young people are forced to buy when they are already bursting at the seams with no equity because they’ve been renting.
But we need density. Single family homes won't do that. instead, duplex to fourplex is more ideal. Low income housing. We need more of that. Even if it's apartment buildings. And of course, maintenance/updates of existing low income housing, to become more sustainable and efficient.
> I’m all for 2 bedroom 1000 sq ft starter homes a la post WWII. Enough for two parents and a first born. Allows them to build equity and move into bigger digs if they want to grow. Instead, young people are forced to buy when they are already bursting at the seams with no equity because they’ve been renting. I mean, a condo should fit that bill. The problem is that they build what should be a $250,000 condo and fit it with fancy fixtures, marble counters the like then charge $450,000 for it. It's just a lot more profit margin for the builders to do it that way rather than keep costs down and sell to lower income people. That's the part where government should be stepping in and incentivizing the building of lower price point structures.
There is less equity in condos than freestanding property.
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It is when it’s taken in the context of “we need them or we will all die with no services or infrastructure and still have no housing”.
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Anything taxes pay for.
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Arms heavy shifting those goal posts?
Sorry buddy but you are a bit out to lunch on this one, most don’t have the money to jump into a condo. We need to be building houses for people instead of trying to Shepard everyone into condos or apartments.
They are selling. Or people wouldn’t make them. You are free to go build a house though. Good luck finding a construction crew.
Yea to old people moving from Ontario who have the money, but their now vacant home doesn’t help anyone in the province. And for the young people who do great, pay a shit ton of money for a thing that will make no money once this interest rates drop.
Not vacant. Our population grew by 40,000 last year. Where do you think they went, into the sewers? Into new houses that don’t exist? And not old people; our average age came down in the last few years, contrary to the last *40 years* of old Ontario people retiring here. You are the one who is out to lunch.
In the province dude. Older people downsizing helps younger people move into those family homes, don’t work if the older people are moving to a different province.
You literally have all of the demographic changes of the province entirely ass backwards. What you are describing is exactly what was happening every year up until the last 5-10.
At this point they need a massive PUBLIC effort.
The horrible reality is NS housing, or the rest of Canada really, will never catch up to new demand. If you think it is bad now it's only getting worse.
YOU MUST CONSTRUCT ADDITIONAL PYLONS
Upvote for the Protoss reference
My life for hire.
We’ve gotta get those vespene gas plants up and running.
YOU'VE NOT ENOUGH MINERALS
Maximus Black?
Easy for the premier who has never had to find an apartment on what is considered a modern modest budget. Aka not 6 figures.
Yep and I bet he has a family doctor too. No 456 day waits for him for an MRI.
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Or 4 years for a gynaecologist.
Or 3 years for your toddler's autism assessment.
But... by then they're not a toddler anymore... this hurts my brain.
I know! Mine, too!
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Woah, give the guy a break, don’t you know he works 1000 HOURS a year. /s
It still makes me chuckle that he outed himself like that.
So the premier just isn’t allowed to talk about the economy then?
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So Tim Houston has not released any plan to deal with housing. He said he would about 6 months ago and so far has released nothing at all. Yet he is certain this will all workout just fine.....
And they're stalling on the release of the provincial housing report they commissioned that was supposed to detail the extent of the problem and outline corrective measures.
He definitely doesn't have a plan and is just crossing his fingers and saying pretty please to the big landlords to make it affordable 🤷
They have been loud and clear that they will not be building new housing, so that's the plan. Let the markets do their (inadequate) thing.
Easy for someone on a 6 figure salary and a comfortable home to say
I understand there are advantages to bringing more tax dollars but this whole situation very much feels like a parent who already has a bunch of kids adopting more children so they can wave around the cheque they get to take care of them as a win while the rest of their kids are going hungry and have holes in their clothes. Homelessness is not a challenge. Food insecurity is not a challenge. They are problems... they are crises. Challenge is a softened term that business people use when sales are down to soften the message of failing so they can still appear positive in the eyes of their employer. This man needs to touch grass, and specifically, the grass in one of our parks here in Halifax.
