It’s a familiar old glass of beer every time anybody says it would be better for Ontario if the LCBO were abolished. Nice, but the Howe Institute makes a feeble case that the government would see more money if it did so. The institutes’s other claim that prices would go down is a no-brainer. If that were the only issue for the Ontario Government to ponder, we would have private liquor stores in a wink. But it isn’t. This government — especially this government — will never give up the cheaply-collected $1.7 billion which is pumped each year into the Queen’s Park slush fund from the LCBO. Right now, the minister merely has to bark at the LCBO to send over the money and it’s done. You may be sure that the cost of collecting the taxes required to part private distributors with their cash would be expensive. Hamilton Spectator
