Canada’s mammoth wealth gap in 3 easy charts

Canada’s wealthiest 86 residents hold the same amount of wealth as the poorest 11.4 million Canadians combined, a new study has found.

Outrageous Fortune: Documenting Canada’s Wealth Gap, released Thursday by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, shows the country’s wealth gap is even larger than its income gap.

That means the lucky 86, making up just 0.002% of the population, have so much net wealth ($178 billion), they could buy everything (EVERYTHING!) owned by every single person in New Brunswick, and still have billions to spare.

Here are three highlights from the report:

1. Between 1999 and 2012, the greatest dollar gains in wealth acquisition went to Canada’s wealthiest 20%. Specifically, 66% of the increase in wealth went to the top quintile, while the poorest fifth of Canadians remained in a net debt position:

2. When you look at the proportion of wealth held by each quintile, it shows the poorest three quintiles (the lower class, the lower middle class, and the middle class) were largely unchanged in the proportion of wealth held since 1999:

3. When you compare the income gap and wealth gap, it shows the richest 20% of Canadian families capture almost 50% of all income while holding almost 70% of all net worth. Meanwhile, “even the poorest of families have a measurable share of income (thanks to Canada’s tax and transfer system), but they have no measurable share of wealth.”

Photo: duckiemonster. Used under a Creative Commons BY 2.0 licence.