SOUNDING THE ALARM - New national research report by Community Food Centres Canada takes an in-depth look at working-age poverty
Single working-age adults experience the highest rates of poverty and receive the lowest amount of government income supports
TORONTO, June 15, 2023 /CNW/ - Community Food Centres Canada (CFCC) has released a new report that puts a human face on the staggering levels of poverty and food insecurity experienced by working-age single adults.
Sounding the Alarm: The Need to Invest in Working-Age Single Adults makes it clear that a job is not a pathway out of poverty. In Canada, more than one in five working-age single adults is living in poverty.
More and more Canadians are surviving on low-wage, part-time, temporary jobs that lack benefits or stability. This, coupled with outdated and inadequate social support programs designed for a very different labour market, has led to where we are today.
Now, nearly one million working-age single adults are stuck in a cycle of deep poverty.
"The evidence is overwhelmingly clear – through woefully inadequate income support programs and a labour market that creates precarity because of low wages and few benefits, we are trapping people in poverty in this country," explains Nick Saul, CEO of Community Food Centres Canada.
Sounding the Alarm references stark statistics alongside lived experience. The report pulls from focus groups with working-age single adults from across the country living on low incomes.
Some focus group participants received social assistance while others worked in low-wage jobs. Many shared the specific challenges they face—from an inability to afford nourishing food or decent housing to feeling stigmatized and discriminated against due to their low incomes. Others feel trapped on social assistance because giving it up for part-time or contract work would mean losing access to important health benefits.
As one participant from Ontario put it: "How are you supposed to get ahead when you're stuck in a cycle like that?…They don't really want you to succeed. They want you to just survive."
The report puts forth key policy recommendations that can help fill a major gap in support for working-age single adults.
In accordance with a 2022 report co-authored with Maytree, CFCC suggests that the existing Canada Workers Benefit (CWB) be expanded and enhanced into a refundable tax credit called the Canada Working-Age Supplement. Working-age single adults living in poverty would receive the supplement whether they are attached to the labour market or not.
"Sounding the Alarm illustrates that our governments and employers are leaving working-age single adults behind," says Saul. "We urgently need a national solution that responds to the realities that people are voicing in this report. If Canada is serious about making life equitable for everyone, then we need to find the political will to create income policies that take people out of poverty – not for a week, or a month, but for good."
- 22 per cent of working-age single adults live below Canada's poverty line
- They comprise 50 per cent of the 1.8 million Canadians living in deep poverty
- Their poverty rates are nearly three times higher than the national average
- Their average annual income is $11,700, less than half of the $25,252 low-income threshold for a single-adult household
- They make up 38 per cent of all food-insecure households in Canada
Read the full Sounding the Alarm report here.
Nick Saul, CEO, Community Food Centres Canada
Sherri Hanley, Director of Policy & Community Action, Community Food Centres Canada
Krista D'aoust, Hamilton Community Food Centre
Kathleen Ko, Harmony Community Food Centre
Erin Beagle, Roots Community Food Centre
At the heart of Community Food Centres Canada's work is the belief that food is a basic right. We bring people together around good food to help communities thrive. With 400 partners across the country, we build inclusive, culturally responsive Community Food Centres, share knowledge, create health-focused programs, and advocate for equitable policy change. Learn more at: cfccanada.ca.
SOURCE Community Food Centres Canada
Media contact: Kennedy Sherwood, Community Food Centres Canada |236-508-2357 | [email protected]
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