On March 9, when Mark Carney became the Liberals’ new leader and the prime minister–designate, it was easy to get lost in the day’s big-ticket headlines. There was his stunning 85.9 percent sweep of the vote. There was his full-throated attack on US president Donald Trump. There were the uncomfortable facts that he is not a sitting member of Parliament, has never held elected office, and speaks halting French. His highest-profile announcement was probably his plan to eliminate the consumer carbon tax. But just as important, even if it flew under the radar, was another change: Carney promised to scrap the Liberals’ capital gains tax hike. “We think builders should be incentivized for taking risks,” he said on stage in Ottawa, “and rewarded when they succeed.”

Carney, as voters have been endlessly reminded in the lead up to the April 28 federal election, is an economist with a bachelor’s from Harvard University and a master’s degree and a doctorate from Oxford University. So he, of all people, must have known that, in his victory speech, he was deliberately mischaracterizing the nature of capital gains taxes and the reason the Liberals proposed the increase in the first place.

Bear with me a moment: for those not wealthy enough to bother learning about capital gains—which is to say, most of us—the term refers to profits made from selling an asset like property or stock. In Canada, capital gains are taxed at a 50 percent inclusion rate. Income, on the other hand, is taxed at 100 percent. So if you work for a living, all your earnings are taxable. But if you make your money flipping houses or day trading, only half of that is taxable. Does that seem fair to you? Me neither.

The Liberals’ increase to the capital gains tax introduced last year was paltry: the inclusion rate would have gone up to only about 67 percent and would be only on profits over $250,000. You would have to be very, very rich for this to impact you; by the government’s own estimate, although only 0.1 percent of Canadians would be affected, the hike would bring in more than $19 billion in revenue over five years starting in 2024/25. But after various private interest groups raised hell, Carney and the Liberals caved. More so than ending the consumer carbon tax—which, for all its policy merits, was a political albatross—killing the capital gains tax increase was nothing but a gift to the ultra rich.

That shouldn’t come as a surprise. Carney’s case to Canadians is that, as the governor of the Bank of Canada during the financial crisis and as the leader of the Bank of England during Brexit, he’s a proven manager in times of economic turmoil. If the polls are accurate, the pitch seems to be working. But even putting aside the legitimate issues here—his eagerness to take credit for whatever........

© The Walrus