Juno News - Big Tech's Assault on Free Speech

00:00:00.000 Welcome to Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show.

00:00:06.600 This is The Andrew Lawton Show, brought to you by True North.

00:00:12.500 Coming up, big tech's assault on free speech and how we fight it,

00:00:17.060 and a modest proposal to fix Canadian taxation.

00:00:22.460 The Andrew Lawton Show starts right now.

00:00:26.020 With three weeks to go until the American election,

00:00:31.360 Twitter decided to become a player in the political process rather than simply a platform.

00:00:36.660 Anyone who's been watching the slow and sometimes not so slow descent into this from big tech wouldn't be surprised.

00:00:43.540 But nevertheless, it was egregious what happened on October 14th,

00:00:47.160 which was also my birthday, which is how I remember the day.

00:00:50.080 But I got sidetracked in the later hours of the day watching what was unfolding

00:00:53.720 as Twitter decided to censor the New York Post

00:00:57.200 and anyone wishing to share a New York Post article about Hunter Biden.

00:01:03.400 Welcome to The Andrew Lawton Show, Canada's Most Irreverent Talk Show here on True North,

00:01:08.140 Friday, October 16th.

00:01:09.980 In the couple of days since then, we've had some new developments,

00:01:12.700 but overwhelmingly the same problem still exists

00:01:16.520 and will continue to exist right up until the American election and beyond.

00:01:20.600 And I know we tend to focus on Canadian stories here.

00:01:24.780 The reason I'm focusing on this is because big tech censorship,

00:01:28.260 big tech intervention in the political process,

00:01:30.320 this may be manifesting itself in the United States,

00:01:33.580 but is by no means strictly an American phenomenon.

00:01:36.560 And it's entirely possible, probable in fact,

00:01:40.120 that something like this could happen in Canada when the next Canadian election rolls around.

00:01:44.300 Let's say True North has some exclusive story that Twitter decides people don't have a right to see.

00:01:50.040 This is where we'll be.

00:01:51.840 Now, there are a lot of things to unpack here,

00:01:54.420 and I'm going to try to take a 30,000 foot view of matters so as to not get too in the weeds.

00:01:59.780 But I do have to talk about the ideological component here,

00:02:03.580 because when Twitter decides on this story being published,

00:02:07.680 and the story, I mean, if you haven't read it by now,

00:02:09.580 it's still on New York Post's website, nypost.com,

00:02:14.080 is that the New York Post got its hands on a laptop,

00:02:17.660 a waterlogged laptop that had been dropped off at a repair shop,

00:02:20.780 which ended up being passed to federal authorities and eventually passed to Rudy Giuliani.

00:02:26.420 And on this laptop, purported emails between Hunter Biden and a Ukrainian official

00:02:32.020 about a meeting that was set up by Hunter Biden with Joe Biden

00:02:37.080 when he was serving as vice president.

00:02:39.140 Apparently, some sexually incriminating footage of Hunter Biden.

00:02:42.940 And there are a lot of questions about this,

00:02:44.940 questions about the material, questions about the content.

00:02:48.180 Was this actually a computer that Hunter Biden dropped off at a laptop,

00:02:52.120 at a computer repair store?

00:02:53.560 Or were these hacked materials and the computer repair story was just a cover?

00:02:58.680 The thing is, no one has actually thus far made the claim

00:03:02.860 with any evidence that there was a hacking here.

00:03:05.760 And we know it's possible.

00:03:06.980 I'm not saying it's not.

00:03:08.120 But no one has actually made that claim.

00:03:10.340 But what Twitter did is used its policy,

00:03:13.660 its purported policy against the dissemination of hacked materials

00:03:17.060 as its justification for censoring the New York Post and censoring its article.

00:03:24.100 Now, as it stands, we're what, 20 hours after this story came out

00:03:28.360 and, no, sorry, more than that, 44 hours after the story came out

00:03:32.480 and the New York Post Twitter account has not actually tweeted anything.

00:03:35.760 Now, I don't know if their account is still frozen

00:03:38.040 or if this is just by choice where they're saying,

00:03:40.880 you know what, we're not tweeting anymore.

00:03:42.280 But that's important to know because they went dark

00:03:44.820 when most media outlets would have been continuing to do follow-up

00:03:48.520 as the New York Post was and promoting those follow-up stories.

00:03:52.060 And there were a great many of them.

00:03:53.560 For example, how Joe Biden at his town hall on Thursday night

00:03:57.060 was not asked a single question about the scandal.

00:04:00.400 Not a single question about it.

00:04:02.600 And how the mainstream media has been more focused on challenging the New York Post

00:04:06.420 than it has with going after a censorship,

00:04:10.260 a form of censorship that actually harms free press in general

00:04:14.060 and could be turned against any other media outlet in Canada.

00:04:18.600 So this is why it's important here.

00:04:20.420 Now, I've always been, and I know I've faced a great deal of criticism

00:04:23.680 from a lot of people that watch and listen to this show

00:04:26.420 for saying this, that I do not believe the answer to the big tech problem is regulation.

00:04:31.820 I am a free market, conservative, libertarian type when it comes to these issues.

00:04:36.520 And I believe that the free market is the answer, not government regulation.

00:04:41.600 But Will Chamberlain had posted something on Twitter

00:04:44.220 that I actually thought was, it was directed at people like me,

00:04:47.520 but I didn't think he was off base in saying it.

00:04:49.580 He said, you know, today's the day that libertarians lost the argument

00:04:53.420 on regulating big tech.

00:04:55.240 And I'm not going to lie, and I said as much, it's not looking good for libertarians.

00:04:59.180 But I've had some time to look at this and to think about this a fair bit more.

00:05:03.000 And I have a couple of things to say on this that are important.

00:05:06.620 Number one, and this is, I think, the first and foremost,

00:05:09.880 you don't get to amend your principles based on how the political individual situations unfold.

00:05:18.160 You don't get to say, oh, well, I believe this.

00:05:20.240 I believe this is important.

00:05:21.380 But you know what?

00:05:22.260 I don't like that.

00:05:23.980 Ergo, I'm going to make an exception to what I believe.

00:05:26.180 If you do that, you either have to reevaluate your principles

00:05:29.180 or accept that your principles are not consistent.

00:05:31.320 So that's the philosophical point on this.

00:05:33.840 But the other aspect of this that I think is important here

00:05:37.280 is understanding that I don't believe regulation would make any of this better.

00:05:44.180 Right now in the United States, there's a Republican government.

00:05:46.980 There's a Republican Senate.

