Canadians spend 41.8 per cent of their paycheque on taxes: Fraser Institute

Canadian tax burden | BCBusiness

Your tax bill trumps your food, shelter and clothing expenses combined, according to a study from the Fraser Institute, which looks at the tax bill of the average Canadian family over a period from 1961 to 2013

According to the Fraser Institute’s estimates—which includes direct taxes, like income tax and sales tax, and less direct forms of taxes, like taxes on natural resources and corporations—the average Canadian household spends $32,369 in taxes, $16,678 on housing and $8,139 on food.
 
That tax burden—on the average household cash income of  $77,831—includes $1,731 in taxes on liquor, tobacco and amusement.  The good news? Your total tax burden fell 0.9 per cent this year over last.
 
The report’s big claim? The average Canadian family’s tax bill has increased 1,832 per cent since 1961. Kin Lo, associate professor at UBC’s Sauder School of Business, disputes that figure. The report’s time frame stretches back 52 years, just prior to the implementation of the Canada Pension Plan in 1966, and Medical Care Act in 1965, which increased how much Canadians contribute to their government dramatically.
 
Lo also criticizes the report’s dichotomy of necessities and taxes: “If food, clothing and shelter are the only necessities of life, and that which are taxes go towards—things like roads and sidewalks—then the dichotomy is kind of unfair.”