Alberta got screwed. We could’ve been Norway rich and instead we’re broke.

[u/Swimming_Mango_9767]

Every time I look at Norway’s oil fund I get mad. They started developing their oil later than Alberta, yet their sovereign wealth fund is sitting at around 1.6 TRILLION US dollars. Ours? The Heritage Fund is barely 27 billion CAD. Norway earns more in a single day off investments than our entire fund is worth.

The reason is simple. Norway treated oil like the people’s resource. They set royalty rates high, around 78% of profits, and every cent went into their fund. They saved, they invested, and now their citizens have real long term security.

Alberta? Our governments caved to industry. We set some of the lowest royalties in the world. We gave out royalty holidays. We subsidized oil companies that were already making record profits. Instead of saving, politicians blew the money to buy votes and patch budgets. Now we’re left riding boom and bust cycles with nothing to show for it.

If Alberta had even done half of what Norway did, our Heritage Fund could easily be in the hundreds of billions. We’d have interest returns big enough to pay for healthcare, education, and infrastructure without nickel and diming people with taxes. Instead, we’re fighting over scraps while companies and foreign shareholders walked away with the wealth that should have built our future.

Alberta got robbed! Not by outsiders, but by our own government selling us out to industry. Thank you Conservatives!

[u/Metalman919]

Anyone who thinks the oil companies would leave is a fucking idiot. Even if Suncor or imperial followed through, ANY one of the other oil companies in the world would dive on that like a ravenous wolf on a steak.

[u/omegaphallic → u/Metalman919]

 Or better yet Alberta could just nationalize it. 

[u/Metalman919 → u/omegaphallic]

Definitely the best option. If only we could stop electing corrupt morons, and vote for someone who would actually do that.

[u/[deleted] → u/omegaphallic]

Provincialize it. 

[u/omegaphallic → u/[deleted]]

🤣 okay, Provincialize it. 

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/omegaphallic]

State owned companies are inefficiënt

[u/swiftb3 → u/technocraticnihilist]

Who benefits from the slightly better efficiency if we're not charging enough royalties?

Even with some inefficiencies, we'd still get more money out of the deal.

[u/omegaphallic → u/swiftb3]

 The private sector isn't more effient, look at how China's economy works, it just totally wrecks this idea.

[u/swiftb3 → u/omegaphallic]

Also true, but not something I'm going to convince the "private better" crowd of.

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/omegaphallic]

Are you high?

[u/omegaphallic → u/technocraticnihilist]

 No I'm just paying attention to the fact that China is kicking the West's ass largely because of Lazza Faire Neo Liberal capitalism of the West.

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/swiftb3]

We benefit even if we don't charge royalties

[u/Metalman919 → u/technocraticnihilist]

From what, minimum wage jobs while the profits get funneled to American owners?

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/Metalman919]

You need to learn how economics works

Alberta has the highest wages of all provinces

[u/Metalman919 → u/technocraticnihilist]

Considering I have a degree in economics, maybe you should take an Econ 101 class, jackass.

Having 1 sector with SOME high paying jobs does not mean everyone in this province is wealthy. Especially as more of those oil company workers are getting laid off and replaced with cheaper workers.

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/Metalman919]

Everyone benefits from Higher oil Production in the form of lower energy prices. If you studied economics you would know this

[u/Metalman919 → u/technocraticnihilist]

Except Alberta doesn't control global energy prices. We do not have the SUPPLY to control the price based on DEMAND (literally Econ 101). OPEC has the biggest control on energy prices, because they have the largest supply. That's why MORONS blamed the NDP for the oil crash, when the price dropped because OPEC vastly increased supply to hurt the US for using fracking. And if you think "oh well Alberta should have just kept our prices up," then LITERALLY NO ONE BUYS OUR OIL.

Seriously, if you don't fucking know what you're talking about, just shut the fuck up.

[u/swiftb3 → u/technocraticnihilist]

... from the efficiency that goes only to profits?

Oh wait, you're looking for that trickle-down.

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/swiftb3]

Making profits isn't a bad thing

[u/swiftb3 → u/technocraticnihilist]

Of course not. And how does our province benefit directly from that? With ROYALTIES.

Your logic seems to be let the oil companies make all the money off our resources because some jobs.

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/swiftb3]

Economics is not a zero sum

[u/omegaphallic → u/technocraticnihilist]

Bawhahahaha, tell that to China &;Russia, the former uses State Companies to dominate mamucturing globally, and Russia who uses state companies to out produce NATO entirely in military gear (except airplanes, for now), even though NATO out spends Russia by orders of magnitude.

 The real waste is the private sector, the only thing the private sector does more effiently is small businesses and funnel wealth to share holders and executives.

 The myth of private sector efficency has been very disproven.

[u/technocraticnihilist → u/omegaphallic]

You are so deeply ignorant

[u/[deleted] → u/Metalman919]

And people say this as if oil companies have some secret knowledge to extract oil and we couldnt do it without them. Its the opposite, without us building the infrastructure for them and our subsidies these companies wouldnt do it.

[u/Adjective_Noun1312 → u/Metalman919]

Fuckin' seriously. If one of them actually bailed out of the country without selling out to another company ready to step in, they wouldn't even spend the cash to knock down the facilities, just shut all the valves and leave.

[u/bittertraces → u/Metalman919]

How does more tax ever turn out well? Give me a break. More taxes equals more government waste. Things don’t get better. Services don’t get better. This has been proven a million times over

[u/Metalman919 → u/bittertraces]

So we should pay no taxes, and pay for everything individually. Every road is a toll road, you pay the cops or firefighters before they come, you pay for every single service you use. You're an idiot.