00:05:48.060 We know that the U.S. is summoning the Twitter executives like Jack Dorsey to the Senate,

00:05:54.680 and they'll have some theatrics there.

00:05:56.660 But for the most part, yeah, you could have a little bit of that,

00:06:01.260 and you're not going to fundamentally change the culture.

00:06:03.840 Because this is a cultural problem here.

00:06:06.220 The big tech companies feel that they can just do whatever they want,

00:06:09.760 that they feel they can actually go after free speech and do this.

00:06:13.460 And censorship that comes from the state is an egregious form of censorship.

00:06:17.720 There's also cultural censorship, and there's also corporate censorship.

00:06:21.680 And these are all different, but they are still censorship forms.

00:06:25.640 And we still have to look at them and understand them,

00:06:28.040 and I would say fight back against them.

00:06:30.820 Let's look in a Canadian context.

00:06:32.520 Right now, we have Justin Trudeau and Stephen Gilbeau saying that they plan to put forward

00:06:38.440 all of these regulations on big tech companies.

00:06:41.100 They say they want to regulate Twitter and Facebook,

00:06:43.160 and they want to make it so that these companies don't allow hate speech on their platforms.

00:06:47.240 In this case, regulation is actually a conduit to encouraging more censorship from big tech companies.

00:06:55.700 So when you have a government that is prone to censor and does not want people to be able to speak out

00:07:01.700 about whatever the issue is or use the sort of broad and ill-defined term of hate speech to go after speech they don't like,

00:07:08.940 you actually have government regulation of big tech as a conduit to impose censorship.

00:07:14.620 So once you go down that road of saying that,

00:07:17.960 yes, we believe it is appropriate for government to regulate the content and regulate the management of social media companies,

00:07:25.340 you are giving government license to go in the exact opposite direction of what you think you're trying to do and what you want to do.

00:07:33.020 So you always have to assume that any power you give government will eventually be used by a government

00:07:40.780 whose values and views are unfavorable to you.

00:07:43.740 So you can't just say,

00:07:45.060 well, because we think the government right now is on side with this,

00:07:47.860 we can justify this because you're going to be sorely, sorely disappointed when it's used against you.

00:07:53.600 So I don't think regulation will make anything better in the long term

00:07:56.840 because we know that regulation always goes down a very dark and very bad road.

00:08:01.860 Now, this is again why I still hold to my views that we need to find a free market solution to these things.

00:08:07.920 I will say it's harder and harder to do that.

00:08:10.760 And what I think New York Post should do and other media outlets is start diversifying their online presence.

00:08:16.620 Make it so that you are not basing your entire business model on Twitter and Facebook

00:08:22.520 and giving these companies so much power over you.

00:08:26.480 And this is very difficult.

00:08:27.940 And I say this as someone who has frustrations with Twitter and Facebook,

00:08:30.940 but I also use them.

00:08:32.260 I use them to communicate with people.

00:08:33.860 And yeah, I have my own website and my own mailing list.

00:08:36.460 And you can join up at andrewlaughton.ca if you'd like.

00:08:39.500 But what I'm doing here is trying to take advantage of a great many platforms,

00:08:44.940 True North's website, Facebook, Twitter.

00:08:46.680 I'm on Parler now and trying to communicate people with directly.

00:08:50.220 I know that I don't have a right to be on any one of these platforms.

00:08:54.460 I know that they are not, as has been argued in some court cases, the modern example of the town square where anyone has license to it.

00:09:03.900 They are companies.

00:09:04.700 They can set out their own rules and their own terms.

00:09:07.480 New York Post has not been censored in some senses because it still has its own website.

00:09:12.800 They are still posting content, but they were censored because they got into bed with people that were offering no protections to them.

00:09:21.180 And people that could decide on a whim, we're going to rip your content offline.

00:09:25.000 We're going to deny other people the right to share your content.

00:09:28.720 And that was what happened here.

00:09:31.320 So the answer to this is for, I think, people to go back to how the internet was in the early days in many respects,

00:09:37.420 which is to start supporting your own brand and not letting someone else hijack that.

00:09:43.920 I would love to see social media companies move more towards a model, even if you have to pay them to use them.

00:09:50.600 If you're a big publisher, that way you would at least get some sort of a contractual relationship with them.

00:09:56.580 For example, if New York Post's web host, whoever hosts its website, had decided, you know,

00:10:01.840 we don't like this Hunter Biden story either.

00:10:03.760 We're going to pull your website offline.

00:10:05.360 Well, New York Post would be able to say, hang on, we're in a contract with you.

00:10:07.940 You cannot do this.

00:10:09.520 And if the company says, well, we have these terms of service, New York Post could be like, you know what?

00:10:13.800 That's BS.

00:10:14.740 We're going to another company.

00:10:15.980 So you have to take this look of self-preservation.

00:10:18.780 If you assume the worst of everyone, I know that's a myopic way to live,

00:10:22.520 but if you assume the worst of these sort of actors, you're going to not be surprised when these dynamics happen.

00:10:30.320 So I would say to anyone and everyone, as you move forward in these debates,

00:10:36.320 know that social media companies only like to pay lip service to free speech.

00:10:41.200 They aren't actually interested in cultural free speech.

00:10:43.980 These are the same companies that will permanently suspend your account if you use the wrong pronoun.

00:10:48.520 I think my colleague, Lindsay Shepard, had her account locked at one point for supposedly misgendering someone.

00:10:54.460 And what's interesting, though, is that I think Twitter grossly miscalculated its response here.

00:11:00.420 And this just goes to show how many powers people up at Twitter headquarters are having,

00:11:05.480 people that might not even be higher ranking officials,

00:11:07.900 because you saw this on Twitter that Jack Dorsey had said that it was wrong.

00:11:13.500 We updated our policy and enforcement to fix.

00:11:15.760 Our goal is to attempt to add context, and now we have capabilities to do that.

00:11:21.040 He apologized not for the blocking earlier on, but he apologized for our communication around our actions.

00:11:30.520 He said blocking with zero context as to why we're blocking is unacceptable.

00:11:35.920 Whereas I was like, no, no, no, you added too many words in that sentence.

00:11:38.940 Actually blocking it is fairly unacceptable.

00:11:41.980 Legal, but unacceptable.

00:11:43.640 And if I were the New York Post, I'd be severely, severely considering the possibility of a defamation or libel claim.

00:11:52.520 I'm not an American lawyer.

00:11:53.480 I'm not a Canadian lawyer either, for that matter.

00:11:55.340 But what Twitter has done here is actually maligned the New York Post reporting by saying

00:11:59.500 that the information that was in the Post story was the product of hacking.

