At a convention of Canadian Liberals, tech executive Patrick Pichette proposed that youngsters eager to escape Canada be charged a half-million dollars for what he apparently regards as a privilege, not a right.
We must remind ourselves that the word “liberal,” here, is used in its modern, anti-liberal sense: of the ideology of ever-increasing restraints on everybody.
Very illiberal.
Even if Pichette means Canadian dollars, that’s still $360,000 in real USD dollars. Hardly a ten-dollar processing fee. More like extortion. He rationalizes that the kids owe that much anyway thanks to Canada’s heavily subsidized education system.
Terry Newman observes that Pichette “is a Canadian who left Canada for better opportunities himself.” He went to California and Google and now lives in London.
But Pichette and his de facto self-exemption are not the problem. The problem is all Liberals who “want to govern as many aspects [of the economy] as possible, pick winners, and unload the tax burden of the massive bureaucracy onto Canadians, the smartest of which understand this clearly and choose to leave.”
While Pichette’s proposal had his audience of Canadian Liberals cheering, sane individuals rightfully express varying degrees of alarm. After all, punishing people for leaving a country is eerily reminiscent of what totalitarian states do: prevent them from leaving altogether.
Pichette’s rationale itself is based on a misunderstanding. Are the half-million per student subsidies really there to educate? More like to placate well-organized lobbies of too-often ideologically driven careerists.
The idea that Canadian students actually receive half-a-million-dollar educations is not believable.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
Illustration created with Nano Banana
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