alt Hacker News>This is a naive perspective.
Okay.
SR&ED had 22,758 applications last year. Software development only accounted for 40% of it. So 9000 applications from software dev firms, the majority being very small firms. That is a tiny, tiny minority of software firms in this country.
>In reality, most of the software development that a typical growth company does is eligible
No, it absolutely is not, unless you are lying on the application. And yes, a lot of people lie to get government grants and subsidies. And it works out pretty good until someone audits it and realizes that someone is making a shitty instrumentation console that absolutely no one would say advances scientific knowledge and demands the credit back plus interest and penalties.
And yes, I've seen people's absolute bullshit SR&ED applications before. I've had peers ask me to review theirs, where they do bog standard bullshit dev but read on HN how super easy it is, and they convince themselves that "everyone is doing it". Only those signatures on the form that lies about what is actually being claimed.
Again, it's awesome...until it isn't. Which is why the vast majority of software firms are not claiming this.
“Vast majority” is literally only one company I have ever heard of in Canada. Slack didn’t bother because they could not claim at the 35% and Andreesen showered them with so much cash it simply wasn’t worth the hassle. But every other software company I have ever had any insight into in Canada claims SR&ED. And not by lying on the forms… Everyone gets audited typically every 3 to 5 years. You can’t make it through an audit with B/S. They are very good at sussing out the bad claims and yes, that is a punishing experience as it should be.