00:12:04.300 And as I said, well, I would not say that is impossible.

00:12:07.980 So far, there has been no evidence or what I've seen anyway is credible reporting that has said it was hacked.

00:12:15.060 This was a determination that Twitter made.

00:12:17.920 And Twitter has now gone beyond auditing what you're posting on Twitter,

00:12:22.000 but auditing what is in a story that you may link to on Twitter.

00:12:26.360 So the idea of Twitter fact-checking certainly shatters this idea that Twitter has been claiming

00:12:31.540 that it's purely a neutral platform and not a publisher that has its own bias,

00:12:35.840 because they're now trying to effectively regulate not just the content of what's on Twitter,

00:12:40.980 but the content of what's on other platforms that people may link to or share on Twitter.

00:12:45.900 And as of Thursday, Twitter's, what's your title here?

00:12:51.340 The Legal Policy Trust and Safety Lead had put a thread forward saying that they are amending their policy.

00:12:59.200 So it sounds like the New York Post story is going to be fine now.

00:13:02.700 Maybe, maybe not.

00:13:03.520 She says, over the last 24 hours, we've reached significant feedback, I'll bet,

00:13:07.720 about how we enforced our hacked materials policy.

00:13:11.020 After reflecting on this feedback, we've decided to make changes to the policy

00:13:15.060 and how we enforce it.

00:13:16.700 She says that they have added new product capabilities,

00:13:20.120 such as labels, to provide people with additional context.

00:13:24.380 We are no longer limited to tweet removal as an enforcement action.

00:13:28.580 She says this will help people to assess content for themselves,

00:13:32.520 which she argues better serves the public interest.

00:13:35.480 She says they'll no longer remove hacked content unless it is directly shared by hackers

00:13:40.160 or those acting in concert with them.

00:13:42.240 She said we will label tweets to provide context instead of blocking links from being shared on Twitter

00:13:48.160 because it was at the point where you could not even send it in a direct message to someone.

00:13:52.520 If you try to send that link, it would just give you this error message of sorts

00:13:56.480 where you couldn't actually do it.

00:13:58.240 So now they're saying, okay, we're just going to contextualize it.

00:14:00.920 And this is what Facebook and Twitter and YouTube have been doing with, you know,

00:14:04.520 Trump's tweets and posts for a while with a lot of things that are related to COVID-19

00:14:09.060 or climate change.

00:14:10.240 In fact, I think we even had one of our things given that little warning label at some point.

00:14:14.840 Now I like try for it.

00:14:16.040 I try to just say something that, you know, triggers the ire of the social media censors.

00:14:21.220 And again, I'm still using these platforms because in a lot of ways,

00:14:24.780 our world has been structured around them,

00:14:26.960 wherein these are the ones that you need to use to communicate.

00:14:30.920 But my call to all of the conservative billionaires out there who are frustrated with this

00:14:35.480 is start putting money into your own.

00:14:38.680 I mean, Parler is an example.

00:14:40.220 It's got a decent enough audience.

00:14:42.280 I think there are a lot of technical issues on Parler that I would still like to be worked out.

00:14:46.880 YouTube is one.

00:14:47.820 I mean, you've got all of these companies like Fox and MSNBC and CNN and NBC and CBS and ABC

00:14:54.680 that are putting their content on YouTube.

00:14:57.180 I mean, these are multi-billion dollar companies

00:14:59.240 that have the ability to create their own video platforms.

00:15:03.000 And some of them do, and they are all terrible, though.

00:15:06.520 None of them are as good as YouTube as far as the technical experience to the user.

00:15:11.920 Why are people not making alternatives to these things?

00:15:14.680 Why is everyone accepting the premises that these three countries,

00:15:18.480 or I say companies, but they are like countries in a lot of ways,

00:15:21.340 that these three companies get to control the internet, Google, Facebook, and Twitter?

00:15:26.620 And that's the problem is that people for too long have been capitulating to this narrative,

00:15:31.300 which is why when something comes along and they decide three weeks before an election,

00:15:35.260 you know what?

00:15:35.700 The New York Post, you don't get to be a media outlet no more.

00:15:38.740 I realize that's poor grammar.

00:15:40.240 It's a Norm Macdonald reference.

00:15:41.780 You don't get to do this anymore.

00:15:43.500 Then we are all like, oh, well, it's censorship.

00:15:45.980 Yeah, well, a load of good that is if you can't get your stories out

00:15:48.620 with three weeks to go until an election.

00:15:51.160 So yeah, people can have the Senate committee hearings.

00:15:53.880 They can do all this.

00:15:54.680 But if we don't push back against the cultural climate,

00:15:57.440 not just the cultural climate that supports censorship by big tech,

00:16:01.100 but the cultural climate that doesn't look for any alternatives to these,

00:16:05.980 no regulation will save you from what comes next.

00:16:09.560 We'll be back in a few moments with more of The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:16:12.460 Stay tuned.

00:16:14.480 You're tuned in to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:16:19.540 Welcome back to The Andrew Lawton Show.

00:16:22.000 I know it's not tax time just yet for most people,

00:16:25.220 but at the same time, in Canada, it's always tax time in some form.

00:16:28.840 Even if you're not filing them, you're certainly paying them,

00:16:31.400 which is why a really great new book came out

00:16:33.740 was one that I wanted to spotlight here.

00:16:35.960 It is called The Grumpy Accountant,

00:16:38.300 One Fed-Up Tax Pro's Practical Plan to Fix Canada's

00:16:41.800 Senselessly Complicated Tax System.

00:16:43.860 It's part tax advice, part novel,

00:16:46.140 and part analysis on the state of taxation in Canada.

00:16:49.400 And the author is accountant Neil Winokur,

00:16:51.820 who joins me on the line now.

00:16:53.280 Neil, good to talk to you.

00:16:54.060 Thanks for coming on today.

00:16:55.500 Thanks so much for having me.

00:16:56.980 It's funny.

00:16:57.400 I actually spoke about tax policy a few weeks ago on the show,

00:17:00.280 and I was just like relentlessly mocking

00:17:02.100 the fact that I was even having the discussion

00:17:04.460 because I'm like, no one's going to care about this.

00:17:06.660 And then everyone did.

00:17:07.520 Everyone actually found it as enjoyable as I did.

00:17:09.740 So when I learned of this book and read through it myself,

00:17:12.660 I'm like, I got to get Neil on the show.

00:17:14.340 So I appreciate it.

00:17:15.760 You're a grumpy accountant.

00:17:17.080 I'm a grumpy taxpayer.

