Law Times

PAGE 2 NEWS Social equality BY RON STANG For Law Times A s the Ontario government re- leased its budget last week, Law- yers for Fair Taxation issued a press release calling on Finance Minister Dwight Duncan to "Tax us. On- tario is worth it." The weekend before, Toronto lawyer Omar Ha-Redeye formed the organization as an offshoot of a group created just prior to that called Doctors for Fair Taxation. Ha-Redeye has long known the person behind that group, Dr. Michael Rachlis, a health policy expert at the University of To- ronto and long a defender of Canada's pub- lic health-care system. The physicians and lawyers involved have one overall objective: to have richer Canadians — a group they freely admit they are a part of — pay a greater share of their income in taxes, especially at a time when governments are running huge deficits and social services are fraying. Ha-Redeye says the fact that doctors took the lead shows the relative lack of so- cial consciousness among the legal profes- sion compared to its health-care counter- parts. "It really does emphasize the fact the legal profession, unfortunately — how do I put this politely — we have our heads may- be buried in our books far too oſten." The groups — and apparently one form- ing among engineering professionals — have laid out a proposal for raising taxes on the top 10 per cent of income earners who make more than $100,000. group points to a recent submission by the Canada Revenue Agency to the 2011 Ju- dicial Compensation and Benefits Com- mission showing the highest-paid self-em- ployed lawyer in Canada earned more than $8 million in 2010. Ha-Redeye notes many lawyers are see- ing the effects of underfunded social pro- grams, such as an increase in crime. "They affect homicide rates, they affect social tur- moil generally, and yes, those have trickle- down effects all over the legal system." Lawyers for Fair Taxation says govern- ments lost $100 billion in revenue between 2000 and 2010 because of tax cuts that have "overwhelmingly gone" to the wealth- iest in society. In the 1960s, it notes, the top marginal Lawyer James Morton says he readily signed the peti- tion calling for higher taxes. For example, for the portion of income over $100,000, they say there should be a surcharge of one per cent; for the amount over $170,000, they're calling for a two- per-cent surcharge. Income above $640,000 should have a three-per-cent surcharge, ac- cording to the two groups. And for the very rich making more than $1.8 million, they believe the surcharge should be six per cent. In dollar terms, someone making $130,000 would pay just $200 more in tax. As the legal profession, in Ha-Redeye's view, has "such a negative reputation" for being wealthy, insular, and self-interested, he says it needs "to be more visible as law- yers in terms of saying we will make sacri- fices for the sake of the greater society." The rate was 80 per cent for those making more than $400,000. By contrast, today's "richest Ontarians pay only 46 per cent on their income above $132,000," the group points out. Ha-Redeye agrees with critics who say governments could do a better job of spend- ing tax money more efficiently. "I think they go hand in hand," he says. But Derek Fildebrandt, national re- search director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation, says if groups like Ha-Redeye's want to pay more tax, there's an easy solu- tion short of legislating increases. "Every year at tax time, you can donate to the gov- ernment to pay down the debt," he says, sug- gesting that members of the groups "all vol- untarily start giving more of their money." Fildebrandt says tax hikes are a dis- incentive to productivity. "How many people are going to want to become law- yers or doctors if financial benefits are even further diminished?" he asks. "I think a lot of these guys just don't understand the concept of incentives." Fildebrandt argues a better way of deal- ing with tax inequities would be by closing loopholes. That means, he says, "closing the exemptions and credits that are mostly politically motivated." Raising tax rates, he says, would simply cause people to look for ways to avoid paying. Former Ontario Bar Association presi- dent James Morton says that when he dis- covered Lawyers for Fair Taxation's web site, he readily signed the group's petition calling for hikes in taxes. But Morton disagrees with the stereo- type that lawyers care little about society in general. "I think you'd find fairly strong support among a lot of lawyers for fair taxes, taxes that recognize the value of a well-ordered and properly funded society with the nec- essary infrastructure." He believes this notion crosses the spec- trum of law — from criminal to corporate — because of lawyers' innate desire to see justice "as an abstract thing." "And that's not something that goes away even as you become older and cynical," he says. Morton notes this idea also manifests itself in practice. He says that while there may be a more recent push for large firms to have their lawyers do pro bono work, it has been "almost mandatory" at smaller firms for years. 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