Families earning more than $60,000 per year now fall under new federal ‘poverty line’

VANCOUVER—Due to the federal government’s newly established official poverty line, some Canadian families earning more than $60,000 annually are now considered impoverished, finds a new study released today by the Fraser Institute, an independent, non-partisan Canadian public policy think-tank. “There’s real poverty in Canada—hunger, misery and serious housing inadequacies—but Ottawa has now lumped in families and individuals with near middle-class incomes, which will do nothing to help eliminate serious deprivation in this country,” said Christopher Sarlo, a senior fellow at the Fraser Institute, professor emeritus of economics at Nipissing University and author of A Critical Assessment of Canada’s Official Poverty Line.