Did you know?

• On average, each Canadian household spent $71,360 in 2008 up two per cent from 2007 ¹

• The average household debt in Canada is 131 per cent of annual household income? ²

• The average household only saves $1000 per year? ²

• One in three people, on average, will be disabled for 90 days or longer at least once before age 65. ³

• The average length of a disability that lasts over 90 days is 2.9 years. ³

• There are an estimated 70,000 heart attacks each year in Canada. That’s one heart attack every seven minutes. ⁴

• Almost half (43 per cent) of Canadians are concerned about their financial condition at retirement.⁵

• Canadian households did not experience any particular relative wealth increase in the past two decades. ⁶

• In 2007, Canadians donated $10 billion to charities. 84 per cent of people over the age of 15 gave a donation to a charity or not-for-profit organization. ⁷

References

¹ Statistics Canada

² The Vanier Institute of the Family, Issue 5

³ CIA 86-92 Aggregate Table & 1985 Commissioner’s Disability Table A (Experience Table)

⁴ Heart and Stroke Foundation

⁵ Certified General Accountants Association of Canada, Where Is the Money Now: The State of Canadian Household Debt as Conditions for Economic Recovery Emerge, page 25

⁶ Certified General Accountants Association of Canada, Where Is the Money Now: The State of Canadian Household Debt as Conditions for Economic Recovery Emerge, page 37

⁷ “Caring Canadians, Involved Canadians: Highlights from the 2007 Canada Survey of Giving, Volunteering and Participating, published by Statistics Canada, 2009, page 11.