How the 2023 budget affects Canadians struggling with inflation

From a grocery rebate to a new RESP rule, personal finance columnist Rob Carrick discusses how the federal budget could affect your wallets.

[patriciacarlos]

Inflation is far more harmful to individuals than a collapsing stock or property market because it directly affects people's cost of living, which they immediately feel. It is not surprising that the current market sentiment is extremely pessimistic. In today's economy, assistance is critical if we are to survive.

[ryanr]

a modest income is defined as:
Less than $35000 if youre single, less than $45000 for couples.
If you work a full-time job at minimum wage, youre making more than a 'modest wage'
Members of Gov who make the budget should have to live off 36000-46000. See if they believe its liveable

[chrismathers]

All I read from the budget is every single person in Canada will owe another 20k in federal debt.

[fattony]

lol $225 is enough for a couple bags of groceries. I feel my financial burdens drifting away.

[Womba]

2% payroll tax, .14 per liter hike. that's instant inflation on April 01. A grocery rebate is a joke, it will only bid prices higher.

[zorroara]

The "grocery rebate" is an insult to Canadians' intelligence, makes a mockery of the poor and ignores fiscal realities almost entirely. If you want to know what it does for you, it adds another $4000+ dollars out of your pocket into a government administration that now has a reliable track record of outspending all previous governments combined and still managing to deliver almost nothing at all in the way of benefit. Stop worrying about $200 and start worrying about the state of your country. Wake up, Canada.

[palestinelucas]

why are the MPs salary in Canada the second highest in the world

[ryanr]

The Gov is acting like their doing you a favour, instead theyre incentivising poverty.

[hadrian]

record inflation, the highest real estate prices in the G7 countries- even though we are the largest geographically, we pay the most and get the least for our healthcare dollar our of every country on earth- except the USA, a Healthcare system in ruins with ludicrous wait times and service, all with record setting immigration and a "goal" of 500K more people a year. Does anyone think it will actually get better ?

[TylesBrain]

Grocery rebate is a fancy way of stealing your money and giving a tiny amount back

[Slipshott]

They may be trying to minimize inflation, but the 14 cents a litre carbon tax on Apr 1 is going to raise food cost and other goods once again.

[BudzzableRides]

14.5 per litre fuel tax increase will create more inflation as usual! Insane spending! 200 dollar hand out fixes nothing, in fact in the long run WE pay for it too!

[Vinkalu]

“You will own nothing and be happy.” - WEF (Justin Trudeau’s master)
Welcome to the Mouse Utopia experiments, human version.

[MKK]

- Printing money, mass spending, rising taxes + interest rate + inflation rates, rising number of peoples to rely on Food banks does not bring pleasant future at all!
- Will more Canadians request bankruptcy?
“The feds will make life more expensive with the April tax hikes, ” said Franco Terrazzano, Federal Director of the CTF. “Trudeau shouldn’t be raising taxes when Canadians can’t afford gas or groceries.”
The carbon tax will increase to 14 C/L of gasoline and 12 C/CM of natural gas on April 1!
-The alcohol escalator tax automatically increases excise taxes on beer, wine and spirits every year by the rate of inflation. Alcohol taxes will increase by 6.3 per cent on April 1!
- The government gives $295 million to the Ford Motor Company!
- Rogozynski: "There may be a recession [in 2023]. That's not the time to introduce a bunch of big new increases!"
---- Why has violence and crime soured over the last 3 years?
They come to your car in the streets, beat you and take you out of the car and steal your car to send them to Dubai?!
Is it related to the wide opening borders policy?
Is welcoming and keeping 2, 000 illegal refugees from southern borders in Niagara hotels with taxpayers money correct?
- Why does nobody even apply for a new Mortgage application?!

[KellyBrownlee]

It's only a 1-time payment, it's useless and a waste of money!

[Bn-fdkp]

Still waiting for that budget to balance itself Eastern Canada.

[stancoleshill]

Just think of the carbon tax as the grocery tax. There isn't a direct tax on food. Think of the "wastewater charge" on water that in my area is 1.25 TIMES the water charge itself. Just call it something else besides TAX and in Canada and nobody will complain.

[mikeburton]

I’m sorry, this comes across as real propaganda. I have worked hard my whole life, an average Canadian and I was looking forward to retiring within the next two years. Now I’m afraid I won’t have enough money to live on ( in Canada at least) and I need to find a way to leave some money for my kids so they can have the things the last three or four generations simply took as “normal”, like house, families, food. Are there people out there getting 5-12% raises annually that I’m just unaware of? There has to be a correction. It may not be pretty.

[DeviantCanuck]

We'll all be living in a van down by the river.

[syxs]

the new budget is going to make inflation considerably _worse._ throwing petty cash at poor people is just an expensive way of gaslighting the country.