Bill Kelly: COVID-19 spending is frightening, but necessary

In a different time, even a couple of years ago, if a federal government proposed a spending plan of $100-billion over three years to stimulate the economy, it would have been lambasted by fiscal and political critics as irresponsible and out of touch with reality.

But these are unusual times; these are pandemic times and the old fiscal playbook has been tossed aside.

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Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland‘s economic statement is rife with stimulus spending to do whatever it takes to help Canadians and Canadian businesses to stay safe and solvent.

The fact that the conservative-minded Chambers of Commerce, which advocates for the interests of small businesses, supports such measures speaks to the severity of the circumstances that citizens and businesses face now and in the future.

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Should we be concerned about the monumental deficits that are being created and fiscal challenges we’ll face on the other side of this horrific health care and economic calamity? Absolutely — but we need our governments to deal with the crisis before us.

The costs of battling this pandemic are enormous, but the cost of not doing enough is worse.

There will be troubling economic times ahead, to be sure.

But I think most Canadians would rather be survivors who have to deal with those consequences than victims of this pandemic pestilence.

Bill Kelly is the host of the Bill Kelly Show on Global News Radio 900 CHML.

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