A new poll suggests nearly half of Canadians are living paycheque to paycheque as the cost of living crisis continues to squeeze household budgets, and young people are more likely to say their finances are in poor shape.
It also suggests the Conservatives, who are hammering home a message about affordability, are gaining popularity, with 38 percent of respondents saying they'd vote for the Tories if an election were held today.
And support for the Liberals, who focused their recent cabinet retreat on the housing crisis, is slipping.
The poll by Leger shows that 47 percent of respondents say they’re living paycheque to paycheque, including 53 percent of those aged 18 to 35 and 57 percent of people between the ages of 35 and 54.
The poll suggests high prices are hitting people in Atlantic Canada, Manitoba and Saskatchewan the hardest—more than half the respondents in those regions say they’re just getting by on each paycheque, compared to 38 percent of Quebecers and 42 percent of people from British Columbia.
Sixty percent of respondents described their household finances as good or very good, while 36 percent said their finances were poor or very poor. Another four percent said they were not sure.
People over the age of 55 were most likely to say they were faring well compared to younger age groups, and more men than women reported that their finances were in good shape.
Nearly half of respondents under the age of 35 reported being worried about losing their job in the next year, at 47 percent, compared to 35 percent of people aged 35-54. Men were more worried about losing their job than women, according to the data. Anxieties were highest in Ontario and lowest in Quebec.
Younger people were also most likely to say they think Canada is in an economic recession. In all, 61 percent of people who took the poll said yes to that question, while 16 percent said they don’t know and 23 percent said no.
Leger surveyed 1,597 Canadians last weekend. The poll cannot be assigned a margin of error because online surveys are not considered truly random samples.
It also suggests the Conservative party’s support is at 38 percent—three percentage points higher than it was in the last poll in late July.
That continues a trend that has seen the Tories rising in Leger polls since late May, when they were at 31 percent, and puts support for the party four points higher than it was during the last federal election in 2021.
Liberal support among decided voters was nine points behind the Conservatives at 29 percent, the same as it was in July, and the NDP was top choice for 18 percent of those polled. Support for the New Democrats was down two points from July.
Still, 34 percent of those polled say they’re either very satisfied or somewhat satisfied with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government. Another 24 percent said they were somewhat dissatisfied, while 35 percent said they were very dissatisfied.
Only 35 percent of women polled said they were satisfied with the government, while 57 percent said they were dissatisfied.