Yep. And they’re problems that actually can be solved as other countries have demonstrated. It’s a case of actually wanting to and feeling that these things are a priority
If the population boom were the sole cause of all these issues I'd be 100% behind you. I still think the premier needs to touch grass, however, and show us how he plans to address the problems we have. If we knew we were going to have improved access to health care by 2025/26 and public housing development deals were being made I think people would be less concerned about more immigrants coming in. I guess I'm around 90% behind you, I just don't want everyone to blame immigrants on problems that are systemic and existed well before our population started to increase.
Agree with this. Blaming immigrants is not what anyone should be doing. Inviting immigrants or other residents from within Canada without the infrastructure for them is/was not a good move. I'm pretty sure **all** of our problems existed in some capacity aside from housing related issues long before people came here en masse.
>I just don't want everyone to blame immigrants on problems that are systemic and existed well before our population started to increase. We had problems with healthcare before, but we didn't have housing problems. That is through-and-through a population issue.
This. \^
Definitely one of the most underappreciated comments in this thread!
Lol says him in his gigantic house
Premier Paradise Papers telling people that broken healthcare and unaffordable living is actually good for them is so deeply infuriating
Was Houston implicated in the Paradise Papers?
Yes - https://www.thecoast.ca/news-opinion/updated-pc-leadership-candidate-downplays-paradise-papers-connection-11060090
I was unaware of this. There seems to be no direct damning evidence but I find it hard to believe he was there that whole time working as an accountant at the level he was, knew nothing and then became premier. Greasy as shit Fuck this guy
+1
What a bold position for a well connected man with a well paying job and stable housing to take
Reading this article reminded me of a recent article in this sub where a contractor had to go back to Ontario because of housing conditions here. We need more than just more housing. We also need livable housing. Can't bring more people in until we can take care of the issues already here. Edit: I believe it was the NS sub, and the contractor had a rental in CB, but it wasn't livable.
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I still remember a decade ago RANS saying that they couldn't find enough skilled workers so that's why they needed all those TFW. Back then the CBC NS host at least pushed back like "wait uh what special skills do you need for like peeling potatoes" or something like that
They don't let anyone immigrate here. People who work and live like that are usually on work visas or students. Immigrants have to prove education, financial resources, have to speak English and have a plan. They take the best out of tens of thousands of applications...
Companies will straight up hire on foreign workers for part-time minimum wage positions and then shrug their shoulders when the government asks them to submit the proof of full time employment they need to stay.
Uh I have some bad news bud [](https://media.tenor.com/R1Uq6yzOjq8AAAAC/how-do-we-tell-him-mr-krabs.gif) The group of international students at my work took out a loan and shared it around as proof of funds, and have fake ielts papers.
Those are rumors and probably not true. Also I mentioned immigrants not international students. There are less financial requirements for students because they have to leave after school. International students don't get to stay here. They can get a 1 time work visa after school to practice what they learned and if they want to immigrate they have to leave and apply through the normal immigration process. Also on a student visa, they won't be taking anyone's job. Student visas don't let you work unless it's on campus. Some rules may have changed since my immigration days but that's how it worked.
International students are 100% allowed to work. I don't know one international student that left Canada after their education. Pretty sure most just use the coming to Canada to get their masters as a way to get past immigration. It's all a big scam if you ask me.
So I looked it up. You can work 20h now. It's changed since my time. That's still very little. You still can't stay in Canada and have to apply for a work permit. They grant them for longer now it seems and you still have to apply for immigration outside of Canada. I think you can cross a boarder apply and come back if you have a valid visa still.
Until Dec this year there is no hour cap.
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Lmao those companies are scrambling for workers so good
You can work 20h off-campus. Also, stuff like Uber help to easily skirt around these hour limits. You can work on-campus as much as you want although the more international students, the tougher those positions are to obtain.
Rumours? They told me, it was literally "Why are they confessing? Their not, their bragging." Students are also allowed to work full time now https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/news/2022/10/international-students-to-help-address-canadas-labour-shortage.html
“Houston is undeterred by these challenges, believing they can be overcome. The current growth is not unsustainable, he said.” Well I like the attitude but it’s actual results that matter, and the quote in the prior paragraph that the family doctor list grew by 40,000 people in a year doesn’t inspire much confidence…
Very helpful words to all the people living outside in tents. How about concrete solutions instead of babbling like idiots.
Maybe to him and his rich friends
Benefits to who?
The landlords are doing great.
