Don’t you love it when wealthy people tell you that your taxes are too low?

Take Krishna Pendakur, for example. He’s a Simon Fraser University economics professor who wrote an op/ed for the Vancouver Sun today claiming that returning B.C.’s income tax rates to the 1990s levels would solve all the province’s problems. “1990s-level tax rates could pay for improved public education,” blares the headline.

Pendakur trots out some stats claiming that BC’s spending on education has gone from one-third of the provincial budget in the mid 1990s to one-fifth today. He conveniently ignores the fact that the number of students in the past ten years has dropped by eight per cent. And he ignores the fact that health care spending has shot up to 43 per cent of the most recent budget. And he doesn’t mention the fact that a full two-thirds of provincial spending now goes to three sectors: health care, education, and post-secondary education.

Yes, post-secondary education, where he gets his pay cheque. Make no mistake: Pendakur doesn’t mind going back to 1990s taxation levels because he is part of the top level of income earners in the province. According to public disclosure documents, Pendakur made $149,790 in 2009/10, plus another $25,271 in expenses, and whatever pension and benefits a university professor gets. (Not to mention the fact his wife is a teacher, as written in his op/ed.) Not a bad nest egg.

Shockingly, that $149,790 only ranked him #118 of all the staffers at SFU. He couldn’t even crack the top 100! He’s also 937th of the 11,068 people making more than $75,000 in BC universities and colleges.

Now he wants to cut your pay to increase his wife’s. Ridiculous.

Let’s take a moment and compare taxes in the 1990s to today:

In 1990s B.C., a family with an income of $20,000 paid $810 in B.C. income tax. Today, that family pays $205—a cut of 75 per cent.

In 1990s B.C., a family with an income of $60,000 paid $4,911 in B.C. income tax. Today, that family pays $3,091—a cut of 37 per cent.

In 1990s B.C., a family with an income of $100,000 paid $11,525 in B.C. income tax. Today, that family pays $7,418—a cut of 36 per cent.

I’ll keep my tax cut, thank you very much.

P.S. One more fun fact: Susan Lambert, the B.C. Teachers Federation President, made $80,924 from the Burnaby School District in 2009/10. That placed her 461st out of the 727 people in Burnaby schools making $75,000 plus, and 5,888th out of the 9,577 people in the B.C. school district sector making more than $75,000.