Jim Sinclair
President, B.C. Federation of Labour

"That's a bunch of crap. If you want a good country, it costs money. If you want a cheap country, then you don't pay for it. It's no different from buying a good car or having a good home. If you have a higher tax rate, you can build a better community. Canadians don't mind paying taxes providing they get fair value for their taxes."

Becky Wong
Vice president, ABF Financial Group Inc.

"Employees are taxed not only on their income but for some...retirement benefits as well as employment insurance. There should be more incentive in terms of personal savings under tax-shelter programs through RRSPs. If we increase the overall [RRSP contribution] limit, then it allows more opportunity to shelter our tax dollars."

Gina Whitfield
Executive director, COPE

"In order for us to have a civil society, we need to pay taxes. Safety nets are what we need as a society, like health care. It doesn't benefit us to have more money in our pockets and nothing to share for people who have less than us....Canadians should be striving to be more like the Nordic countries."

Dave Park
Chief economist, Vancouver Board of Trade

"The amount collected in relation to gross domestic product in Canada is the highest of all G8 nations. Our taxation is extremely high. The growth in the economy had all been funnelled into government. If you look at this last federal budget, they increased their program expenditures by 5.8 percent. That's totally unsustainable."