The concentration of wealth among Canada’s richest 1% is deeper than previously believed, according to a federal government report based on a new modelling approach.
The top 1% of Canada’s families hold about 25.6% of the wealth — roughly $3 trillion — up from 13.7% estimated under previous methodology, says the report from the Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer.
“The distribution of wealth among households is heavily skewed toward the wealthiest families,” the report notes.
“In Canada, a small proportion of families at the top of the distribution possess net worth that is orders of magnitude higher than the country’s median net worth.”
Source: Canadian Government
Tom Szalay says
More questions than answers:
1% of Canadians hold over 25% of the wealth. How much is enough?
At new BC minimum wage of $14.60/h, 35h/week full-time employee still grosses only $28,000/year. For a single income or single parent family, how does this cover the costs of rent, childcare, utilities, transportation, food, medicine, etc.?
In a country as rich as Canada, why do we continue to have food banks that survive on the generosity of a few to feed the hungry? Why do we have hungry people going to food banks? Why can the working poor not afford basic groceries? What portion of income from ‘average’ Canadians is needed to support charities such as food banks, housing for the poor, women’s shelters, etc.? What portion of the billionaires’ wealth or income is contributed to these basis societal needs?
If we put more money in the hands of the poor, how much of it will they spend and how much will the squirrel away in savings? What grows the consumer economy, spending or savings?
As the rich get richer, how much of their new wealth is spent to run the economy and how much is used to earn even more wealth? How much is enough?
Why do earned wages get taxed for the full amount, while capital gains earnings are taxed at only half that rate? Other than TFSAs, RRSPs held by ‘average’ Canadians, which group is benefiting the most from this preferential tax policy on investments? The poor or the top 1%?
Why do employees working for larger corporations and governments get generous health care insurance covering dental, vision care and prescription medicines. Why do the poorest among us have to pay for 100% of these costs? Why has there been no progress made on universal benefit for all medical costs for all Canadians instead of just the basics?
Is it time to totally re-jig our tax structure in our post-covid world? How about universal minimum income to replace the patchwork of EI, social assistance, disability benefits, and CERB that we are currently navigating? How about real meaningful tax increases to marginal incomes over, say, a million dollars per year? How about wealth tax on multi-millionaires?
The majority of Canadians support a wealth tax on the very rich, according to a new poll commissioned by North99. In the US, Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren has proposed an annual wealth tax of 2 percent on families with wealth above $50 million. Of the 2,000 Canadians polled by Abacus Data, 67 percent supported a 2% annual wealth tax on household wealth of over $50 million while 17 percent were unsure and only 14 percent were opposed.
Publisher: Good item Tom. Thanks. If just talked to Dic Cannings and stated that his leader Jagmeet had a good platform for tax reform for the VERY rich. The VERY rich do not need their money and most of us will never realize just how that is accumulated. The more you have the more you make.
So two things I agree with
Guaranteed Annual Income for basic sustenance.
A look at current tax structure for those working and making $13,000 to $130,000 a year.
Wealth taxes on anyone earning more than $130,000 a year
More than a million
More than five million etc. etc.
Let us provide incentives to work hard and make a living and earn lots of money
Let us look for the silver spoons where no work is being done just capital starting to multiple
More important to me
Anyone with cash overseas or using tax havens told to move there and all Canadian assets reverting to the Crown.
Will it happen? no – even the NDP unlikely to offend the rich.
Lynne Thompson says
Wonder how much that study cost??!
Publisher: I would think a lot less than many you will never see.