The Marguerite Ford Place, a social housing project on West 2nd Avenue, in Vancouver, British Columbia, Tuesday, September 10, 2013.Rafal Gerszak/The Globe and Mail
Statistics Canada's latest release of 2011 National Household Survey data illustrates, among other things, how much Canadians have been earning and where they have been living. Some highlights:
Housing costs weigh heavily
One-quarter of Canadian households, about 3.3 million, spent 30 per cent or more of their total income on shelter, exceeding the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation's "affordability threshold."
The '1 per cent'
The top 1 per cent among earners averaged $381,300, and 64 per cent of them lived in Ontario and Alberta.
The low income
4.8 million Canadians, or 14.9 per cent, lived in low-income households in 2010.
Transfer nation
In 2010, 70 per cent of Canadians received some government transfers — Canada Pension Plan, employment insurance, or old age security benefits, for example. Of those receiving government transfers, 13 per cent reported it as their sole source of income.
Most and least dependent
Employment income accounted for 87.8 per cent of total income in the Northwest Territories, the highest in the country. At the other end of the spectrum was Prince Edward Island at 68.6 per cent of total income.