Opponents of lower Canadian taxes often argue higher taxes north of the 49th parallel are simply the price Canadians must pay for more public healthcare. In addition, knee-jerk anti-American critics often assert our national priorities are simply so much better than those nasty and brutish Americans.

'We're virtuous because we spend more tax money on beds in hospitals as opposed to bullets,' seems to be one argument to dismiss Canadian-American tax comparisons. Ignore for a moment the elitism behind such arguments. (Imagine the furor if Canadians constantly put down India in the same manner some Canadians trash our southern neighbours.) As well, put aside the disrespect such anti-military attitudes betray about Canada's soldiers who fought for Canada in two world wars, Korea, and a variety of peace-keeping operations this century.

But silly anti-Americanism aside, a recent article from the Fraser Institute argues the taxes-are-higher-here-thanks-to-healthcare argument is incorrect. Economist Andrew Kosnaski points out such assertions ignore the large chunk of healthcare in the United States paid for via the public purse. While taxpayer-funded healthcare in Canada represents approximately 70% of total healthcare dollars spent, public healthcare spending accounts for just under 50% of total healthcare dollars spent south of the border.

More importantly, expressed as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and excluding private healthcare spending in both countries, total public health expenditures account for 6.45 percent in the United States as compared to 6.6 percent in Canada, a difference of under 2/10ths of a percent of GDP (1998 estimates.)

Expressed another way, when defense and healthcare expenditures are both removed from the respective tax burden, the remaining tax burden for 'other' spending amounts to 22.1 percent of GDP in the United States. In Canada, the comparative figure is 36.0 percent of GDP - a 13.9 percentage point difference in Canada.

In other words, no matter how widely perceived and repeated, the bar-room conversation that blames higher Canadian taxes on public healthcare is mistaken, or induced by beer. The cost of government and the taxes to pay for it is indeed much higher in Canada - almost 14% worth of GDP higher - but public healthcare is not the reason. It's all the 'other' spending Canadian governments engage in.