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Canada doesn't have ghettos or slums quite like in America but it does have some very poor low-income districts. Poor people in Canada don't live like middle class people in America, they live like poor people. Fortunately Canada doesn't have too many very poor people because people are not allowed to stay on welfare for very long and there's no such thing as food stamps and other kinds of benefits that poor people in America get. Everything in Canada is a lot more expensive than in America and there are no freebies. They have to be able to prove that they're looking for work every day and they have to take whatever kind of work they can find to earn a living. So there are poor people who are very low-income earners and just scraping by from month to month. It's a real hardship to be a poor person with no money in such a cold country like Canada with long winters and short summers so the hazards of winters here are a strong motivation for people to get educated in skills training, find work and then work hard.
Canada has made a lot of progress in the last 30 years in regards to its poverty. There are parts of the country that are chronically poor (many in the east) that have also improved a lot since the 1980s. There's a fascinating documentary on YouTube called The Ballad of South Mountain. It's about two families living in Nova Scotia's Annapolis Valley in the 1980s. The basically live in shacks, have no education, and have no running water. I found it shocking when I saw it - that this existed even 30 years ago. But then I remember my own aunts and uncles (from near the area), born in the 1950s and 1960s, only one of whom finished high school. Most dropped out before Grade 8, although they never lived in those conditions. Parts of NS used to resemble the poorest parts of US Appalachia, although government intervention has lifted up the poorest.
Guess it depends on your definition of poor and middle class, My idea of Middle class is some one making $50K to $100K from a nice job, probably lives in a nice bungalow in the suburbs, drives a nice car,has some savings etc. Poor IMO is some one making minimum wage or living on welfare and lives in an inexpensive apartment in the cheaper parts of town,lives paycheck to paycheck probably has no car or savings etc.
Poor as in on the streets? Or relatively poor as in what jambo101 just described? I think for the most part you have to make a super conscious decision to be truly poor here. Maybe a drug problem or something.
If you are just a single person and you work not even full-time at minimum wage, you can still have a nice little bachelor and enough food and spare cash to live okay, it's just not as comfortable as making small to mid-range salaries. I think the other issue is young families with two or three kids they didn't plan, trying to pull all this family stuff off on the lowest possible pay.
A few more differences, between Canada and the USA, in terms of poverty.
Canada spends a LOT more on health care and public education than the USA does. We can do that because we don't have to support a huge military force, and a whole alphabet of law enforcement agencies, like FBI, DEA, BTAF, USCIS, BP, US Parks Police, and on and on. And our national debt is nowhere near what the US debts are.
Public housing in Canada isn't luxurious, but it is not all bad , either. And we have a program of placing public housing in middle class neighbourhoods, with good schools, and recreation centres, and supermarkets, and park lands.
Because we have a universal health care system, poor people are treated like everyone else, with care and dignity. Even the homeless guy that lives under a bridge, has a health card, and can get treatment at the neighbourhood clinic, with no cost to him. Same for the needle junkie, and the 16 year old single mom, and her child. We view addiction as a medical problem, not a criminal problem.
In Canada, if you are employed, even at the Provincial minimum wage, you won't pay any income taxes, if your income is less than about $21, 000 a year. Seniors who get the Canada Pension and the Old Age Pension, are able to live well enough. In Canada, about 70 percent of seniors, over age 65 are considered to be " well off " and close to being affluent.
My wife and I fall into that category. A combined annual pension income of over 100, 000 dollars, and we own our own home, plus six rental properties in Toronto, and have no debts. Good management of our investments brought us a 19 percent return in 2013, after taxes.
Canada has a high level of University graduates. About 45 percent of adult Canadians hold at least one 4 year University degree, and some have more than one. Universities in Canada are tax payer supported, and costs here are much lower than in the USA, for the same degree.
Jim B.
Toronto.
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