It is an often stated maxim that the power to tax is the power to destroy. The national Canadian government seems not to understand this. A recently passed law requires Facebook (and other similar companies) to make payments to Canadian news organizations if the site allows links to those sites in Canada. So, for instance, if Facebook allows a link to a CBC news story about western Canada’s wildfires, Facebook would be required to pay certain cash renumeration to the CBC due to Facebook supposedly benefiting from such content.
Only, it seems that Facebook would rather just ban links to Canadian news organizations, and Justin Trudeau is not amused. He complains that Facebook is choosing “corporate profits” over the safety of Canadian citizens by limiting the amount of news that Canadians are exposed to on social media. This makes little to no sense because if Facebook was making so much money on linking to news articles, they would still come out on top after making these payments to the CBC and others.
It should also be noted that the largest news organizations in Canada are government owned and would be the largest recipient of such payments.
Leftists, like Trudeau, like to live in a world where basic economic laws do not exist. If you make something more expensive than it’s worth, people won’t buy it. The Canadian government made news links in Canada more expensive than they are worth, and so Canadians will miss out entirely.
Like I said at the start, you can tax something out of existence. The leftists seem to want to do this with oil and guns, but act completely flabbergasted when they break other things they want to milk through confiscatory policies.
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