00:17:18.660 Explain to me why there is so much to be grumpy about in Canada

00:17:22.400 and why you wrote this book.

00:17:23.600 Yeah, so it's interesting.

00:17:26.120 The reason why there's so much to be grumpy about,

00:17:29.140 most people think it's because of the actual amount of tax

00:17:32.800 that we all have to pay.

00:17:34.760 And of course, that does make a lot of people grumpy.

00:17:37.080 But what really gets me going and makes me grumpy

00:17:39.440 is not the amount of tax that we're paying,

00:17:42.620 but the complexity and the amount of bureaucracy

00:17:46.420 that we have to deal with in order to file our tax returns.

00:17:51.260 And even without thinking about how much tax we're paying,

00:17:56.760 it's the method and the way we have to file our tax returns.

00:18:01.280 That's what makes me grumpy.

00:18:03.120 I realized after a certain number of years of doing my job

00:18:05.780 that the job of a tax filing accountant should not even exist.

00:18:11.200 And that's why I wrote the book.

00:18:12.460 I wanted to shed light on that particular aspect of our tax system.

00:18:16.380 It's too complicated.

00:18:17.800 We need to simplify it.

00:18:19.180 We can simplify it.

00:18:20.700 Other countries have much simpler systems.

00:18:22.760 And that's why I wrote the book.

00:18:24.600 The book itself, I mentioned earlier, is part novel.

00:18:27.620 It follows a fictional character named Jerry.

00:18:30.160 And I'll talk about that in a moment

00:18:31.300 as he goes through all of these stages of life

00:18:33.920 from getting a job, paying taxes, getting a tax refund,

00:18:37.600 an audit, marriage, kids, even death, and all of this.

00:18:40.320 And the one recurring theme is that at every stage of life,

00:18:44.140 government is there with its handout.

00:18:47.060 Yeah, exactly.

00:18:48.160 The way our tax system is designed is that

00:18:50.300 we seem to have this philosophy in Canada

00:18:53.940 of the idea that government is there

00:18:57.820 to always lend a helping hand.

00:19:00.460 And it's not only about help with actual money being transferred,

00:19:04.960 but it's with deductions and credits

00:19:07.200 that are riddled into our tax system.

00:19:10.420 For every stage in life and every life event,

00:19:13.160 there's a tax deduction or credit,

00:19:14.920 which when you really think about it,

00:19:16.700 it doesn't really make any sense.

00:19:18.320 And that's what really bothers me.

00:19:20.240 So if you are in university or college,

00:19:23.200 there's tuition credits.

00:19:24.560 If you have children, there's child care.

00:19:26.600 And if you're trying to save money,

00:19:28.560 well, there's RSPs and TFSAs.

00:19:30.540 And if you have some health problems,

00:19:32.480 there's medical expenses.

00:19:33.560 And they're all there to help us

00:19:35.660 and to maybe make the tax system more fair.

00:19:38.880 Like each credit and deduction

00:19:40.000 has a valid reason and rationale for it.

00:19:43.760 But the downside of it is that

00:19:46.060 when you're trying to target every single life event

00:19:48.560 and every single special interest group,

00:19:50.260 then everyone wants a tax credit.

00:19:52.820 So if you're a volunteer firefighter,

00:19:54.240 you have a tax credit.

00:19:55.140 Look, I love volunteer firefighters.

00:19:56.580 They're heroes.

00:19:57.460 But do we need a tax credit?

00:19:58.900 Like every single stage in life

00:20:01.300 and every little thing you do,

00:20:02.900 there's going to be a tax credit or deduction.

00:20:05.200 And that just creates all this complexity.

00:20:07.360 No one knows what credits or deductions there are.

00:20:10.880 And no one can file their own tax returns

00:20:13.000 because of all of this.

00:20:14.940 And there is an inerrant unfairness in it as well.

00:20:17.480 And you touch on this,

00:20:18.460 I don't know if it's intentionally or not,

00:20:19.880 in the book where one person

00:20:21.540 with the same income as another

00:20:23.080 has a vastly superior tax return

00:20:25.920 because of how many of these credits

00:20:27.400 they availed themselves of.

00:20:28.800 And I don't fault people for using

00:20:30.700 whatever tools and tricks they can legally

00:20:33.000 to reduce their tax burden.

00:20:34.800 But it means that it's very unlikely

00:20:36.460 that people are going to get

00:20:38.500 as low a tax amount as they're legally entitled to

00:20:41.780 because the system is so complex to navigate.

00:20:44.200 Exactly.

00:20:45.780 And those with lower incomes

00:20:47.520 and more modest incomes

00:20:48.580 who might not be able to afford

00:20:50.360 the best professional tax devices

00:20:53.360 they can obtain each year

00:20:55.300 might be missing out

00:20:56.440 on certain deductions and credits.

00:20:58.300 In fact, in the throne speech

00:21:00.560 that happened in the end of September,

00:21:02.920 there was one line thrown in there

00:21:05.840 into the throne speech

00:21:06.820 about automatic tax return filing

00:21:09.340 that the CRA actually might start

00:21:11.020 filing the tax return for the taxpayer,

00:21:14.080 those with very low incomes,

00:21:16.020 because right now there's about

00:21:17.960 a billion dollars of tax credits

00:21:20.800 that people are missing out on,

00:21:22.660 actual like GST credits

00:21:24.120 and money that they're entitled to,

00:21:25.420 but they're not filing their tax returns

00:21:27.300 because it's too complicated.

00:21:28.840 So the CRA is saying,

00:21:29.680 oh, we'll do it for you.

00:21:30.960 But that's a perfect example

00:21:32.340 of how the way our tax system is designed,

00:21:34.960 the more money you have,

00:21:36.860 the more you're able to afford

00:21:38.480 the higher professional fees,

00:21:41.060 the more you can be assured

00:21:44.060 that you're actually getting

00:21:45.120 all the deductions and credits

00:21:46.220 you're entitled to.

00:21:47.120 And that's a big flaw in the system.

00:21:48.500 The more deductions and credits you have,

00:21:50.440 then the more complicated it is

00:21:51.900 and then the more money you need to spend

00:21:53.480 to file your tax returns.

00:21:54.920 So we're actually spending now

00:21:56.080 $7 billion a year.

00:21:57.880 That's just families,

00:21:59.400 $500 on average per household

00:22:01.400 to get your tax returns filed.

00:22:03.800 That doesn't include small businesses

00:22:06.140 and corporations.

00:22:07.100 So it's a lot of money.

00:22:08.280 And the budget for the CRA

00:22:09.300 is almost $5 billion a year now.

00:22:12.460 It wasn't like that 10 years ago.

