Understanding Alberta Separatist Claims As Gaslighting

The arguments that the Alberta separatists make to justify their positions are carefully crafted to seem almost reasonable, while at the same time are actually distorting the picture entirely to support their claims of "legitimate grievances".  This is a form of gaslighting which Albertans are being subjected to on a scale most have never seen before.  Gaslighting is using manipulation to cause someone to question their own perception of reality (I have linked to the Wikipedia definition because it's in fairly straightforward language without getting bogged down in the details and nuances that you would find in more psychological analyses of the topic.) 

I think it's worth taking apart some of their complaints and explaining exactly how they are twisting things in order to create their arguments, in the hopes of convincing people that Alberta is really hard done by in confederation.  I'll explain in more detail why I see this as a form of manipulation through distortion as we go through the example. 

The examples come from The Alberta Prosperity Project's own website, as of February 17, 2026.

Economic Grievance - Equalization and Transfer Payments

There is a lot to unpack here, and all of it is twisting things around.  

First, they want to lump together the NEP (a short-lived policy program from 1980-1983, abolished in 1985) in with Equalization, which is a program baked into the constitution as a means to ensure that Canadians have (relatively) equal access to programs and funding.  This is an example of conflating issues together to muddy the waters.

The NEP

In Alberta, the conservatives have spent decades complaining about the NEP - to such a degree that it is very difficult to find a coherent, unbiased analysis of it as legislation and its effects.  Years ago, as an undergraduate student, I spent a fair bit of time studying the NEP trying to understand it from a legal and economic perspective.  All I will say about it here is that if you want to understand it, it becomes necessary to actually read the legislation itself rather than the analyses you will find in popular culture sources. 

Did the NEP result in "a transfer of wealth to Ottawa"?  Well - the answer to that is "it's complicated" - a simplistic approach would be to argue that the price controls aspect of the program meant that there were intrinsic limitations on the royalties that Alberta could receive from its oil production, and similarly oil companies lost money in terms of profits.  However, that is an abstract transfer of money and does not provide a full accounting of both costs and benefits to Canada as a whole (remember - this is _NATIONAL_ policy, not merely the interests of a singular province).   Alberta did not "send money to Ottawa" per se.  

Equalization

Equalization is a perennial complaint among the "western alienation" crowd.  They complain that Alberta is "shut out" of the equalization system by the formulas used to calculate which provinces receive how much money.  This is true, but again, there is a lot more to the story.

First, we have to understand what "equalization" is.  It is a singular, global program that the Federal Government manages which is intended primarily to ensure that less well off provinces receive revenues to enable them to meet a standard of living for all Canadians.  The amounts that provinces receive depend on the application of a fairly complex formula. 

Alberta separatists love to whine about how Quebec gets equalization and we don't.  They often pin that on the fact that in the current formula, Quebec's hydroelectric resource revenues are excluded, while Alberta's O&G revenues are not.  To an extent, this is a "fair" criticism - but more reflective of Quebec's general ability to advocate for itself in the context of Federal-Provincial negotiations rather than a demonstration of systemic unfairness that attacks Alberta.  

However, let's explore a couple of other factors in the equation, because again, things are never as simple as they are presented.  The "fiscal capacity" component of how equalization is computed examines the ability of the province to garner revenues from its own sources - including taxes.  Because Alberta insists on keeping its income taxes as low as possible, and refuses to implement other revenue generating instruments such as a sales tax, there is no equation in the current system where Alberta would be a net recipient of equalization.  If Alberta were to do receive equalization payments, other provinces would rightly argue that they should receive a comparable boost in their equalization share because Alberta is nowhere near touching the ceiling of its fiscal capacity. 

Federal Transfers

Federal transfers are separate from Equalization.  Federal Transfers are generally monies earmarked for paying the Federally committed portion of any number of programs.  These funds have "strings attached" to them which commit the province to spending the money on specific areas (or risk having some or all of a transfer clawed back later).  In principle, these transfers are designed to assist with implementation of programs such as health care, while at the same time providing the Federal Government with at least a modicum of a mechanism to enforce the terms of those programs. 

The separatists turn around and argue that based on their estimates of how much Albertans pay in taxes to the Federal Government, that we're being "short changed" on Transfers _AND_ Equalization.  The problem with this is that it twists reality around a couple of facts that distort Alberta's wages and economy.

The first factor is that one industry (the oil patch) pays a lot of people hugely inflated wages compared to what workers of a similar skill set would get in other segments. Part of this is because working "on the rigs" is very dangerous work, and very hard work that most people can only do for a few years of their working lives before injuries make it impossible to continue working.  

The second factor arises from the first.  Alberta attracts a lot of young people who come seeking the higher incomes that are part of the oil industry "boom cycles".  I can't blame them - a young man out in Newfoundland working on a fishing boat can make way more as a rig hand - so here they come.  This has the effect of pushing down Alberta's "average age".  Basically you have a situation where people come to Alberta for some number of years, and then when circumstances change, they move elsewhere in the country.  This might be retirement, it might be other factors, but it doesn't actually matter.  

All of this boils down to, Albertans on average pay higher taxes - not because they live in Alberta, but because they earn more - the rate of taxation is exactly the same as it would be in any other province for the same salary.

That reality also means that Albertans place very different pressures on various social systems.  They might use less healthcare resources on average compared to a place with more retirees, but would place higher demands on childcare (oh wait - Alberta opted out of that transfer just recently - for "reasons").  Federal transfers are usually done on a formula basis which tries to sort out the demographic and population pressures that are involved.

Additionally, Alberta governments have been hostile to any number of Federal programs that carry transfer payments as part of the mechanism, on the basis that Alberta "doesn't want to deal with the strings attached to the transfer payments".  This further reduces what Alberta receives in transfers, and non-compliance with the conditions of other programs also means that the value of transfers received is reduced still more.

It is a fallacy to claim that because Albertans pay an estimated $60 billion annually in federal taxes and only receives $27 billion in transfer payments for a lot of reasons.   The separatist logic here is very transactional and simplistic.  It ignores not only policy decisions made by Alberta, but it goes further and claims unfairness when those very policy decisions negatively affect the Alberta government's revenues through the transfer payment systems.  Further, because transfer payments are population based, and Alberta is roughly 20% of Canada's population, it's going to get less dollars back than it pays out.  However, we should not lose sight of the fact that Albertans benefit from this in the long run because so many do move to other parts of Canada at some point in their lives.  

The Gaslighting

I hope that my brief discussions above have helped you see that the separatists are engaging in some significant distortions to support their claims.  Yes, there's a degree of truth that they start from, but then they wrap an entire narrative around it which radically distorts the picture to the point that you find yourself scratching your head and going "well maybe there's something to it" - except there isn't.

They engage in what almost amounts to a Gish Gallop, spewing points at you very quickly, and implying linkages between topics that simply aren't reasonable or real.  For example, the NEP hasn't been a thing since 1985, whining about it 40 years on is ridiculous by any measure.  Connecting the NEP to Equalization is also ridiculous because the two are completely unrelated topics, and only in the most generalized sense can you link them.  

The problem is that they've got a practiced set of talking points, and most of us aren't walking around with enough knowledge in our heads to directly challenge them when presented with the lie - the result being that many people will walk away thinking there's something to the claims, even when there isn't.  Presto, they have just gaslit that person into doubting the reality they thought they lived in.