5288...Alberta Is The Metro Detroit Of Canada

In the same way that Metro Detroit has the richest neighbourhoods [Royal Oak for example] and the poorest [below 8 Mile] so does Alberta.

"A new report released this morning by the U of A’s Parkland Institute and the Alberta College of Social Workers says that despite Alberta’s obvious wealth, inequality and disparity in the province are growing faster than almost anywhere else in the country."  The report, which I found this afternoon on their website, parklandinstitute.ca, uses data from StatsCan and comes up with these results:

- a full 87% of earnings in the province goes to the top half of families;- that the top 10% of Alberta families get 28% of after tax incomes, while the bottom 10% of families get only 1.7%;- the top 1% of Alberta earners have an average income of $675,200 compared to an average of $353,100 for the top 1% nationally;- in 2009 the median income in Alberta was $68,100, while the median income among Alberta CEOs was just under $2.5 million;- in 2009, women working full-year full-time earned just 68% of what men earned – tying Alberta with Newfoundland and Labrador as the worst in the country;- Albertans consistently work longer hours, with less time off and holidays, than almost anyone else in the developed world.

WFDS