Colin P said:So am I reading that right that Davie is proceeding with the JSS light?
dapaterson said:No. A great idea would be to abandon DREE and all its children, and stop paying ridiculous multiples of world prices for Made In Canada.
dapaterson said:If the government is taking few dollars out of the productive economy, the economy grows. Government has no money of its own to spend. If it's spending more somewhere, it's taking more somewhere else.
jmt18325 said:When you spend a dollar in Canada, that dollar stays in Canada potentially forever. It's recycled and multiplied time and again. If we buy ships somewhere else, that dollar is gone. The reality is, ships that are more expensive, produced in Canada, are actually not that much more expensive (and even cheaper) when you consider economic opportunity cost.
jollyjacktar said:Yeah, right. Unless that dollar goes to the Irving off shore tax avoidance fund... pull the other one now.
jmt18325 said:When you spend a dollar in Canada, that dollar stays in Canada potentially forever. It's recycled and multiplied time and again. If we buy ships somewhere else, that dollar is gone. The reality is, ships that are more expensive, produced in Canada, are actually not that much more expensive (and even cheaper) when you consider economic opportunity cost.
Chris Pook said:The problem with that is that most of the stuff that will be going INTO the ships is not built in Canada. The hull may be Canadian materials and the labour for assembling the whole package may be Canadian. But most of the gear, where the big bucks will be spent, will not be Canadian.
CBH99 said:Further to the points made by JMT, and correct me if I'm wrong, BUT...
- The cost of building the ships in Canada will undoubtedly include labour. I'm going to assume (perhaps wrongfully) that labour will be a fairly sizable portion of any money spent, building the ships here. Is that labour not taxed? Is it not taxed relatively robustly, given we are in Canada?
The point to the above is that while money will be spent, the government may get a considerable amount of that money back. Whether it is workers being taxed, and then further paying GST on their purchases. If the materials are sourced in Canada, then there are taxes to be paid in the acquisition of those materials. And those workers are taxed, etc etc.
So while we may pay a hefty sum to have the ships built in Canada, the government will eventually see a sizable amount of that money returned to it, in various forms. If they are built overseas, that money is gone. No tax revenue, no workers paying GST, less money to Canadian suppliers, their workers aren't being taxed, etc etc.
**Full disclosure - I'm not the sharpest pencil in the case. I could be 100% wrong about everything I said above.
Oldgateboatdriver said:I don't think jmt18325 was referring to FMF specifically. He was talking about doing repairs here, period. I think he was referring to large repairs that could then be done by the yard that built the ship in Canada to start with, as they would have the knowledge to do so.