The city of Toronto’s proposed 2024 budget is both outrageous and a master class in political manoeuvring. At a time when people are struggling financially, who would suggest a 10.5-per-cent tax increase, then threaten to boost it by an additional six per cent if the federal government doesn’t pony up more money?
BUT …
Gripped by Toronto’s annual budget panic? Just wait for the surplus
… As regularly as it panics over its budgets, Toronto runs big surpluses. Spending rises, no surprise there. But so does revenue. Year after year, more than one in every 10 dollars of Toronto’s revenue has flowed through to a surplus on the bottom line. The city’s accumulated surplus – the measure of net worth that represents its ability to deliver services – stood at $32.3-billion at the end of 2022.
Anyone who knows this history would bet that Toronto ran another healthy surplus in 2023. Notwithstanding the peaking budget panic, I’ll stake my soon-to-jump property tax bill that Toronto will run yet another one this year.
