Chapter 4

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/edmonton/story/2008/04/22/budget-follow.html

This article from cbc.ca talks about how Alberta is spending too much money and saving too little. The budget for Alberta is $37-billion, which includes a three-year, $22.2-billion construction program for schools, roads, and health-care facilities. As for savings, only $279-million is to be set aside for the province. The Alberta director of the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, Scott Hennig, has said that the government needs to plan for a time when there is little energy revenue. He said, "They'll have no choice essentially to raise taxes or cut spending or dip into savings or go back into debt. I mean those are just four horrible options that this government's going to have to look at if prices drop."

Chapter 4 mentions the growth of government spending. Although the article doesn't specifically mention it, Wagner's law of increasing state activity seems to be a concept as well. According to the article, Alberta is doing some "record spending" even though it plans to save more in the coming year. Two-fifths of the entire spending in Canada is controlled by the government. $37-billion and $279-million is a big difference, so it's clear that Alberta's spending is very high. Wagner's law of increasing state activity states that government expenditures can be expected to grow faster than the total output of goods and services in industrialized economies. There are many factors involved in increased government spending, including the transition from a rural to urban country and the government becoming more involved in the education system. These are true for Alberta, considering there is the $22.2-billion construction program for roads and schools.

Alberta isn't the only province to have increased government spending. BC is definitely one of them. Since Vancouver got chosen to host the 2010 Olympics, there have been millions and millions of dollars put into the budget for the Olympic Games. Just recently, there was news of going over the budget and having to spend even more money. Personally, I'm pretty glad that Vancouver gets to host the Olympics, but then again, $1.6-billion is a lot to be spending on building things that will be used for two weeks. Of course, the venues will probably be turned into something else or used for different occasions in the future, so perhaps the Olympics will be some sort of investment for us.