I wrote this many years ago (2005), when we were effectively a single income family, and I was lamenting the tax system’s treatment of us. The numbers have changed over the years, but single income families really do get the shaft from the Tax System.
So what have we learned?
- In our specific scenario (read all of my disclaimers in my previous posts) a Single Income Family as compared to a Dual Income Family, pays:
$7424.00
Approximately MORE in taxes (that is Provincial and Federal taxes combined). - This means that the Single income family to NET the same would have to make over $12,000.00 GROSS more to bring home the same amount (that is just unfair). Remember the single income earner at that level is taxed at the HIGHEST level on that extra income.
- The Dual Income family is MORE likely to be eligible for:
- Family allowance cheques
- Provincial tax credits
- Pay less for the Ontario OHIP TAX
- The Dual income family gets to write off a great deal on Daycare including:
- Daycare costs
- Summer Day Camps costs
If this doesn’t convince you that the Taxman HATES Single Income families, I don’t know what would.
If you agree or disagree comment on this, I am willing to dialogue with folks on this, but if you agree that this is UNFAIR, contact your member of Parliament. Remember an election is just around the corner, and they MOST LIKELY will return your calls (as opposed to afterwards when they kind of forget you exist (IMHO)).
What can we do to fix this?
- Introduce a FAMILY or HOUSEHOLD income concept, where spouses or live-in folk can split the income (or even level the taxes) of the house and NOT get taxed at such a high level.
- Might promote more folks to stay at home with kids (thus not as much daycare)?
- Overhaul the whole tax system, so that everyone pays the same thing. Here I should be careful, because they’ll just end up making dual income folks pay as much as Single income folks!
- National Daycare moneys should go directly to the families, (ALL OF THEM) and let THEM figure out what to do with the money (ok, now I sound like Ralph Klein).
The previous points are MY Opinion only, but maybe it’s time to get more than just crazy crackpots like ME thinking about this?
If you want to compare this and have Quicktax, it’s dead easy, just create an extra return in it, and compare what you might pay if you were a Single Income earner!
Could be worse. They could have followed through on the Chretien child-care policy, funding child care facilities for two-income families, paid in large part from the taxes paid by one-income families. Basically, if you give up a second income to stay home with your children, you would still have to pay for your neighbour’s child care when they chose to collect two incomes. Thank God that reverse-Robin-Hood never happened.
Wow, looks like you did a really evaluated research! What an informative post =)
By the way, thanks for commenting at my blog!
No worries, there are many interesting Blogs out there, and yours is one of them!
C8J