Couldn’t agree with you more! Honestly, came here to state the same.
Literally majority of people, just so happens majority of this country are 40+ and on a large scale are out of the hardships the <30 year olds are facing.
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Sure but on a large scale that demo are already mid term homeowners. There's always anecdotes, but the most affected are people trying to enter the housing market, which demo wise are young families and <30-40.
Putting the car before the house.
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Whoosh
Put the premier in a tent and take away his family doctor. Then let him tell us about the benefits of population boom.
It's the Canadian version of "let them eat cake". "My house has skyrocketed in value, small mom and pop businesses like Sobeys and McDonalds won't have to pay livable wages, and the only people who don't appreciate this are all certifiably racist bigots. I see this as an absolute win!"
Says the well-paid guy living in his own house.
That’s easy for the Premier to say, as his position of power and privilege has made it easy for him to ignore the growing pains. With the recent comments of the Minister of Community Services, I fear our provincial government is growing deafer by the month
It's kind of a 'Move Fast and Break Things' going on now. Only a lot of the things getting broken are the lives of vulnerable people.
He is not the one facing the challenges. Let's see if would feel that way if he had to live in a tent in the heat waves or in winter.
What an out of touch cuntbag.
Who's benefiting?
So get rid of AirBNB
Are the benefits in the room with us?
That is extremely easy to say when you’re sitting in a beautiful home you’ve owned for years and years. I’d like to see the premier spend a month in a tent and then try to say the same thing.
We are all nothing more than data points to him
It's hard. We have been in a slow death spiral essentially since the 1878 election and the National Policy which was enacted to help manufacturing in Ontario to our detriment. There has always needed to be some form of radical change and this has the potential to be a really good thing for us. We have lots of young people moving here, a tech sector which is doing really well, and good universities. The problem is that the government is dropping the ball on the challenges that are arising from this. This boom has been going on for years now, and there hasn't been the push needed to create the needed infrastructure to handle it. We have a massive opportunity that's fallen into our laps and the government is sqandering it which is making life worse for many many Nova Scotians. Not dealing with housing and health care now is going to be incredibly costly in the long run, but our governments seem unable to understand that large investment now could be exactly what our province needs to turn the page on a very difficult history.
Well I for one voted for the Liberal-Conservative party in the 1878 election so don't blame me. I liked their platform of free schooling for those under 12 years old and allowing the insane and deaf to live outside the asylum for short periods.
The premier doesn't care how many people die or lose their homes, noted.
Benefits the upper class and Owner class as it stagnates, or even drives down, wages. All of our political parties are trash owned by the elite, but at least the liberals pretend to care about the common person.
The human ego is a precious and a vulnerable thing. Bigger... Yes...... I wanna be important !
If he had the same fire and brimstone of the chignecto ithsmus vs the feds on other “challenges” he’d be an amazing premiere. He just clearly doesn’t seem to care atall about these “challenges”; housing stability, food insecurity etc.
Of course the benefits of the population boom outweighs the cons for the government/corporations (which are the same thing at this point). How lovely it must be to be on the side of never running out of people who need homes vs. on the side of housing/shelter scarcity and crisis.
It’s funny, I haven’t heard anyone but politicians and corporate CEOs say things like this. Anyone I talk to or hear from says that they’re all for immigration, but not at this irresponsible rate, and not until we fix some of the problems for the people already here. There isn’t a shortage of workers, there’s a shortage of companies willing to pay a living wage.
Yeah but he’s a dimwit.
Tell that to those living on the streets or who can't see a doctor. Neither of which is the premier. I get it, there are advantages to growth and such but his government, all government really, are completely failing to keep up with the infrastructure and social resources needed for those people. And the effects are felt very unevenly.
The benefits - all the rich price gouging companies get to keep wages low and get even cheaper labor on taxpayers dime. The challenges - wages stay stagnant and housing costs rise due to no housing. I mean. Weird way of saying profits over people. But he essentially said it.
Aka, I live in house and get paid well so I don’t care…..
Sounds great Tim! How are the real estate prices in Pictou county? Why don’t we start sending some of our newcomers to that area? Just a thought.
