Does The Cost of Living Make Canada Less Fair for Young People Today?

Dave and Ron Butler discuss rising costs and why younger Canadians have a legitimate case to feel it’s harder to get ahead today.

I’ve said this in a lot of interviews and it’s a, a really sad and negative comment. When I started out as the Wealthy Barber, 88, 89, when the book came out, and I would sit down with people, the bottom 15 to 20% of income earners, yeah, they would definitely have trouble getting at the kinds of things I taught.

It’s now the bottom 50%. Of income earners has trouble getting at the things I’m trying to teach because of exactly what you brought up. Such a high percentage of their after-tax income is swallowed in the fixed costs that have gone up so dramatically. This khap economy that is described, it’s actually a pretty good analogy, perhaps more appropriate stateside than Canada, but still very relevant up here that a lot of us older.

People have had reasonably good incomes and still do, but we’ve also had the money to set aside and save, and the assets have done so well that that’s carried us. The younger people haven’t had the time nor the excess income to save the assets rising in value haven’t helped them, and that gap is getting bigger and bigger.

I think a lot of the young people have a legitimate beef that things aren’t as fair now.

Have a, they have a 100% legitimate beef, you know, maybe less so in Brandon, Manitoba or Monta New Brunswick. But in major cities uh, in, in Canada, they have a big beef. Uh, look, it’s, if you want to actually own a car in Canada.

It’s becoming an incredibly expensive proposition. So if you think back to when we were kids, young people, teenagers, getting our driver’s license, it wasn’t too hard to get a car. Like I think it

was pretty darn easy. I think I had one the same day I got a license. Now those days are passed. I mean, it’s just so expensive.

And that’s when you’ve gotta question the general fairness of what’s happened to our society.