00:22:14.300 So it's gotten out of hand.

00:22:16.320 And what my idea is,

00:22:18.000 let's simplify it,

00:22:18.900 get rid of deductions and credits,

00:22:20.220 you lower the rate.

00:22:21.380 And most people agree with this.

00:22:22.720 It's just a lack of political will

00:22:24.420 and courage to actually get it done.

00:22:26.580 I want to talk about the political aspect

00:22:28.320 of this very shortly.

00:22:29.340 And the book is not political,

00:22:30.820 I will say.

00:22:31.620 I think it really does appeal

00:22:33.260 or should appeal to people

00:22:34.420 of broad ideological

00:22:36.000 or political persuasion.

00:22:38.100 But when you talk about

00:22:39.440 the tax return idea,

00:22:42.280 I have always,

00:22:43.060 just as a lifelong Canadian,

00:22:44.680 taken for granted

00:22:45.520 that this is how filing taxes is.

00:22:47.920 And I actually didn't realize

00:22:49.040 until reading this

00:22:49.920 that there are millions of people

00:22:51.400 in other developed Western nations

00:22:53.280 where a majority of the populations,

00:22:55.480 people with simple employment situations,

00:22:57.840 actually don't have to file

00:22:59.140 tax returns at all.

00:23:00.180 This is not a universal thing, evidently.

00:23:03.120 Right.

00:23:03.640 For example, in the UK,

00:23:05.480 in the United Kingdom,

00:23:06.440 if you're an employee,

00:23:07.840 okay, and you have no other income,

00:23:09.240 so you don't have self-employment income,

00:23:11.040 you don't have capital gains

00:23:12.180 or investment income to report,

00:23:13.740 you have a,

00:23:14.360 well, you know,

00:23:15.000 here we call it a T4,

00:23:16.200 whatever they call it there,

00:23:17.380 and you have no other income,

00:23:18.460 you don't have to file a tax return

00:23:20.200 at the end of the year.

00:23:21.060 Your employer is filing the T4

00:23:23.900 to the government

00:23:24.520 and that is the tax return.

00:23:26.780 And that's what we do here.

00:23:27.840 Your employer takes your T4,

00:23:29.320 they file it to CRA,

00:23:30.580 they give you a copy.

00:23:31.980 The CRA has your T4 already.

00:23:34.020 In fact,

00:23:34.380 if you file your tax return

00:23:35.660 and you make a mistake

00:23:36.960 in putting a number on your T4,

00:23:39.220 the CRA will automatically

00:23:40.840 correct it for you

00:23:41.840 and send you the reassessment.

00:23:43.000 Yeah, because they already know

00:23:44.000 the correct number.

00:23:45.640 Exactly.

00:23:46.240 So why do we have to file it?

00:23:47.440 It doesn't make any sense.

00:23:48.800 So,

00:23:49.120 and that's when you start to get into

00:23:50.740 like automatic filing

00:23:51.980 by the government,

00:23:52.900 pre-filled tax returns,

00:23:54.420 and there's pros and cons of that.

00:23:56.560 I'm not crazy about that idea

00:23:58.100 because then we have to,

00:23:59.800 you know,

00:24:00.340 think about,

00:24:00.840 well,

00:24:00.920 do we trust the CRA

00:24:02.080 to file our tax returns for us?

00:24:03.880 I don't know if that's such a good idea.

00:24:05.980 But if we move to a really simple system,

00:24:08.820 employees,

00:24:09.980 so those who have a T4

00:24:11.500 and nothing else

00:24:12.300 should not even have to file

00:24:14.060 a tax return at the end of the year.

00:24:15.660 And those who are self-employed,

00:24:16.880 I talk about this a lot in the book,

00:24:18.440 about maybe four or five chapters in the book

00:24:20.540 deals with self-employed

00:24:21.680 and small business owners.

00:24:22.500 They should have a much simpler time

00:24:26.720 filing their tax returns.

00:24:28.500 And I propose ideas

00:24:29.380 on how to simplify things for them as well

00:24:31.520 because the bureaucracy that they,

00:24:33.660 anyone who's self-employed,

00:24:34.740 has their own small business,

00:24:35.660 has to go through

00:24:36.340 is absolutely ridiculous.

00:24:38.060 It's very unfair.

00:24:39.080 It's very burdensome.

00:24:39.960 It's costly.

00:24:40.740 It's complicated.

00:24:42.000 And it keeps people up at night.

00:24:44.160 And it's,

00:24:45.860 the whole system is ripe

00:24:47.540 for a major disruption for sure.

00:24:49.660 Yeah, and it actually disincentivizes people

00:24:53.300 creating businesses in some cases.

00:24:55.800 I remember, for example,

00:24:56.720 when I started working for myself,

00:24:58.760 setting it up was very daunting.

00:25:00.040 And I eventually, you know,

00:25:01.140 worked my way through it

00:25:02.040 and had some professional help

00:25:03.760 with that process.

00:25:04.480 But I know there are a lot of other people

00:25:05.740 that would look at this and say,

00:25:06.820 there's no way I'm going to be able to do this.

00:25:08.980 People that are terrified of the idea

00:25:10.900 of making a mistake

00:25:12.260 and risking the penalties

00:25:13.540 and all of that.

00:25:14.860 And that is not an environment for growth,

00:25:17.580 for economic growth,

00:25:18.600 for growth of business.

00:25:19.660 In a country that I think

00:25:21.460 desperately should be welcoming growth.

00:25:23.980 Absolutely.

00:25:24.620 Yeah, the regime

00:25:25.560 that small business owners

00:25:26.580 have to comply with.

00:25:28.080 I mean, think about,

00:25:29.100 let's say you own

00:25:29.760 your own small business.

00:25:30.680 It's just you, okay?

00:25:31.680 So you're an owner-manager

00:25:33.020 and you incorporate

00:25:34.280 because a lawyer told you,

00:25:35.740 well, you really should have it

00:25:36.600 in a corporation.

00:25:37.720 So now you have to file

00:25:38.440 your personal tax return,

00:25:39.600 your corporate tax return,

00:25:41.260 your GST return.

00:25:42.960 And depending on your province,

00:25:44.080 HST, some provinces,

00:25:45.620 you actually have to file

00:25:46.920 a separate sales tax return

00:25:48.700 to your province.

00:25:49.420 So you have GST to CRA

00:25:50.660 and you have provincial sales tax

00:25:51.940 return to your province.

00:25:53.000 So you have personal corporate sales tax.

