THeBlueCashew

Quote from: "cc la femme"Hi Asia!!



And I'll add  further ..... one can make a viable argument that if we do not wisely use the tools and abilities we were given / luckily born with to help ourselves ... then we are disrespecting the power that so generously gave them to us



I'm not arguing or proclaiming .... I'm just tossing out more food for thought

Quote from: "Fashionista"This was the talk at our fellowship lunch after morning service today..



They are worried how it will affect their jobs and businesses..



My husband and I are not voting, but we had people urging us to do that today..



What does an NDP government mean for Alberta?



I don't think it will mean much difference to most people,

Quote from: "seoulbro"

Quote from: "Fashionista"This was the talk at our fellowship lunch after morning service today..



They are worried how it will affect their jobs and businesses..



My husband and I are not voting, but we had people urging us to do that today..



What does an NDP government mean for Alberta?



I don't think it will mean much difference to most people,

They should be concerned Fash. You should too. Their federal counterparts have gone to the US to trash Keystone XL. They will kill the goose that lays the golden eggs. Our ring of fire would create a lot of jobs and produce plenty of revenue for Ontario and we desperately need it. The NDP oppose it of course.

Quote from: "Azhya Aryola"I think that those who can vote but don't should also not complain about the government since they choose not to have a say or a voice. That's just my opinion though.

Quote from: "Frank"It should be interesting to see what the makeup of the Alberta Legislature will be by tomorrow. Even if the NDP doesn't win, it will change how things are done in the province from now on if they get a lot of seats. For better or worse, Alberta won't ever be the same again.

QuoteVoters want to know: where did all our money go?



Alberta kept a mere $4.38 per barrel of oil in 2013. That same year our neighbours in Alaska managed around $38 while Norway raked in over $80. Why has Alberta given away this resource so cheaply? Because we have been led to believe that this is best we can do.



I live in British Columbia and we have fared little better than our Alberta cousins. B.C. is home to some of the most valuable timber in the world. Since 1940, some 4 billion cubic metres of it has been carted away with a current market value of close to half a trillion dollars.



What do we have to show for it?



Negotiating resource rents is no garden party and understandably companies are playing to win. This is particularly true in Canada where some $33 trillion in petroleum and timber are at play. While Canadians are typically unbeatable on the hockey rink, realizing a fair return for our remarkable resource bounty is one game where we have got our clock cleaned since Confederation. The situation in Alberta is so far gone that people are starting to rightly ask where all the money went.



Alberta has so far extracted $500 billion more petroleum than Norway, even at today's depressed prices. Yet Norway has $1 trillion saved, an amount that was growing by $1 billion per week before oil prices collapsed. Alberta will be $30 billion in debt by 2020, not counting the moribund Heritage Fund that has not seen any oil revenue since 1987.



Does Norway have a problem attracting investment? Hardly. Even the conservative Fraser Institute has acknowledged this, noting that Norway is the third most attractive jurisdiction in the world for oil investment. This is in spite of taxing oil profits close to 80 per cent.



But it seems that Albertans are fed up with being afraid. The Calgary Herald just published a measured assessment of what an NDP government might mean for the Wild Rose province. After Rachel Notley met with the editorial board, Alberta's largest daily concluded she is not nearly as scary as some vested interests would like you to believe.



What are the implications for Canada? Alberta has, in many ways, become the economic and political centre of the country. The free-market tax-cutting worldview that has become such an inarguable failure in Alberta has migrated to Ottawa where the Harper government has slashed government revenue by more than $45 billion per year. Finance Minister Joe Oliver even joked that our grandchildren should be left to deal with enfeebled future finances from his recent budget.



Harper himself has made fear a defining feature of his government, stoking terror about everything from terrorism to a carbon tax. But what if Canadians stopped being scared? What if Canada -- as Norway has so profitably done -- called the bluff of extractive industries that have feasted on our resources? It would have been hard to imagine just a month ago but Alberta may be the pivot point in this national transformation.



//http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2015/05/04/Alberta-Election-Nerves/

QuoteRoyalty Miscalculation Cost Alberta Billions, Expert Says



'The Tories chose to pretend the big blunder did not happen,' says consultant Jim Roy



The Alberta government has failed to collect nearly $2.5 billion per year in resource royalties since 2009 due to a major calculation blunder, according to Jim Roy, a private royalty expert who advises governments around the world.



As a consequence, the province has failed to collect $13 billion in the last five years, charges Roy, a former senior advisor on royalty policy for Alberta Energy.



That's not what Alberta's long-reigning government promised to voters in 2007.



After a controversial royalty review, the first one in a decade, premier Ed Stelmach told Albertans that the new formulas for calculating royalties would increase Alberta's ''fair share'' of hydrocarbon profits by $2 billion a year, beginning in 2009.



But instead of increasing royalties by $2 billion a year, Alberta's ''fair share'' plummeted due to bad forecasting and major flaws in how the province collects natural gas and bitumen royalties, Roy said.



''Announcing a royalty increase and delivering a royalty decrease is difficult to explain to voters,'' Roy said. ''The Tories chose to pretend the big blunder did not happen. Nobody talks much about the government gifting the petroleum industry $13 billion.''



//http://thetyee.ca/News/2015/05/02/Royalty-Miscalculation-Cost-Alberta-Billions/

QuoteRachel Notley, the leader of Alberta's New Democrats, has already promised to hold a review of the province's royalty structure if her party wins next Tuesday's election.



Premier Prentice contends that a major review of Alberta's royalty formula would have negative consequences.