Low income cut-offs (LICOs) before and after tax by community size and family size, in current dollars, annual.

Low income measure (LIM) thresholds by household size for market income, total income and after-tax income, in current and constant dollars, annual.

In 2022, 9.9 percent of all Canadians were living in low income. Between 2000 and 2022, the percentage of population with low income experienced a decrease, reaching the lowest value in 2020. The highest share of Canadians with low income was recorded in 2015, with 14.5 percent of the total population.

Low Income Measures

The low income measures (LIMs) were developed by Statistics Canada in the 1990s. They, along with the low income cut-offs (LICOs) and the market basket measure (MBM), were created in order to measure and track the low income population of Canada. With low income measures, individuals are classified as being in low income if their income falls below fifty percent of the median adjusted household income. The median income is adjusted in order to reflect the differing financial needs of households based on the number of its members. The low income measures are a useful tool to compare low income populations between countries as they do not rely on an arbitrary standard of what constitutes the threshold for poverty. Statistics Canada insists that the low income measures are not meant to be representative of a poverty rate. The department has no measure which they define as a measurement of poverty in Canada. Latest data and trends In 2022, around 2.1 million people were living in low income families in Canada. This figure has been fluctuating over the years, both in absolute numbers and in proportion over the total population. More women than men were living in low income families in 2022, though the number of men in low income has risen at twice the rate as that of women. One of the more drastic changes has been the rise in the number of single individuals living in low income, increasing by more than 60 percent since 2000.

Number of persons in low income, low income rate and average gap ratio by age, sex and economic family type, annual.

The Ministry of Education (MEQ) annually calculates two deprivation indices for the 69 school service centers and linguistic school boards: • the Socio-economic Environment Index (IMSE), which consists of the proportion of families with children whose mothers do not have a diploma, certificate or degree (which represents two thirds of the weight of the index) and the proportion of households whose parents were not employed during the week of reference of the Canadian census (which represents a third of the weight of the index). • The Low Income Threshold Index (LFS) corresponds to the proportion of families with children whose income is close to or below the low income threshold. The low-income cut-off is defined as the income level at which families are estimated to spend 20% more than the overall average on food, housing, and clothing. It provides information that is used to estimate the proportion of families whose incomes can be considered low, taking into account the size of the family and the environment of residence (rural region, small urban area, large agglomeration, etc.). For the 2024-2025 school year, the socio-economic data used are extracted from the 2016 Canadian census and relate to the situation of Quebec families with at least one child aged 0 to 18. Depending on their geographical position, these families are grouped together in one of the 3,680 settlement units established by the Ministry. The annual school indices are grouped in decimal rank in order to locate the relative position of the school among all public schools, for primary and secondary education. Note that schools may include more than one school building, that no index is calculated for school boards with special status (Cree, Kativik and Littoral) and that only schools with 30 students or more are selected (without an MEQ-MSSS agreement). For the school year 2024-2025, 689 primary schools and 194 secondary schools are in deciles 8, 9 or 10 according to the IMSE index and make up the group of schools said to be in more disadvantaged areas. These schools respectively welcome a total of 158,176 and 116,843 students, representing 30% of the public network for each of these two levels of education.This third party metadata element was translated using an automated translation tool (Amazon Translate).

If you’re a senior with low income, you may qualify for monthly Guaranteed Annual Income System payments.

Maximum payment and allowable private income amounts for the period from July 1, 2025 to June 30, 2026 are:

• $90 monthly for single seniors (maximum monthly payment amount), your annual private income must be less than $4,320
• $180 monthly for senior couples (maximum monthly payment amount), your annual private income must be less than $8,640

The data is organized by private income levels. GAINS payments are provided on top of the Old Age Security (OAS) pension and the Guaranteed Income Supplement (GIS) payments you may receive from the federal government.

Learn more about the Ontario Guaranteed Annual Income System

This data is related to The Retirement Income System in Canada

Join the Ontario Ministry of Finance for a free webinar to help you learn about tax credits, benefits, and other programs available to support Ontario seniors with a low income. Visit ontario.ca/TaxTalk to learn more.

The Ministry of Education (MEQ) annually calculates two deprivation indices for the 69 school service centers and linguistic school boards: • the Socio-economic Environment Index (IMSE), which consists of the proportion of families with children whose mothers do not have a diploma, certificate or degree (which represents two thirds of the weight of the index) and the proportion of households whose parents were not employed during the week of reference of the Canadian census (which represents a third of the weight of the index). • The Low Income Threshold Index (LFS) corresponds to the proportion of families with children whose income is close to or below the low income threshold. The low-income cut-off is defined as the income level at which families are estimated to spend 20% more than the overall average on food, housing, and clothing. It provides information that is used to estimate the proportion of families whose incomes can be considered low, taking into account the size of the family and the environment of residence (rural region, small urban area, large agglomeration, etc.). For the 2024-2025 school year, the socio-economic data used are extracted from the 2016 Canadian census and relate to the situation of Quebec families with at least one child aged 0 to 18. Depending on their geographical position, these families are grouped together in one of the 3,680 settlement units established by the Ministry. The annual school indices are grouped in decimal rank in order to locate the relative position of the school among all public schools, for primary and secondary education. Note that schools may include more than one school building, that no index is calculated for school boards with special status (Cree, Kativik and Littoral) and that only schools with 30 students or more are selected (without an MEQ-MSSS agreement). For the school year 2024-2025, 689 primary schools and 194 secondary schools are in deciles 8, 9 or 10 according to the IMSE index and make up the group of schools said to be in more disadvantaged areas. These schools respectively welcome a total of 158,176 and 116,843 students, representing 30% of the public network for each of these two levels of education.**This third party metadata element was translated using an automated translation tool (Amazon Translate).**

Data behind the Map of the Geographic Areas of Higher Poverty from the 2021 Census. Please see pp.26-7 of the Poverty Reduction Strategy (https://legacy.winnipeg.ca/interhom/cityhall/pdfs/Poverty-Reduction-Strategy.pdf) for the definition of "high poverty area". MBM is Statistics Canada's Market Basket Measure. LICO-AT refers to Statistics Canada's Low Income Cut-Off After Tax. A Census DA is considered to fall within a Ward or Neighbourhood if its center-point does.

Population statistics used to calculate percentages is from the 100% data in the 2021 Census and were obtained using cancensus. von Bergmann, J., Aaron Jacobs, Dmitry Shkolnik (2022). cancensus: R package to access, retrieve, and work with Canadian Census data and geography. v0.5.7.

MBM Data for this publication were obtained through the Canadian Community Economic Development Network's Community Data Program (https://communitydata.ca/). Statistics Canada. 2021. Target Group Profile of The Low-income Population (MBM), Census, 2021. Census of Canada (database). Community Data Program (distributor). Communitydata.ca (accessed October 28, 2024).