What is the ‘living wage’ across Ontario and how much do you need to earn to make ends meet?

Money is removed from an ATM in Montreal, Monday, May 30, 2016. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Ryan Remiorz

There is nearly a $10 difference between Ontario’s minimum wage and the hourly rate workers need to be able to comfortably live in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), according to a new report.

On Oct. 1, the provincial minimum wage increased by 40 cents to $17.60 per hour, reflecting the second highest provincial rate in Canada. British Columbia boasts an hourly rate of $17.85.

• READ MORE: Ontario’s minimum wage is rising in October. But is it enough for workers to support themselves full-time?

That increase still pales in comparison to what the Ontario Living Wage Network (OLWN) says is needed for full-time workers to comfortably live in the GTA, which is $27.20 per hour—a $9.60 difference from the current provincial rate.

To calculate a living wage, OLWN considers the living expenses across 10 regions in the province for three types of households: a single adult, a single parent, and two adults supporting two small children. They consider factors like food, shelter, childcare, transportation and recreation costs and then aggregate the results, including any applicable government taxes, benefits and transfers. Savings are not taken into account.

“If you’re working that minimum wage job, you’re going to be short by $336 a week,” Craig Pickthorne, OLWN’s director of communications, said in an interview with CTV News Toronto.

“Because of that difference between the living wage and the minimum wage, it’s so far off now and every year we do the living wage calculations, they continue to pull further and further away from the minimum wage.”

Last year’s calculations for the GTA had the hourly rate at $26. That points to a 4.6 per cent increase for 2025.

Pickthorne says that is a less severe jump than in previous years, and even in comparison to other regions across Ontario. The highest increase was seen in the southwest region of Ontario—encompassing the area from Sarnia to Windsor—at 8.3 per cent, rising from $19.85 to $21.50 per hour.

The cost of rent is what’s primarily driving living wages up, Pickthorne said.

“We’ve seen in previous years that food prices were part of the increase and there weren’t as much this year as they were last,” Pickthorne said. “The 30 to 40 per cent of the living wage rate is because of rent … and so when that goes up, it really has a big influence.”

Zoocasa, a real estate website, recently crunched numbers to see how much Canadians should make at minimum in order to rent a one-bedroom apartment affordably—meaning only spending 32 per cent of gross annual income.

• READ MORE: Toronto renters should make about $44 hourly to comfortably afford a one-bedroom apartment: report

With their metric, Torontonians should be making at least $86,062 annually, or $44.13 hourly, if they want to rent that unit on their own, according to Zoocasa. That figure is 151 per cent higher than Ontario’s rate and roughly 62 per cent higher than the GTA’s living wage rate.

These wallet-hurting rental costs have caused a mass exodus out of the GTA, Pickthorne noted, which has also driven up costs in the surrounding regions.

“We also see a significant rate in say, what we call Bruce Grey Huron Perth Simcoe,” Pickthorne said, pointing to the area that sprawls from Stratford to Barrie.

As a result of more people moving there, Pickthorne says that’s pushed the living wage rate for that area up by 6.7 per cent, to $24.60 an hour.

Here’s what the hourly living wages look like across Ontario for 2025:

• Greater Toronto Area, $27.20
• Bruce Grey Huron Perth Simcoe, $24.60
• Ottawa, $23.40
• Dufferin Guelph Wellington Waterloo, $23.00
• Hamilton, $22.60
• East, $22.20
• Southwest, $21.50
• Brant Haldimand Norfolk Niagara, $21.40
• North, $21.10
• London Elgin Oxford, $21.05

In research recently conducted by OLWN and the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, looking at data from July 2024 to June 2025, about 17.3 per cent of Toronto workers have a salary below living wage. Racialized workers are more likely to be earning less with 20.1 per cent in that category compared to 12.1 per cent for non-racialized workers.

Across Ontario, there is an income gap of seven to 10 percentage points between racialized and non-racialized workers. The Greater Sudbury region reflects the biggest disparity, with 36 per cent of racialized workers earning less than living wage compared to 16.5 per cent of non-racialized workers.

A lot more women in Toronto do not earn a living wage compared to men, reflecting 20.4 per cent versus 14.4 per cent.

When intersecting race and gender, racialized women in Toronto the most likely to earn less than a living wage, reflecting 23.4 per cent.

Are you making less than a living wage and feel that your income has not kept up with the rising cost of rent in Toronto? We want to hear from you.

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