
By Lester Bronzon Catarbas
Students, who are often faced with limited budget, were among the key groups who have benefitted from the tax relief. For some students, the GST Holiday allowed them to save some money on variety of goods and service, most especially groceries. According to several students, these savings provided them a modest but valuable cushion.
Balkirat Dhaliwal, a Business Admin Marketing student, said the GST break has helped him a lot when it comes to dealing with stress during holiday shopping. “Even though [the amount] was little, it saved me a lot,’ he said. Balkirat who also works in retail noted that majority of shoppers are giving positive response to the tax relief by the government. In a recent report from Statistics Canada, inflation rate was down to 1.8 per cent in December, with the GST holiday playing a huge part in it.

The Bill C-78 or the Tax Break for All Canadians Act in 2024, specifically removes the GST (Goods and Services Tax) and the HST (Harmonized Sales Tax) on all food and many holiday essentials for two months. This initiative, which started on December 14, 2024 and runs till February 15, 2025, aimed to make life easier for Canadians during the holiday season and help workers save up for the new year.
However, some students noted that the savings are still not enough to significantly impact their financial status in the long term. “I don’t think the tax break has provided a significant impact on my expenses at all,” said Andrew Phuong, a student at York University. “I think I’ll save a lot more if the government would focus on lowering the prices of things like gas where I spend the most.”
What do businesses say about it?
In a recent data released by Restaurants Canada and OpenTable, restaurants have seen a boost in dining and traffic coinciding with the GST/HST holiday.
The data reveals a fair increase in how often Canadians dined out at restaurants in December compared with December 2023. Restaurant-reservation platform OpenTable saw an 18 per cent increase in dining compared to the corresponding period in 2023.
“We are very pleased to see the early signs of recovering consumer demand for our sector. This shows that removing sales tax on food is a measure that supports Canadians, businesses and workers,” said Kelly Higginson, President and CEO at Restaurants Canada. “We urge the government to make the GST and HST tax break on prepared food permanent,” she concluded.
In a recent report from The Canadian Press, some businesses have been in favor to make the GST holiday permanent.

“People are just loving it, like we hear about it everyday, it’s just crazy,” said Bill Pratt, Chief Executive of the Chef Inspired Group of Restaurants that owns Habaneros Modern Taco Bar, Cheese Curds and Studio East Asian Gastropub in Nova Scotia. “There’s always going to be naysayers, but I’m on the other side of the fence going ‘Come on let’s run it even further. Let’s keep it going,” he added.
One of the naysayers to the GST Holiday is Michael Maderazo, Owner of Southeast Sandwiches, a local sandwich restaurant in Vaughan. “I don’t see any impact of the GST holiday on my business,” he said. “The amount of people dining in is the same as to when there is no tax break,” he added.
The GST holiday ends on February 15, 2025.
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