Sign of the apocalypse #4529: CEOs think taxes should be raised

According to a Report on Business survey, a majority of Canadian executives are in favour of raising taxes. “Almost three out of five of the senior executives who responded to the latest C-suite survey agree that in order for the federal government to balance its books, some form of tax increase may be necessary,” the Globe somewhat awkwardly reports (on first read, it seems as though only five CEOs responded to the survey, and of that five, one was particularly conflicted). One hundred and fifty-one top executives were respondents in the study, but before anyone accuses Canadian executives of being Commie sympathizers, we should note that the majority of CEOs responding didn’t say they supported a tax hike, but rather that one was probably necessary in order to combat the deficit.

Other interesting tidbits from the survey include the fact that most CEOs approved of raising interest rates (and, boy, did they get their wish today) and that they were optimistic about North America’s economy—Canada’s, especially. The report also seemed to indicate that most executives said that raising the GST would be the best way to eliminate the deficit. One respondent, Chad Ulansky of Metalex Ventures, went even further:

I’d be willing to pay a little more on my income tax…If we could somehow have consensus around the country to all suffer through a bit of higher taxes for the next five or 10 years, we’ll be a far stronger country on the other side of it.

While we’re glad so many executives are optimistic about our economy, we’re concerned for the companies whose CEOs answered “don’t know”—especially the six per cent who “didn’t know” their view of the federal budget.

• Executives say it’s time to raise taxes [Globe and Mail]
• Harper says higher taxes could hurt recovery [Bloomberg]