An unknown number of people who never qualified to receive the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) got thousands of dollars, some $13,000 and a growing number of businesses have gone bankrupt since March 2020. And yes, I know, this is old news to most Canadians, yet how each provincial government is going to deal with the CERB fraudsters is still undecided or at least unclear. This is what I mean.
Let’s use an example I read earlier today. A woman in Saskatoon was in a Tim Horton’s parking lot when someone told her about the CERB. Even though, due to a medical issue, she hasn’t worked for years, she called the number, got the CERB of $2,000, money she was not entitled to and the Saskatewan government gave her $1,200 for her disability. That is a total of $3,200 a month. It is unclear as to how many months she received the additional $2,000 yet she did manage to spend $4,000 on new furniture and blankets because she said her apartment is infested with cockroaches. (Just as a head’s up, buying new furniture and blankets will not get rid of cockroaches or bed bugs.) Since the Saskatchewan government has clawedback the CERB money she was not supposed to receive dollar-for-dollar from her disability cheque she couldn’t pay her rent, got evicted and is now if I remember correctly couch-surfing. Everyone on social assistance like welfare or disability has their worker, or someone explain exactly what is expected of them before they receive any provincial funds. This woman is one of thousands, perhaps even hundreds of thousands of people who received the CERB when she shouldn’t have. The Canadian government said it gave Canadians over $80 BILLION in CERB money, money it did not, and still does not have. Money that taxpayers will have to find a way to pay because the Canadian government has borrowed it.
Meanwhile, businesses all over Canada are going bankrupt. Just today it was predicted that in the next few months over 200,000 small businesses will go out of business because they cannot afford to stay open. That number does include the businesses that have already gone under. Businesses pay all kinds of taxes. Businesses hire people, even if those people are only contract employees, those people pay taxes. We pay taxes every time we buy something or use a service. And yes there are a few exceptions like childrens clothing and childrens shoes and some foods, but everything else is taxed. Businesses are like us. They need to buy things to keep everything running smoothly. If I had a choice between giving a business or someone on social assistance an extra $2,000 to $13,000 I would give the money to the business.
Now I know that there are people out there who say that the provincial government should not be taking, clawingback the CERB money from people on welfare or disability, because the CERB money is federal and I understand that. But understand this, not only are taxpayers going to have to pay more taxes to pay down the debt, those CERB fraudsters were not entitled to that money in the first place. They also figured out how to live off the money the provincial government gave them every month, in some cases years. If anyone really wants to push this further, than maybe they can fork out some of their own money, like between $2,000 to $13,000. You know to help those CERB fraudsters pay back the money they weren’t entitled to. That is of course, if any or all provincial or territorial governments will still make them.
Here is the link to article I read earlier today.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/saskatchewan/landlords-tenants-cerb-rent-1.5810230
And here is a link to my latest post from, Behind the Blog. It is called, Should People Receive Social Assistance?
Thank you for reading, A. Rebel’s Rant! ;D
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