Fewer living paycheque to paycheque but more overwhelmed by debt: survey

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TORONTO -- An annual survey of Canadian employees suggests that a smaller percentage is living paycheque to paycheque compared with last year.

The Canadian Payroll Association says its 2018 survey found that 44 per cent of working Canadians reported it would be at least somewhat difficult to meet their financial obligations if their paycheque was delayed by even a single week.

That's down from 47 per cent last year.

Countering these positive gains, the association says the percentage of respondents who reported feeling at least somewhat overwhelmed by debt increased to 40 per cent nationally, up from 35 per cent in last year's survey.

The online survey containing more than a dozen questions was conducted for the association by Framework Partners from June 22 to Aug. 1.

The number of responses varied widely, depending on the question, with a total of 5,074 responses to the question about a one-week delay in paycheque and 3,809 responding to the question about being overwhelmed by debt.

The polling industry's professional body, the Marketing Research and Intelligence Association, says online surveys cannot be assigned a margin of error because they do not randomly sample the population.