Lower-income households lose ground on multiple fronts
The divide between Canada’s richest and poorest households widened in 2025, driven by slowing wage growth, declining interest income, and a softening labour market, Statistics Canada reported Monday.
The agency said the income gap – measured by the difference in disposable income share between households in the top 40% and the bottom 40% – reached 46.7 percentage points in 2025, up from 46.4 percentage points the year before.
Statistics Canada attributed the widening gap partly to lower-income households seeing wages rise more slowly than the national average, while also experiencing a decline in investment income tied to reduced interest payments on savings.
The wealth divide was similarly stark. The top 20% of the wealth distribution held 65.7% of Canada’s total net worth at the end of 2025, averaging $3.5 million per household. By contrast, the bottom 40% held just 3% of the country’s net worth, averaging $81,650 per household. The wealth gap between the two groups stood at 62.7 percentage points – up 0.6 percentage points from the previous year.
Debt pressures persist despite spending pullback
Insolvency firm MNP Ltd. said Monday that its own survey data reflected similar trends. The firm’s debt index held steady over the past year as Canadians pulled back on spending, but financial pressures remained unevenly distributed.
The average amount Canadians had left at month-end reached an all-time high of $1,000 as of MNP’s March survey, up from $907 in late November, a report from The Canadian Press noted. However, 43% of respondents said they were within $200 or less of being unable to meet monthly spending needs, up from 41% the previous quarter. Twenty-nine per cent said they were already falling short on bills and debt payments, up from 25%.
“Many Canadians are not just feeling financial pressure, they are navigating an environment that continues to shift, increasing uncertainty and making it more difficult to plan, budget, and stay ahead financially,” Grant Bazian, president of MNP Ltd. told The Canadian Press.
The MNP survey of 2,000 adult Canadians was conducted March 10–11 by Ipsos and is considered accurate to within 2.7 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
The widening gap is reflected in other recent data. A January 2026 report by Oxfam Canada found that income inequality was at a record high in 2025 and that wealth inequality was also growing as part of a larger global trend. The report, titled “The Rise of the Super-Rich,” found approximately 89 Canadian billionaires in 2025, with their collective wealth growing by more than 20% over the previous year. The country’s top 40 billionaires alone increased their wealth by $95 billion.
