In a country with some of the world’s most expensive real estate, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government wants housing to become more affordable.
In a country with some of the world’s most expensive real estate, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government wants housing to become more affordable.
Canadians are using real estate as their retirement nest eggs. That means they’re investing less in productive businesses and are woefully under-diversified. Reducing/removing the capital gains exemption on real estate sales would encourage actual investment.
To be fair, the reason they’re using it for retirement is because every other method (defined-benefit pensions, defined-contribution pensions, bonds, mutual funds, RRSPs) have been systematically broken by the wealthy.
The dotcom bust, and the lesser extend the 2008 crisis, wiped out a lot of Boomer and elder-Xer equity. Real estate was the next thing that “weath advisors” pushed after they ran the other options into the ground.
If people could retire with dignity and security, we probably could have headed off some of the early stages of the real estate speculation boom. Of course, that would have required rich people to make less money, or face some kind of consequence. As it stands, the economy suits them just fine, even if it fails everyone else.
Shit, when was such an exemption passed? That’s literally a law that turns housing into a non-productive investment.
Making a necessity to live in the modern world an investment is the way to turn a portion of the population resentful and unproductive.