The Carney budget delivers a fiscal impulse exceeding 2% of GDP — the largest since 1980. Deficit-financed capital spending on nation-building projects, internal free-trade, and export diversification beyond the US. Bottom federal income tax rate cut to 14% from 15%. Oxford Economics estimates this as a significant structural shift in Canadian fiscal policy.

Epoch: 113

Domain: fiscal_policy

Fiscal cost estimate (LLM): $38.00B CAD

Structural estimate (RIPPLE): +$145.78B CAD net (v3-bfs-signed depth=2, decay=0.5/hop; diverges)

Top RIPPLE cost paths

• +$78.77B → canada_health_transfer (Canada Health Transfer (CHT)) via gdp_growth
• +$59.40B → consumer_spending (Consumer Spending Growth) via employment_rate
• +$10.14B → defence_spending (Defence Spending) via federal_revenues
• +$9.79B → quebec_program_spending (Quebec Total Program Spending) via quebec_gdp

Variable changes

• gdp_growth: {"new": 1.8, "old": 1.2}
• fiscal_impulse_pct_gdp: {"new": 2.1, "old": 0.3}
• deficit_financed_capital_spend: {"new": 38.0, "old": 12.0}
• federal_revenue_foregone_tax_cut: {"new": 3.2, "old": 0.0}

Chamber amendment (round 1): Mandate 20% of capital spending for rural broadband and transport infrastructure.

Chamber amendment (round 2): Mandate 20% of capital spending specifically for rural broadband and road maintenance.

Targets deficit_financed_capital_spend.