So what do you call OAS then? Take food away from a working family and give it to someone making well above that working families income just because they happened to live in Canada for 10 years fund?
We give 9150$ a year to individuals making 93k a year over 65. If we can afford to do that we can easily afford to send people to school for things which will actively benefit our society.
No-one is taking food away. OAS has been around for a long time, throughout which deficits have been paid by borrowing. We had a prolonged period of fiscal surplus during which we were in effect paying for all the promises we made to ourselves in real-time, and paying down the accumulated borrowing of the past. We were even introducing new programs. Income tax rates went down.
People eligible to vote in 2015 changed all that. We entered a period of even more new programs, and the government-to-be openly said during the election it was going to blow away the surplus to do so. Income tax rates for lower incomes remained down, and some new rates for the highest earners were introduced - I suppose we've been taking their food away. Wags at the time claimed that younger people turned out in larger numbers than usual to vote for legalized marijuana, but deficits and new program spending were part of that package. Those who enjoy playing an inter-generational blame game will have to accept that is part of the playing surface.
Some of the new programs amounted to transfers to younger people with families, paid for mostly with more borrowing.
So some desired increases in transfers to younger people have indeed happened, and one way or another the funds to pay them are being found.
The question is whether more stringent means testing for OAS should be treated as an alternative way of paying for other existing programs, or "new money". I favour the former. I have no doubt some people, particularly on the political left, will try to frame it as the latter. If any savings from OAS reform are eaten by new demands, and the new demands (and borrowing) continue to accumulate year after year, there will indeed be a point of collapse.
I see no point in prolonging the misery of the country if it's just going to be a bunch of people clamouring for money from somewhere other than themselves and willing to borrow itself into ruin.
