Canadian billionaire Jim Pattison warns that recent policy proposals to tax the wealthy may lead to investment fleeing Canada, and make it harder to tackle current labour shortages.

“The people that are in business, they invest money which creates jobs,” Pattison said in a wide-ranging interview on Thursday. “They should pay their fair share, but there’s other alternatives. The government is taxing people that have money [and who] will go someplace else, like the United States or somewhere.”

Pattison’s message to the government is simple: encouraging investment will create jobs needed to help ensure Canada’s economy will see a strong recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Capital goes to where it’s friendly to capital,” he added. “The more you hit capital, they’ll find a place that’s more favourable in most cases, but capital creates jobs handled in a proper way.”…read more.