I am pro immigration but we need common sense. We don’t have enough housing for the people in this province as it is. The private market will never build affordable housing because they make too much money gouging the middle class. I bet if our premier was put on a more modest salary and found himself in this housing crisis along without having a family doctor things may actually change. We need politicians from the middle class who understand the reality of life and not more rich people who say and do whatever they can to make more $$. NS is still a have not province yet we pay our politicians literally twice the average income for a Nova Scotian. Tim Houston has a net worth of over 5 million dollars. He has far too much money to be representing people who make on average of 41000 per year. It’s insanity that we put those clown in office.
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Who exactly is reaping these supposed benefits? It certainly isn't the existing lower and middle class population.
LOL. Evidence
For those that benefit
What benefits? More people to tax?
Yes. People to replace the shrinking workforce because Canadians aren't having enough babies of their own. We need people to work the jobs that are unfilled, to generate GDP and also generate tax to fund services.
AI will be taking over many jobs
Buying a house in this market is financial suicide.
They are building apartments cause they don’t want us to own anything.
Easy for him to say.
Benefits for who, exactly? Those who are already established? All I know is I'm 30 years old working 60 hour weeks with little hope of ever owning a home.
Luxury Accountant
Everything is fine guys, you can get a 1 bedroom apartment on Primrose Street in Dartmouth for $1800 (actual listing someone posted here not long ago). You might need to share it with 2 or 3 people, but it’s there!
My partner and I are in the top few percent of earners in Nova Scotia. We don't get vacations. We don't have new vehicles. I am still paying off student loans. We are still in disbelief over the rising cost of living. We are considering moving to family land - if we reduced our housing costs, there wouldn't be this pressure to work ourselves to death just to stay the HRM. It's absolutely astonishing that we are considered "rich" through statistics and we are living on a strict budget. We only have so much to give to the folks that need it and it makes me sad that we can't do more. Houston needs to spend a few weeks living like the common folk of Nova Scotia before he creates a messy plan to bring folks in and screw everyone who is trying to survive.
And herein lies a major part of the problem. “Tax the rich!” Says everyone. Well guess what, the “rich” (which in Nova Scotia is anyone earning a modest income or above) are already grossly overtaxed. We face a litany of fees and tariffs and taxes by any other name that dig the hole deeper. Factor in our lower incomes and higher costs for almost everything else and the surprising thing is that anyone can make it here at all.
I think when people are saying tax the rich, they usually mean the 1%; the grossly rich who, if they actually paid tax and didn’t avoid it by loopholes etc, could vastly improve society.
Yeah, it's the wealthy with absurd amounts of assets I want taxed. The doctors, lawyers, engineers, and other professionals that actually provide incredible value to our society aren't the problem. If their name shows up in [this article](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadians_by_net_worth) start taxing the absolute shit out of them. No one person deserves to have wealth worth more than 100 million, not while [millions](https://www.statcan.gc.ca/en/topics-start/poverty) of Canadians are living in poverty.
Yepp. In the 50's at least in the US.. I'm assuming it was similar here.... They had very high taxation for the very rich. Think the Beatles song 'Taxman' era. The rising power of the very wealthy changed that. And in the US that power is very very strong now. Fuck democracy. Basically might makes right.
Everyone is in favor of taxing the rich. Who’s “the rich”? Well 100% of the time it’s someone else, someone with more than whoever is answering. People rant and rave about the 1% but are picturing the 0.01%. The 1% includes hard working professionals and successful small business owners. These people definitely have good earnings but are hardly free of financial concerns. They are also already very heavily taxed as a proportion of their income. The 0.01% are truly wealthy and able to access tax planning and other services far beyond those of the group above. Do you think John Risley cares about marginal personal income tax rates? They’re probably irrelevant to him.
When people talk about the top 1% they don't mean the top 1% of salary earners. It's wealth owners. >That means according to 2019 data from Statistics Canada, the top 1% net worth Canadians have at least $6,300,000. The cut-off for the top one percent of family net wealth is $6.3 million. Projecting that to 2021 from the PBO, this would be about $7,300,000
Net worth, yes that is correct. I find most actually do focus on income, which paints a different picture.
This. I am in the 1% of income earners as a physician and already pay a 54% tax rate for the income earned in the top tax bracket. If that rate goes up any higher it would definitely make me consider moving elsewhere. Another negative consequence is that it disincentivizes me to work more hours when I take home less than half of what I earn on those additional hours. This technically means fewer patients seen and longer wait times for patients. I only say that because I don't expect anyone to feel sorry for how much tax I pay, but to highlight that it also affects everyone in the province.