00:25:55.420 And if you want to pay yourself

00:25:56.420 a salary from your own corporation,

00:25:57.940 a T4,

00:25:58.800 your corporation has to deduct tax

00:26:00.540 for you from your own salary

00:26:02.160 and you're paying double CBP.

00:26:04.880 Nobody can figure this out on their own.

00:26:06.640 They're forced to hire people like me

00:26:08.640 to help them.

00:26:09.440 And it just,

00:26:11.040 like, it really bothers me

00:26:12.500 because they shouldn't have to do this.

00:26:13.840 So, for example,

00:26:14.880 in the United States,

00:26:16.520 our neighbors to the south,

00:26:18.000 if you have your own corporation,

00:26:20.380 legally, you can have a corporation.

00:26:22.200 It's separate from you

00:26:23.320 for legal purposes.

00:26:24.600 But from a tax filing perspective,

00:26:26.180 it can actually just be one,

00:26:28.120 I think they call it an S corp.

00:26:30.220 And the way an S corp works,

00:26:32.180 you've one tax return filing.

00:26:33.660 It goes right onto

00:26:34.600 your personal tax return.

00:26:35.640 It's the same tax filing.

00:26:37.220 And the net income from that S corp

00:26:39.480 is just considered your personal income.

00:26:40.900 So it's much simpler.

00:26:42.420 And we need to look at ways

00:26:43.780 to simplify this

00:26:45.040 for small business owners

00:26:47.100 and those who are self-employed.

00:26:48.640 And I think that

00:26:49.380 that would probably encourage

00:26:50.600 more people to try

00:26:51.560 and venture out on their own

00:26:52.420 because right now,

00:26:53.940 you try and venture out on your own

00:26:55.500 and you might not even know

00:26:57.400 your obligations

00:26:58.180 that if you hit $30,000 of revenue

00:27:00.780 within, you know,

00:27:02.940 12 months or four fiscal quarters,

00:27:05.980 you have to register for GST and HST

00:27:08.800 and start collecting sales tax.

00:27:10.360 And a lot of people

00:27:10.760 don't even know that

00:27:11.540 and they get into a lot of trouble.

00:27:13.260 And self-employed people

00:27:14.520 have to save their revenue

00:27:16.920 to pay tax.

00:27:18.020 They're now tax collectors

00:27:19.400 for the government.

00:27:20.340 If you're self-employed,

00:27:21.500 you're a tax collector

00:27:22.560 and they don't pay you for it.

00:27:24.240 So it's not easy.

00:27:27.420 It's not easy.

00:27:28.220 It discourages people.

00:27:29.960 And I think some of the ideas

00:27:31.380 in the book to simplify it

00:27:32.980 on a massive scale,

00:27:34.320 it might put me out of a job

00:27:35.880 and other people like me,

00:27:37.500 but I think it would be so beneficial

00:27:39.840 for millions of people.

00:27:41.540 I'll find something else to do.

00:27:43.080 I'm not too worried about that.

00:27:45.480 Yeah.

00:27:45.680 And I was actually going to ask about that

00:27:47.140 because you are in a lot of ways

00:27:49.060 trying to create a tax system

00:27:50.620 that would put you out of work.

00:27:52.640 And we know that,

00:27:53.580 you know,

00:27:53.780 in law, for example,

00:27:54.720 the industry gets more and more complex

00:27:56.300 so that lawyers

00:27:56.920 will always have a market share,

00:27:58.680 whereas you're proposing something

00:27:59.880 that for most Canadians

00:28:01.300 would actually make it

00:28:02.420 quite easy and simple

00:28:03.860 to such an extent

00:28:04.780 that they wouldn't need

00:28:05.520 a tax professional every year.

00:28:07.560 Right.

00:28:08.080 So look,

00:28:08.480 I'll have to adapt my business model.

00:28:11.380 Accountants can do

00:28:12.280 a lot of other things.

00:28:13.300 We could still advise

00:28:14.240 business owners

00:28:14.980 and people who are self-employed

00:28:16.420 about their business finances,

00:28:18.060 but we don't,

00:28:19.220 maybe that tax role

00:28:21.000 could disappear.

00:28:22.420 That would be my goal

00:28:23.620 and my dream

00:28:24.360 for Canada for the future.

00:28:25.820 There are,

00:28:27.660 you know,

00:28:28.800 thousands.

00:28:29.600 I think the CRA 0.94

00:28:30.620 has 40,000 employees.

00:28:32.880 There's thousands

00:28:33.560 of accountants

00:28:34.220 across the country

00:28:34.940 and there's quite a few

00:28:36.680 tax software companies

00:28:38.220 that make a very nice profit

00:28:39.900 off of millions

00:28:41.340 and millions of Canadians

00:28:42.220 who download TurboTax

00:28:43.760 and you file

00:28:44.660 and these tax software

00:28:46.440 that they could download online

00:28:47.560 and that,

00:28:49.160 and in order

00:28:51.340 to file their tax returns.

00:28:52.860 So yeah,

00:28:53.140 in my plan,

00:28:54.340 all of the above

00:28:55.520 that I mentioned

00:28:56.100 would have to adapt

00:28:57.320 their business model

00:28:58.840 and adapt to a new reality,

00:29:00.640 but it's not fair

00:29:01.880 that I should continue

00:29:03.440 to earn a living

00:29:04.120 at the expense

00:29:05.060 of the suffering

00:29:06.340 of millions

00:29:06.920 and millions of Canadians

00:29:08.060 in terms of just like,

00:29:10.160 why,

00:29:10.460 if we were designing

00:29:11.460 a tax system

00:29:12.240 from scratch today,

00:29:14.160 imagine Canada

00:29:14.960 never had an income tax

00:29:16.160 and we said,

00:29:17.060 you know,

00:29:17.300 it's 2020,

00:29:17.860 we need an income tax.

00:29:18.900 There's no way

00:29:20.040 in the world

00:29:20.640 we would design

00:29:21.340 the system

00:29:21.820 that we have right now,

00:29:22.940 right?

00:29:23.100 That would never happen.

00:29:23.940 We would design

00:29:24.820 something much simpler

00:29:26.020 and in 1917

00:29:27.180 when they first

00:29:28.140 established the income tax,

00:29:29.560 it was supposed

00:29:29.980 to be temporary

00:29:30.620 just to fund

00:29:31.720 the end of World War I

00:29:32.800 and of course

00:29:34.460 it's not temporary.

00:29:35.320 We have it over

00:29:35.780 100 years later

00:29:36.520 but the Income Tax Act

00:29:37.820 in 1917

00:29:38.520 was only 11 pages long

00:29:40.960 and today

00:29:41.320 it's 3,000 pages.

