Canadian Politics Today

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/07/canada-america-taxes/533847/

I like taxes because they give me civilization.  I've long been a subscriber to that theory.  I remember when Jonathan Kay was one of the rightest of the right.  He seems to have a totoally different tune now.

The article also mentions the highest tax jurisdiction in the OECD (Denmark) and their great quality of life.  I agree, comparing only to the US is dangerous.

Your complacency is why you vote Liberal.

Who said anything about being complacent?  Your bitter attitude is why you vote Conservative, I suppose.

Paying taxes all depends on where it's going.  Taxes pay for things like infrastructure, health care, social programs etc.  There's lots of good things paid for by taxes.  But there's also a ton of waste in government, & much of it is terribly inefficient.  When government is paid to do something, there's no competition, which can lead to inefficiencies, waste, corruption, complacency/laziness etc.  If a private company doesn't keep costs down & keep production & efficiency high, that company will go out of business.  The civil service doesn't change much from gov to gov, 99% of the same employees doing most of the same tasks with the habits they've learned over the years/decades. I also know that the vast majority of waste, corruption etc in the gov never gets reported in the media so we never know about it, which means the waste & corruption etc in our government is worse than the vast majority of people think  Lluckily some big stories trickle out into the media & govs are held accountable sometimes for those. 

That said, sometimes even the waste & inefficiencies lead to better outcomes than private sector for the whole of society.

There's also this, showing that the corruption could be much worse (any human system is going to have problems):

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/canadas-civil-service-is-worlds-most-effective-uk-report

It's not about complacency.  Sometimes we just have to realize that we do things well.

Well if we're comparing our turd amongst a steaming pile of other turds, I'm glad ours smells the least bad. 

I like our federal public service better than in the US anyways.  Some of our provinces are abysmally run though.

There's also this, showing that the corruption could be much worse (any human system is going to have problems):

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-news/canadas-civil-service-is-worlds-most-effective-uk-report

It's not about complacency.  Sometimes we just have to realize that we do things well.

I think if you use these parameters:
Canada topped the rankings based on its overall score for performance measures such as tax administration, policy making, inclusiveness, openness, integrity, crisis management, fiscal and financial management.

We probably are the best.  It doesn't speak to how efficient we are overall in applying resources to problems.  SJ pointed out that healthcare is one example, First Nations is definitely another.  If we didn't have lawyers running the show we would do much better.

I may shock left-of-centres by saying I do think that great business leaders would do better at running government in that respect.  Unfortunately, the business leaders who enter politics are only interested in cutting taxes for the rich and not in overall organizational improvement.

To assume we can provide the same services as Denmark for the same money is a pipe dream.

That's not the deciding factor.  The management culture of the government seems to have a chief objective of not getting in trouble.  The willingness to take on risk is zero, and avoidance of accountability is high.

I have had to do a few projects with government, and it was impossible to get information and to get decisions made so as to move forward.  One project required the Deputy Minister, a very high profile person, to approve the schedule for us to develop a proposal.  After he rescheduled the meeting 3 times, which was several weeks' delay, we realized that we wouldn't be able to work with him as an authority on the project.  There was no other option, so we declined the work.

Management Culture is about to get an overhaul everywhere, and I expect it will go to government last.

Who said anything about being complacent?  Your bitter attitude is why you vote Conservative, I suppose.

You ooze complacency, and have since Boy Trudeau came to power. I am not bitter, merely dissatisfied. It has always been my nature to seek improvement in all things, to 'fix' what isn't working, or to improve what is. My friends on telling me a problem they have with someone tend to follow it up with "Now don't try to fix this!" My mind simply works that way, always seeking solutions to issues and problems.