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Originally Posted by Cowboy89
https://thehub.ca/2023-06-15/trevor-...match-the-u-s/
Ontario is tied with Alabama for per capita income and somehow has the most expensive real estate and high cost of living. The only competitive provinces to US states are Alberta & Saskatchewan and that's because they have oil which in every thread on the topic the usual suspects on this forum want to phase out.
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That's GDP per capita, which is a very imperfect measure, not income. For instance, Ireland saw its GDP per capita increase something like 30% in a year simply because Apple moved the domecile of its intellectual property there. Obviously Irish peoples' income didn't increase by 30%, and the US is much the same. There are lots of huge companies headquartered there, but that doesn't necessarily end up in peoples' hands as income. Throw in huge income inequality which skews averages higher, and GDP per capita is a bad measure to judge the average American's income.
If you go by median household income (i.e. what people actually earn), Alberta, BC, Ontario, and Quebec are about average among states.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Cowboy89
The affordability crisis isn't same/same. Canada vs. the US. Ontarians & British Columbians pay California/ New York cost of living on Alabama / Idaho incomes. At least the places you look at in the US that have the Highest costs of living also have the highest incomes.
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Have you ever been to Alabama or those other poor states? I've been to 45 of the 50 states and it is abundantly clear that the median income in the poorer states is not what it is in Canada. The level of poverty there is astounding.
I mean, just use basic logic. The average home price in Alabama is something like $200K and consumer goods are generally cheaper there than Canada. If the median income is the same as Ontario, then the median Alabama resident must either have a significant amount of wealth saved up or be living in luxury. Yet they aren't, and 1 in 6 families lives in poverty there. They also have a life expectancy that's about a decade shorter than Canada's, which again should give you a clue about the quality of life in the state.