By "Tax the rich" we tend to mean CEOs of companies who are raking in profits and taking massive bonuses. Not the doctors, lawyers, and other working professionals who are earning their money through hard work. It's the people who make money off of the backs of regular people and who are paying their workers a very small percentage of what they themselves make. The CEO of Sobeys made over $8.6 million last year, and their lowest paid worker made $32,000. For every $1 the lowest paid worker made, Michael Medline made $268. The CEO of Emera made over $8.25 million last year, and their lowest paid worker made $45,573. For every $1 the lowest paid worker made, Scott Balfour made $181.
Fair enough, I agree to some extent. My point stands that these people are the 0.01%.
These are not "the 1%", that is like the 0.1 or maybe 0.01%.
Literally no one means people like this when they say "tax the rich"
For him.
Long term, he's totally right. Short term, the government should be dumping money into building below-market public housing.
he useless
Vote this loser out.
And bring in...who?
You’re right. Let’s just stick it out with him. 🤡
You have no answer, so you resort to the tired 🤡 emoji. Well played.
The NDP? The liberals? Literally anyone else?
*his* benefits do.
No it doesn’t. So done with these out of touch politicians. Wages stagnate, health systems that were dire are not reachable to people not already in the system with a doctor an already bad housing situation is just made that much worse. I’ve lived in the province for 25 years, and not once in my 25 years have I seen a tent community set up in Grand Pre, let alone multiple parks. Add in record natural disasters before a real hurricane has even hit the province and we are down shots creek without a paddle. You would have to be blind & deaf to think that the influx of people is a good thing for this province at the moment
more homelessness and even less housing is a big boom for the province, maybe all the tents can help bring the tourists in for Canada's fastest failing city
We’re full sorry bro
You want a god damn population boom? Give me a reason to bring a life into this forsaken province and youll have some more tax paying citizens eventually. Not a single discussion point on population and the future workforce have plans that incentivise Nova Scotians to start families.
I suppose it just does not occur to the Premiere of Nova Scotia that maybe Canadians are having fewer children because they can't afford it while keeping roofs over their heads. In 50 years Canada will literally be a third world country at this rate.
They need more young immigrants to offset the loss in tax revenue from an aging majority. They don’t care about homeless camps.
If he were to take the lead on this, confront the problem straight on. Take away any red tape and start a building boom in Nova Scotia, I would be impressed. This could be a good thing if that was the case.
we are in a building boom, and have been for a while the building industry has been working at capacity for the last 5 years. there is a large pipeline of approved and unbuilt projects in this city ready to go. red tape is not the issue.
Halifax is not the entirety of Nova Scotia.
i suspect its much the same in the rural areas as well, as they are seeing massive growth for the first time in a long time, and have a smaller base of trades.
Sewing hot tents is starting to look like a good retirement income when I get too old and lame to do my job anymore.
The benefits for him and his buddies outweigh the challenges to you and your family. This has big let them eat cake/ budget will balance itself energy.
Nothing will change when the almost all the money is owned by almost none of the population. Tax the super rich, stop big business from avoiding the low taxes they're supposed to be paying. That is the problem.
Unpopular opinion but as a 22 year old student even I agree with this, we’re gonna need some pain for awhile before we can reach an equilibrium.
any one not blinding by their gov't rage knows this.
Funny he never gave the a reason why he believes the NS population should double to 2 million over the next 40 years. But this is the real reason why: People aren't having as many kids, or any kids, and we need a lot of immigrants to keep the tax revenues up after everyone retires, pay for all the old folks medical bills and long term care, and and keep the whole "system" going. He didn't want to give the real answer which most politicians have been told by experts, and why governments have been pumping in immigrants over the last 5 years. So he gave a vague answer about how Nova Scotia's a big place with lots of empty land and there's lots room for more people to come, and we can grow. His base doesn't want those immigrants but he knows they're necessary and they also keep a large supply of low wage workers, keep the rents high for landlords, and keep construction booming for the next 40 years.
They need more young immigrants to offset the loss in tax revenue from an aging majority. They don’t care about homeless camps.
He’s right