00:29:43.080 Nobody understands it.

00:29:44.840 Nobody can read it

00:29:46.220 and really understand it.

00:29:47.480 A lot of accountants

00:29:48.420 don't understand it.

00:29:49.020 People at the CRA

00:29:49.640 don't understand it.

00:29:50.760 People make mistakes

00:29:51.500 all the time

00:29:52.100 so I think

00:29:53.300 there's something

00:29:53.720 inherently wrong with it

00:29:54.900 that we really need

00:29:56.160 to fix

00:29:57.560 like in a real way.

00:29:59.900 And I know

00:30:00.340 that it's kind of

00:30:01.120 meant to be

00:30:01.640 a sillier story

00:30:02.780 to illustrate

00:30:03.340 the absurdities

00:30:04.280 of the tax system

00:30:05.500 but I mean

00:30:06.100 you get dark.

00:30:06.720 You kill people off

00:30:07.580 in this book.

00:30:08.260 It's not like

00:30:09.020 this is more of a thriller

00:30:10.440 than I think I expected

00:30:11.560 when I started reading

00:30:13.100 but you do reveal

00:30:14.320 again the every stage

00:30:15.460 of life taxation

00:30:16.840 and I won't go

00:30:18.280 through the whole thing

00:30:19.160 but you do kind of

00:30:20.120 end it in a way

00:30:21.120 with sort of a manifesto

00:30:22.460 of what you'd like to see

00:30:23.640 and a lot of it

00:30:24.480 comes down to

00:30:25.340 really putting forward

00:30:27.060 the simplicity

00:30:27.960 learning from other countries

00:30:29.800 we don't need to reinvent

00:30:30.720 the wheel to do this

00:30:31.780 and I would ask you

00:30:33.960 I guess

00:30:34.600 what is the biggest

00:30:36.720 most significant change

00:30:38.700 that would really make

00:30:40.300 the most difference

00:30:41.060 in your view

00:30:41.520 something that a government

00:30:42.280 could put into effect

00:30:43.200 almost immediately

00:30:44.200 if it wanted to.

