The Millennial Moron Podcast

On today’s episode of the Millennial Moron Podcast, I'm joined by Phil Webb, a Vancouver homeowner who's spent a lot of time digging into BC's property tax deferral program: the one that let anyone over 55 defer property taxes indefinitely at heavily subsidized interest rates, with the balance owed coming out of their estate when the home is eventually sold. Phil has been interviewed on the topic for the Vancouver Sun and has written about it for Generation Squeeze.The program was introduced in 1973 to help cash-poor, house-rich seniors stay in their homes. Phil's research shows that BC's version is now the most generous and least restricted of any province's (no income test, no asset test, just an age cutoff), and that most of what it pays out now goes to people who don't need it, including several multimillion-dollar homes in West Vancouver and beyond. We get into who's actually benefiting, what it costs taxpayers, and whether it should be reformed or scrapped outright.Phil was motivated by our conversation to go speak at Vancouver City Council in favor of a housing upzoning proposal, and I've included his comments at the end of this episode.This is a bit of a lost episode, recorded in February 2026, but shortly after, the BC government announced they were reforming the property tax deferral program to charge market interest rates, which kind of rendered the topic moot. However, in recent months there have been attempts to revive the program, so it seemed like a good time to publish it.Note: there are some intermittent audio issues on Phil's track early in the episode due to a connectivity problem on the day.How BC’s Property Tax System Benefits Millionaries (Vancouver Sun):https://vancouversun.com/news/how-bc-property-tax-system-benefits-millionairesPhil Webb On Attempts to Reverse Changes:https://www.gensqueeze.ca/vancouver_sun_phill_webb_reversing_property_tax_defferralGeneration Squeeze Article:https://www.gensqueeze.ca/housing_subsidies_for_multi_millionairesSupport Millennial Moron:Patreon: www.patreon.com/millennialmoronChapters:00:00 Intro01:09 Meet Phil01:46 The Wealth Gap04:34 What Is the Deferral?05:41 BC vs. Other Provinces07:00 Who's Benefiting?09:16 The $28M Mansion10:26 The Real Winners13:12 The Taxpayer Cost16:02 Aging in Place21:37 Why Not Downsize?26:06 Wealth Gap by the Numbers28:20 Broken Social Contract30:22 Billionaires' Row32:25 Explosive Growth34:12 "Nobody Needs This"36:02 Expanding the Program39:53 Rip the Band-Aid Off43:28 Public Hearings44:52 Can It Be Repealed?48:21 Phil's Story49:41 Wrap-Up50:26 Bonus: Phil Speaks at Vancouver City Council

On today's episode, I'm joined by Rachel Wasserman of the Canadian Anti-Monopoly Project to discuss emerging problems in private equity and private credit markets, and how it ties into Canadian pension funds like CPP, OMERS, AIMCo, and others.Wasserman business lawhttps://wassermanlaw.ca/The Canadian Anti-Monopoly Projecthttps://antimonopoly.ca/The Private Equity Playbookhttps://antimonopoly.ca/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/CAMP-PRIVATE-EQUITY-PLAYBOOK-FINAL.pdf

There’s a little-known scandal that cost Canadians $500 million in CPP fund money, involving the rise and fall of a European long-term care provider called Orpea (now known as EMEIS). CPP Investments was the largest shareholder, and had employees on the board of directors, including the audit committee, yet still failed to detect any of the embezzlement, fraud, and elder abuse that was taking place throughout the company’s facilities.After French investigative journalist Victor Castanet published a book on the scandal titled “Les Fossoyeurs” (The Gravediggers), the company collapsed and was eventually bailed out by the French government, causing CPP Investments to sell at a near-total loss. To this day, media coverage of this scandal is nearly non-existent in Canada, and CPP Investments has not addressed what went wrong.Joining me on the Millennial Moron Podcast to discuss this case, as well as other Canadian pension funds and their private equity style activities internationally, is Jason Ward, principal analyst and founder of CICTAR, the Centre for International Corporate Tax Accountability and Research.Sources:CPPIB’s Orpea Debaclehttps://cictar.org/all-research/care/cppibReports on Australian port investments by Canadian pension fundshttps://cictar.org/all-research/dp-world-taxes-australiahttps://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/nov/01/dp-world-port-operator-australia-zero-taxCountry-by-country reportinghttps://www.nationalobserver.com/2025/09/19/opinion/corporate-canada-tax-transparency CICTARhttps://cictar.org/ Support MillennnialMoron:Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/MillennialMoron Buy Me a Coffeewww.buymeacoffee.com/millennialmoron

You’ve probably heard about Brookfield’s use of tax havens in countries like Bermuda and the Cayman Islands, especially since Mark Carney became Prime Minister of Canada. But what exactly are these tax havens being used for?Livi Gerbase from the Centre for International Corporate Tax Accountability and Research (CICTAR) joins Millennial Moron to discuss ways that Brookfield (and other Canadian pension fund managers) is leveraging tax havens and tax-advantaged programs to privatize public utilities in Latin America, with case studies of Isagen in Colombia and BRK Ambiental in Brazil.We discuss the decline in capital investment into infrastructure, increases in prices to consumers, stagnant wages for workers, and the massive increase in debt charges to these former public utilities - which are potentially being used as a profit-shifting scheme to avoid paying taxes to the local governments where these utilities are located.Paper on Isagen in Colombiahttps://cictar.org/all-research/isagen/engPaper on BRK Ambiental and Privatization of Water Serviceshttps://cictar.org/all-research/brk-ambiental-en Livi Gerbase on Xhttps://x.com/GerbaseLivi CICTARhttps://cictar.org/ Pension Funds Fuel Land Grabs in Brazil (GRAIN):https://grain.org/en/article/5575-pension-funds-fuel-land-grabs-in-brazil Support MillennnialMoron:Patreon:https://www.patreon.com/MillennialMoron Buy Me a Coffeewww.buymeacoffee.com/millennialmoron

Today, I’m joined by Richard Coffin, a.k.a. The Plain Bagel, to talk about policies proposed in the upcoming Canadian election, including income tax cuts, TFSAs, housing solutions and more!Check out The Plain Bagel on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@ThePlainBagelThe Canadian Housing Crisis Explained:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Y0SY6OoKV8Millennial Moron on YouTube:https://www.youtube.com/@MillennialMoron