Alberta Prosperity

Understanding Alberta’s Outsized Contribution to Confederation finds that from 2007 and 2022, Albertans’ contributed $244.6 billion to the federal government in taxes and other payments in excess of the money Ottawa spent or transferred to Alberta – more than five times as much as was contributed (on net) by either British Columbians or Ontarians.

An Alberta Dividend: The Key to Growing the Heritage Fund is a new study that finds if Alberta's Heritage Fund were prioritized with specific fiscal rules and began paying dividends to Albertans, it would be worth between $35.8 billion and $38.7 billion by 2026/27–all while paying out between $2.9 billion to $5.5 billion in dividends to Albertans.

Alberta’s “Spending Restraint” in Perspective is a new study that finds although the Alberta government’s current plan to restrain program spending increases is a constructive way to bring provincial spending more in line with sustainable revenues, doing so will be hindered by increases in per person spending introduced over the last two years. In fact, program spending this year will reach $14,334 per Albertan, which is $1,603 more per person (inflation-adjusted) than the government planned to spend this year as outlined in the 2022 mid-year budget update.

Undoing Alberta’s Personal Income Tax Hikes is a new study that finds reversing the 2015 provincial personal income tax rate increases and instituting a flat eight per cent tax rate would help restore Alberta’s tax advantage while saving taxpayers $1,573 a year, on average.