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On March 19, 2019, the federal government tabled its election-year budget. One of the new provisions is a refundable credit called the Canada Training Credit. However, the $250 credit won’t even be available until you file your 2020 income tax return in April of 2021.

Further, if you are born in 1995 or later, you won’t qualify yet. If you were born in 1954 or earlier, you would never be eligible.

In addition, the maximum benefit you can receive is $5,000 in a lifetime (which will take 20 years to get at $250 a year) and the benefit can only be used to a maximum of 50% of eligible tuition costs.

So let’s consider the following scenario:

It is 2019 – you are 25 years of age making $27,000 a year and file your taxes every year.

You decide to take advantage of this credit and enroll in your first semester of schooling in the fall of 2023.
According to Statistics Canada, the average Canadian undergraduate pays $3,419 per semester.

So, you take time off work to go to school full-time in the fall, thus reducing your income by 1/3 in the year to $18,000.

Under the current 2019 rules, you would only have $39 in federal income tax. This amount is low because the tuition credits reduce your taxes.

By 2023, you have built up a “pool” of $250 per year after you turned 26, and believe you have a $1,000 pool available for that year.

When you file your 2023 return the $1,000 is triggered as a refundable tax credit. But you won’t be getting $961 back ($1,000 – 39).

Here’s the catch:

The $1,000 pool reduces the amount you can claim for tuition credits as well, which changes the tax owing to $189 Federal income tax. Meaning the $1,000 pool that you waited for is reduced by 15% by the time you pay it out.

Cash in jeans: $811.

But what if the course you decided to go into begins in January of 2023? You go for the January-April semester, work from May-August, and attend school September-December.

Using the same $27,000 – your income is now reduced by 2/3 while attending full time. Your income is only $9,000 as a result of the May-August period.

Your tuition (possibly paid through student loans) is $6,838 for the year.

Your tax is now zero because even before tuition credits you are below the Basic Personal Amount in your earnings.

Does this mean you get the full $1,000?

No.

Because your income is less than $10,000 in 2023, you don’t get the $250 for that year. As such, you only get $750, and your tuition credits available for carryforward are reduced by $750 as well, thus having a future negative impact on tax of $112.50.

Net result: $637.50 cash in jeans

What if you are a parent that decides to stay home with the kids until they are in school full time and go back to school in 2023?
Unfortunately, because you did not make more than $10,000 a year in any of the years, you get zero.

What if you were laid off, collecting regular EI benefits, and decide to go back to school?
Regular EI Benefits don’t qualify for the $10,000 income calculation. As a result, unless you had special EI benefits like parental leave or earned income from another source greater than $10,000, you don’t qualify.

What if you were self-employed through a small business corporation and paid yourself dividends instead of wages and then decided to upgrade your training?
Your dividend income does not qualify, and so you are not eligible for amounts to be added to the pool.

So assuming you qualify, and you wait the four years to build up a pool of $1,000 (remember that the $1,000 is only a net $850 because of the reduction in tuition credits). That same Statistics Canada report says that tuition is increasing at 3.3% per year. That means by you waiting four years so you can get the Net $850 means your annual tuition has likely increased from $6,838 to $7,786 ($948).

You waited four years, and the tax amount you receive won’t even cover the inflationary price increase on tuition.

In Conclusion

• Those that do qualify won’t see anything until April 2021; the actual net amount of what they will see is only $212.50; and their annual tuition will likely have increased by $225.65.
• Students under the age of 25 will see nothing;
• People over the age of 25 that don’t have more than $10,000 of income will see nothing;
• Seniors will see nothing;
• Parents looking to re-enter the workforce will see nothing; and
• People who have been laid off and have less than $10,000 of non-EI income will see nothing.

Seems like a lot of complex legislation for nothing.

—
Cory G. Litzenberger, CPA, CMA, CFP, C.Mgr is the President & Founder of CGL Strategic Business & Tax Advisors; you can find out more about Cory’s biography at http://www.CGLtax.ca/Litzenberger-Cory.html