Poverty and low-income statistics by visible minority group, Indigenous group and immigration status, Canada and provinces.

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.

Poverty and low-income statistics by disability status, age group, sex and economic family type, Canada, annual.

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

Out of all OECD countries, Cost Rica had the highest poverty rate as of 2022, at over 20 percent. The country with the second highest poverty rate was the United States, with 18 percent. On the other end of the scale, Czechia had the lowest poverty rate at 6.4 percent, followed by Denmark.

The significance of the OECD

The OECD, or the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, was founded in 1948 and is made up of 38 member countries. It seeks to improve the economic and social well-being of countries and their populations. The OECD looks at issues that impact people’s everyday lives and proposes policies that can help to improve the quality of life.

Poverty in the United States

In 2022, there were nearly 38 million people living below the poverty line in the U.S.. About one fourth of the Native American population lived in poverty in 2022, the most out of any ethnicity. In addition, the rate was higher among young women than young men. It is clear that poverty in the United States is a complex, multi-faceted issue that affects millions of people and is even more complex to solve.

Individual poverty status using Market Basket Measure (MBM) by family characteristics, age, and gender for Canada, provinces and territories, census divisions and census subdivisions.

In 2022, the number of persons under 18 years in economic families with low income in Canada was 888,000. Between 1976 and 2022, the figure dropped by 139,000, though the decline followed an uneven course rather than a steady trajectory.

Low income statistics by age, sex and economic family type, annual.

Poverty and low-income statistics by disability status, age group, sex and economic family type, Canada, annual.

Market Basket Measure (MBM) thresholds for the reference family by MBM region and base year. Total thresholds as well as thresholds for the food, clothing, transportation, shelter and other expenses components are presented, in current and constant dollars, annual.

In 2021, around 0.9 million people were living in low income families in Ontario. Ontario had the largest number of individuals living in low income households. Quebec and British Columbia followed with 504 thousand and 287 thousand, respectively.

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).

Among the OECD countries, Costa Rica had the highest share of children living in poverty, reaching **** percent in 2022. Türkiye followed with a share of ***percent of children living in poverty, while **** percent of children in Spain, Chile, and the United States did the same. On the other hand, only ***** percent of children in Finland were living in poverty.

The statistic depicts the total number of persons living in low income families in Canada between 2005 and 2010, distinguished by persistence of low income. Between 2005 and 2010, there were about **** million people in Canada, who lived in low income families for 2 years.

In 2025, nearly 11.7 percent of the world population in extreme poverty, with the poverty threshold at 2.15 U.S. dollars a day, lived in Nigeria. Moreover, the Democratic Republic of the Congo accounted for around 11.7 percent of the global population in extreme poverty. Other African nations with a large poor population were Tanzania, Mozambique, and Madagascar. Poverty levels remain high despite the forecast decline Poverty is a widespread issue across Africa. Around 429 million people on the continent were living below the extreme poverty line of 2.15 U.S. dollars a day in 2024. Since the continent had approximately 1.4 billion inhabitants, roughly a third of Africa’s population was in extreme poverty that year. Mozambique, Malawi, Central African Republic, and Niger had Africa’s highest extreme poverty rates based on the 2.15 U.S. dollars per day extreme poverty indicator (updated from 1.90 U.S. dollars in September 2022). Although the levels of poverty on the continent are forecast to decrease in the coming years, Africa will remain the poorest region compared to the rest of the world. Prevalence of poverty and malnutrition across Africa Multiple factors are linked to increased poverty. Regions with critical situations of employment, education, health, nutrition, war, and conflict usually have larger poor populations. Consequently, poverty tends to be more prevalent in least-developed and developing countries worldwide. For similar reasons, rural households also face higher poverty levels. In 2024, the extreme poverty rate in Africa stood at around 45 percent among the rural population, compared to seven percent in urban areas. Together with poverty, malnutrition is also widespread in Africa. Limited access to food leads to low health conditions, increasing the poverty risk. At the same time, poverty can determine inadequate nutrition. Almost 38.3 percent of the global undernourished population lived in Africa in 2022.

The percentage of persons in low income for all persons in British Columbia stood at 11.6 percent in 2022. Between 1976 and 2022, the percentage of persons in low income rose by 0.4 percentage points, though the increase followed an uneven trajectory rather than a consistent upward trend.

In 2023, over 4.6 million Canadians stated having a fair or poor state of mental health. Perceived mental health can provide a general indication of the population suffering from some form of mental disorder, mental or emotional problems, or distress, not necessarily reflected in perceived health. This statistic displays the estimated number of Canadians aged 18 years and over who perceived their mental health as fair or poor from 2015 to 2023.

Data on individual low-income and poverty status by occupation broad category (1-digit code) from the National Occupational Classification (NOC) 2021, industry sector (2-digit code) from the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) 2017, and work activity during the reference year for the population aged 15 years and over in private households in Canada, provinces and territories, and census divisions.

Discover our detailed portraits of poverty, which offer you a complete overview of the city, and each district. These portraits highlight the distribution of the prevalence of poverty along various key dimensions such as age, family structure, immigration status, core housing needs, and activity limitations. This data will help you better understand the demographic dynamics that shape our community. The data used for these reports comes from custom orders from Statistics Canada, available on the following page: 2021 Census Custom Order.