The 2017 budget

From page 12

The second column of the table shows the exemption threshold over time. The third column shows the value of goods and services that the exempted income could buy given changes in prices as reported in the CPI.

The fourth column shows the amount of money needed each year to buy the same basket of goods that $35,000 could buy.

The negative numbers in the final column show the amount of money that the poor had to borrow each month to buy the same amount of goods and services. The positive numbers show the value of the additional goods and services that they could buy.

Projections

It should be obvious that in 2010 and 2011, the poor, in order to survive, had to borrow in excess of $3,000 each month in 2010 and nearly $700 per month in 2011.

Things improved from the period 2012 to 2014 when the exemption rose to $50,000 and they were able to buy an average of $5,400 worth of additional goods each month. When the Granger government took office and increased the exemption threshold to $55,000, low-income workers had the ability to buy in excess of $8,800 worth of goods and services.

Projections as to what was likely to happen in 2017 indicate that the 2017 budget does not hurt the poor. It helps the poor.

The question then is what is causing the low-income workers to complain? The answer to that and other questions will be provided in the next part of the article.

(To be continued)