WINNIPEG – Manitoba has tabled a deficit budget that borrows heavily from a dwindling rainy-day fund. A look at who wins and who loses:
Winners
Primary caregivers: Get a boosted tax credit for caring for vulnerable relatives at home.
Welfare recipients and low-income earners: Get an increase in rental assistance tied to market values.
Film production companies: Get an extension of a tax credit due to expire next year.
Small businesses: More of them will qualify for a venture capital tax credit.
Roads and bridges: More of them will be repaired as the government rolls out its five-year spending plan.
READ MORE: Manitoba government passes another deficit in stay-the-course budget
Losers
Smokers: Will have to pay another $1 in taxes on a carton of cigarettes.
Banks: Corporation capital tax is going up to six per cent from five per cent.
Rainy-day fund: Will have dwindled to $115 million after $105 million taken out to pay down debt and fund infrastructure. The fund contained $864 million in 2009.
Income taxpayers: Manitoba isn’t adjusting income tax brackets to match inflation.
Black ink: Budget posts a $422-million deficit, virtually unchanged from last year, and puts off balancing the books until 2019.
READ MORE: 8 highlights from the 2015 Manitoba budget
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