Working poor increasing in York Region

YorkRegion.com
Sept. 14, 2016
Lisa Queen

The growing number of working poor comes as no surprise to the executive director of York Region’s Food Network.

“Of course it’s worrisome and we’ve been ignoring it long enough,” Joan Stonehocker said.

“I think what we’re seeing from the food end of things is more and more people are struggling to eat because they are spending more and more on housing. Affordable housing is not getting to the people who need it the most.”
Stonehocker was reacting to a new report coming to regional council Sept. 22 on the increasing number of working poor in the region.

“For some, having a job is not enough to pull them out of low income and they can face challenges in making ends meet,” the report by the region’s community and health services department stated.

It traces trends from 2006 to 2012 based on information from Statistics Canada’s 2006 and 2012 income tax data.

In 2012, 42,930 residents of residents aged 18 to 64, or 8 per cent, were classified as the working poor.

That was up from 31,270, or 6.6 per cent, of that age group in 2002.

The region’s working poor are aging, the report said.

Residents 30 to 44 years old were the largest age group among the working poor in York Region in both 2006 and 2012. However, the number of older workers (44 to 64 years old) increased faster and, as a result, made up a growing percentage of all working poor, it said.

This trend was likely driven by York Region’s overall aging profile and possibly the impact of 2008-09 recession on older workers who lost jobs and found it difficult to find new jobs at similar rates of pay as their old jobs.

Not surprisingly, the majority of the region’s working poor live in the more densely populated southern municipalities.

Markham had 38.6 per cent of the region’s working poor in 2012, compared to Vaughan’s 24.1 per cent and Richmond Hill’s 20.1 per cent.

In the north, 5.6 per cent of the working poor lived in Newmarket, 3.2 per cent lived in Aurora, 3.3 per cent lived in Georgina, 1.4 per cent lived in King, 1.3 per cent lived in East Gwillimbury and 2.5 per cent lived in Whitchurch-Stouffville.

More than 40 per cent of York residents surveyed live with some degree of unstable job prospects, such as working irregular hours, on short term contracts or without benefits, a report from the United Way of Toronto and York released in April said.

SIDEBAR

The report said the increase in working poor likely reflects economic and labour trends across the Greater Toronto Area such as:

• A decline in the manufacturing sector, which historically provided stable jobs not requiring post-secondary education,

• A hollowing out of middle-level jobs in the goods and service sectors, offset by growth in higher-pay knowledge sector jobs and lower-pay service sector entry-level jobs

• Fewer opportunities to advance within companies and more out-sourcing or contracting out services.