00:30:45.080 Okay so you asked me

00:30:46.840 what's the biggest one

00:30:47.800 I'm going to give you

00:30:48.640 my top three

00:30:49.400 Okay perfect

00:30:50.360 So number one

00:30:51.680 for employees

00:30:52.460 like I said

00:30:53.440 we need to eliminate

00:30:54.640 this sounds so crazy

00:30:55.940 but it only sounds crazy

00:30:57.460 because we're so used

00:30:58.400 to what we have right now

00:30:59.260 so number one

00:31:00.100 is eliminate

00:31:00.740 and abolish

00:31:01.740 every single tax deduction

00:31:03.540 and credit

00:31:04.000 and just lower the tax rate

00:31:06.040 to make up the difference

00:31:07.020 and the T4

00:31:08.260 becomes a tax return

00:31:09.460 so no more tax return filing

00:31:11.200 T4

00:31:11.820 that's the tax return

00:31:12.800 that's it

00:31:13.320 forget about it

00:31:14.360 Now self-employed people

00:31:16.000 what I propose

00:31:17.280 is very similar

00:31:18.120 they might have to report

00:31:20.040 a tax return

00:31:20.900 but I want it to be

00:31:21.480 one page

00:31:22.180 that's it

00:31:22.900 one page

00:31:23.660 nothing else

00:31:24.380 revenue

00:31:25.180 no expenses

00:31:26.440 no deductions

00:31:27.140 no CRA audits

00:31:28.160 here's your revenue

00:31:29.080 and you pay a lower rate

00:31:30.300 of tax

00:31:30.760 because we're not

00:31:31.340 claiming expenses

00:31:32.120 for self-employed people

00:31:33.520 who want to claim expenses

00:31:34.720 give them the option

00:31:35.920 so you have option A

00:31:37.040 filing

00:31:37.500 option B

00:31:38.140 filing

00:31:38.500 and a self-employed person

00:31:39.820 can choose which option

00:31:40.840 okay

00:31:41.480 so that's number two

00:31:42.240 and number three

00:31:43.020 GSTHST

00:31:45.040 if you're self-employed

00:31:45.980 you have to collect GSTHST

00:31:47.140 as soon as you hit

00:31:48.180 $30,000 of revenue

00:31:49.580 $30,000

00:31:50.780 that number comes from

00:31:52.020 1991

00:31:52.900 over 30 years

00:31:54.480 that's

00:31:55.140 or almost 30 years

00:31:56.020 that's crazy

00:31:57.100 we haven't had inflation

00:31:59.100 since 1991

00:31:59.840 that $30,000

00:32:01.040 should be

00:32:01.620 closer to maybe

00:32:02.540 $60,000 or more

00:32:03.780 so we need to increase

00:32:04.760 that small supplier limit

00:32:05.980 and that would really help people

00:32:07.700 who are in the income range

00:32:09.220 they're earning $30,000, $40,000, $50,000

00:32:10.780 $60,000

00:32:11.500 and they have to deal with

00:32:12.780 collecting HST, GST

00:32:14.180 dealing with this

00:32:15.020 that I think we need to

00:32:16.680 relieve them of that burden

00:32:17.800 and increase that small

00:32:19.360 supplier limit

00:32:20.060 so those are things

00:32:20.940 that the government

00:32:21.420 should really start

00:32:22.160 looking at

00:32:22.980 as soon as possible

00:32:24.080 it might take a few years

00:32:25.600 to undergo this review

00:32:27.000 but that's okay

00:32:27.820 even if it takes

00:32:28.620 five or ten years

00:32:29.560 it will be worth it

00:32:30.520 in the long run

00:32:31.460 and a lot of these things

00:32:32.920 may reduce

00:32:33.980 government revenue

00:32:35.140 modestly

00:32:35.900 but at the same time

00:32:37.620 you think of

00:32:38.140 how many billions

00:32:38.920 would be saved

00:32:39.780 by not having

00:32:40.840 to bureaucratize everything

00:32:42.420 regulate compliance

00:32:43.780 audit investigations

00:32:45.100 I mean for example

00:32:46.360 you would eliminate

00:32:47.000 a lot of fraud potential

00:32:48.260 if you take away

00:32:49.300 expenses in filings

00:32:50.920 you would eliminate

00:32:51.520 a lot of fraud potential

00:32:52.660 on both employer

00:32:53.900 and employee sides of things

00:32:55.240 and you would simplify it

00:32:57.120 in a lot of ways

00:32:57.760 on the government side of things

00:32:59.720 and on the taxpayer side of things

00:33:02.100 oh for sure

00:33:03.320 and actually

00:33:03.980 what I try to

00:33:04.880 propose in the book

00:33:06.100 is actually

00:33:06.740 a revenue neutral

00:33:08.160 plan for the government

00:33:09.620 and when I wrote the book

00:33:11.400 like you were alluding to

00:33:12.400 before

00:33:12.840 it does

00:33:13.940 it can and does

00:33:15.420 appeal to people

00:33:16.140 across the political spectrum

00:33:17.360 because

00:33:17.740 I actually had a few people

00:33:19.540 review the book

00:33:20.240 as I was writing it

00:33:21.480 and giving me feedback

00:33:22.200 and a couple of those people

00:33:23.840 were people who are

00:33:24.940 on the complete opposite ends

00:33:26.400 of the political spectrum

00:33:27.300 that I am

00:33:27.880 so I'm more of

00:33:29.080 I don't know what you would call it

00:33:30.840 fiscal conservative

00:33:31.740 libertarian type

00:33:33.020 and I had people

00:33:34.120 who are like

00:33:35.480 what I see as

00:33:36.540 extreme crazy leftists

00:33:38.840 and people that I'm close with

00:33:41.180 and I enjoy talking to

00:33:42.640 and they reviewed the book

00:33:43.880 and gave me some great feedback

00:33:44.860 and they really enjoyed it

00:33:45.900 so if we abolish

00:33:47.840 the deductions and credits

00:33:48.940 the flip side

00:33:50.680 is you lower the tax rate

00:33:52.060 and in theory

00:33:53.740 and I show this in the book

00:33:55.040 that can be revenue neutral

00:33:56.860 to the government

00:33:57.780 so it could be a plan

00:34:00.240 that everyone could get behind

00:34:01.480 and yeah

00:34:02.540 it reduces that potential

00:34:03.540 for fraud

00:34:04.100 and also potentially

00:34:05.220 if we have a lower tax rate

00:34:06.860 with no deductions and credits

00:34:08.160 that could bring

00:34:09.320 right now

00:34:10.140 Canada has a huge

00:34:11.480 underground economy

00:34:12.600 because the personal tax rates

00:34:14.600 are so high

00:34:15.300 and you have GST, HST

00:34:17.220 on top of that

00:34:18.100 that self-employed people

00:34:19.100 have to charge

00:34:19.760 so many people

00:34:21.260 are doing cash transactions

00:34:22.500 and not paying any tax

00:34:23.500 at all on it

00:34:24.160 if we had a lower

00:34:25.340 actual rate of tax

00:34:27.180 that was advertised

00:34:27.860 imagine if the government

00:34:28.740 could say

00:34:29.240 look

00:34:29.900 everyone earns their first

00:34:31.240 $50,000 of income

00:34:32.800 zero tax

00:34:33.660 and then from 50 and up

00:34:35.060 you pay a flat rate

00:34:36.960 15 or 20%

00:34:38.220 more people might actually

00:34:39.640 come out of the underground economy

00:34:41.100 and say

00:34:41.340 you know what

00:34:41.780 that's not so unreasonable

00:34:43.160 if I make $80,000 a year

00:34:44.940 I'm not paying any tax

00:34:46.080 on the first 50

00:34:46.960 and I'm only paying 20%

00:34:49.140 above 50

00:34:50.060 you know what

00:34:50.760 maybe people will say

00:34:53.460 you know what

00:34:53.820 I'll pay that

00:34:54.520 because we know

00:34:55.340 that the government

00:34:55.800 does provide us services

00:34:57.260 and we do need a government

00:34:59.120 in some respects

00:35:00.120 so people might accept that

00:35:02.100 and that

00:35:02.500 ironically

00:35:03.720 can actually increase

00:35:04.580 government revenues

00:35:05.320 as more people

00:35:05.920 come out from the underground economy

00:35:07.440 yeah very much so

00:35:09.880 and you do

00:35:10.680 do a really good job

00:35:11.760 at exposing a lot

00:35:12.620 of the contradictions

00:35:13.440 in these things too

00:35:14.400 like for example

00:35:15.200 if you work

00:35:16.460 at an office downtown

00:35:17.780 and you have to pay

00:35:18.620 for parking

00:35:19.120 when you go to work

00:35:19.880 you can't write that off

00:35:20.900 but if you were self-employed

00:35:22.460 and a contractor

00:35:23.200 you could

00:35:23.800 and a lot of these things

00:35:24.900 and I think that

00:35:26.160 when people read through

00:35:27.840 and a lot of these things

00:35:28.660 are intuitive

00:35:29.160 because you live them

00:35:30.160 but at the same time

00:35:31.660 it really reinforces

00:35:32.700 in simple terms

00:35:33.400 why things are so ridiculous

00:35:34.760 so hopefully

00:35:35.300 a kick in the pants 0.99

00:35:36.560 to get people

00:35:37.060 to push for some change

00:35:38.060 the book is

00:35:39.100 The Grumpy Accountant

00:35:40.360 One Fed Up Tax Pro's

00:35:41.500 Practical Plan

00:35:42.220 to Fix Canada's

00:35:43.020 Senselessly Complicated

00:35:44.340 Tax System

00:35:45.280 the author

00:35:46.040 Neil Winokur

00:35:46.800 joins me on the line now

00:35:48.340 Neil thanks very much

00:35:49.240 great job in the book

00:35:50.180 and appreciate you

00:35:50.820 coming on today

00:35:51.420 thank you so much

00:35:52.780 for having me

00:35:53.220 I appreciate it

00:35:54.400 that does it for me

00:35:55.780 we will be back

00:35:56.660 next week

00:35:57.300 with more of

00:35:57.920 Canada's most

00:35:58.700 irreverent talk show

00:35:59.600 this is the

00:36:00.380 Andrew Lawton Show

00:36:01.060 on True North

00:36:01.640 thank you

00:36:02.220 God bless

00:36:02.760 and good day Canada

00:36:03.620 if you enjoy the show

00:36:05.200 and want to hear more of it

00:36:06.280 we need your support

00:36:07.900 head on over to

00:36:09.020 andrewlawtonshow.com

00:36:10.760 and click donate

00:36:11.860 to support the work

00:36:12.820 that we're doing

00:36:13.340 and stand up

00:36:14.160 for independent media

00:36:15.200 thanks for listening

00:36:16.060 to the Andrew Lawton Show

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00:36:18.300 by donating to

00:36:19.120 True North

00:36:19.540 at www.tnc.news

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Juno News - October 16, 2020

Big Tech's Assault on Free Speech

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