Changes to Paper Filing Disempowering

Last tax season, only 7% of all Canadian tax filers filed on paper. The CRA is pushing for zero. It continues to steer the holdouts to digitized filing by adding lots of obstacles. Most recently, it is removing almost all the schedules from the tax return package it mails. This seems unfair to people who paper file because they can’t afford a computer and internet, distrust the security of online filing and those who are neither tax or computer literate. Here’s what they are up against:

Canadian household debt hit a record in the second quarter of this year, at $1.68 of debt for every dollar of income. As interest rates increase and debt levels soar, your clients run the risk of much greater uncertainty about their financial security.

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Jan Sawchuk, of Peachland, B.C., on the Basic Bookkeeping for Small Businesses course

With the looming Oct. 2 deadline for commentary on proposed tax changes to private corporations, the business community is renewing its call for the federal government to scrap the proposals in favour of a comprehensive tax policy review.

More than 65 per cent of Canada’s 14 million households contributed to at least one registered savings account (RPP, RRSP or TFSA) in 2015, according to recently released Statistics Canada data from the 2016 Census.

Nearly four in 10 (38 per cent) Canadians age 55 or older — and 14 per cent of those 65 or older — participated in the labour force last year, the highest participation rates among older Canadians since the collection of comparable Statistics Canada data began in 1976. But who exactly are these stalwart workers, and at what age are they retiring?