I don't disagree that there are investments required. We're obviously, as a chamber of commerce, advocating for where we think the best investment would be, and sometimes the investment may not be in additional spending, new spending, but rather in turning that back to the consumers and the businesses in terms of tax cuts.
By way of an example of what's happening--and to my colleague here, Mr. Glauser, who was, of course, advocating that as well--I smiled thinking of our chairman and the challenge he has in keeping us all on time and listening to completely opposite points of what we should be doing with our money. My congratulations to you on that. But the fact is that businesses today, whether it's business in Halifax or in Hamilton or in Burnaby, are not competing among themselves. They are competing with business in India, Ireland, and the Caribbean. It's worth keeping in mind that if we get it right, lower tax rates can actually lead to increased revenues, and we have to look no further than places like Iceland, Ireland, and other countries to witness that.
For example, Iceland now collects more revenues as a percentage of gross domestic product from a lower corporate tax rate of 18% than it used to collect when the corporate rate was 50%. In Iceland it's been remarkable. In 1998 the country's 40% rate on investment income produced 2% of government revenue, yet in 2006 its 10% rate, down from 40%, produced 14% of its government's revenue.
What we're advocating is to look at it a little differently, and we obviously have other people who say, look at it my way. The chamber of commerce says let's look at it this way as well. And if we do bring in new spending in addition, with the existing spending we have, we just can't bring things in and let it sit there. We have to have a way to examine it to find out whether it's still relevant. Is it contributing to our competitiveness to allow our business to grow? At the end of the day, without a strong economy, there is no money for the social programs that we all love and hold dear, whether it's education, sports, the symphony, or whatever.
I rest my case.