$30 billion, $200 billion, who's counting?

The NDP has quietly removed from its website its leader's eyepopping budget-day claim that the budget committed the government to pay down $200-billion in debt over the next 10 years. Whether it's the conventions of media objectivity or the free pass the NDP is given on most things, no one has seen fit to call this what it is: the most embarrassing gaffe by a political leader in years. The basis for Layton's claim appears to have been the budget's target of a 25% debt-to-GDP ratio in 10 years. Quickly doing the math -- too quickly -- Layton's staff calculated 25% of a $1.2 trillion economy to be $300-billion. Subtract that from the present debt of roughly $500-billion, and you get the $200-billion figure. Well, yes -- if they were planning to get there this year. But to get to 25% in 10 years, assuming the economy grows at all between now and then, requires much less in the way of actual debt retirement: $3-billion a year, using the budget's baseline 5% nominal growth forecast. Hence the current version of the NDP's attack line: "The Liberals are poised to spend at least $30 billion over the next ten years, presuming rosy economic projections are correct, on meeting the artificial target of a debt-to-GDP ratio of 25%." Pssssstt. At least Stockwell Day only got the direction of the Niagara River wrong: not basic budget arithmetic.