If you have the impression that you are paying a lot of taxes in Quebec, know that you are not hallucinating!
It is indeed in Quebec that the tax pressure (or tax burden if you prefer) is the highest in Canada. By provincial fiscal pressure, we mean the total sum of taxes, social contributions of all kinds that individuals and businesses pay to their provincial government, municipalities, public organizations, etc.
According to the “Public Finance Statistics” study that Statistics Canada has just published, the “tax burden” of Quebecers reached in 2022 some 22.3% of Quebec’s GDP (nominal gross domestic product). GDP represents the size of the economy, which is based on the total market value of all the goods and services we produce in a year.
For comparison, Ontarians’ provincial tax burden was 17.2% of their nominal GDP. In Alberta, it peaked at 9.1% of Alberta GDP. In British Columbia? It was 16.7% of the province’s GDP.
The gap in “tax pressure” between Quebec and the other provinces (see the table below) demonstrates the extent to which Quebecers are actually squeezed like lemons by the province’s public administrations.
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Quebec drain of 122 billion dollars
Concretely, the tax burden of “22.3%” of Quebec GDP represented in 2022 the astronomical sum of 122 billion dollars in taxes and contributions that we paid to our provincial public administrations.
That’s $23 billion more than in 2020. While Quebec’s GDP grew by 20.9% between 2020 and 2022, our provincial “tax burden” jumped further, by some 23.2%.
Even worse. Between the coming to power of François Legault’s Caquists in the fall of 2018 and the year 2022, or even over four years, the amount of the provincial “tax burden” increased by 27.2% (+ $126 billion) , exceeding Quebec’s GDP growth by 3.2 percentage points (+ 24%).
Photo Marc-Andre Gagnon
Comparison with‘Ontario
As the government of François Legault likes to compare itself to the Ontario government of Doug Ford, allow me to point out that the “tax burden” of Ontarians recorded an increase between 2018 and 2022 (21.6%) slightly less than growth (21.9%) in Ontario’s GDP.
The Legault government may tell us over and over again that Quebec, under the CAQ, is increasingly catching up with Ontario in terms of productivity, we will agree that the gap of 5.1 percentage points between the “tax burden” imposed on Ontarians (17.2%) in 2022 and that imposed on Quebecers (22.3%) is immense.
In addition, you should know, again according to the Statistics Canada study, that this gap of 5.1 percentage points in 2022 is greater than the gap of 4.6 percentage points which prevailed in 2018. In 2018, the provincial “tax burden” amounted to 21.8% in Quebec, compared to 17.2% in Ontario.
Furthermore, to the provincial “tax burden”, we must, of course, add the “tax burden” imposed by the federal government on all Canadians. For Quebecers, this represents an additional tax drain of around $70 billion.
For each province, here is the tax burden in proportion to their respective GDP imposed by the provincial, territorial and local public administrations:
- Quebec: 22.3%
- Ontario: 17.2%
- British Columbia: 16.7%
- Alberta: 9.1%
- Saskatchewan: 14.2%
- Manitoba: 16.3%
- New Brunswick: 18.1%
- Nova Scotia: 20.4%
- Prince Edward Island: 17.8%
- Newfoundland and Labrador: 16.1%
