Poverty rates in Saskatchewan – an update

Poverty continues to be a major problem in Saskatchewan.  Recently revised Statistics Canada data show that the number of persons in poverty in Saskatchewan in 2018 was 122 thousand, 11.2 percent of the population.  And these figures date from before the pandemic – in 2020 more residents of the province are likely to live in poverty.

In 2018 there were 28 thousand children in poverty in the province.

The poverty threshold for a family of four in Regina was $44,833; for a person living alone it was $22,416.  Living below this line were:

    • 48 per cent of children in female lone-parent families
    • 36 per cent of persons aged 18-64 not living in families
    • 4.6 percent of seniors aged 65 plus

While updated data do not include information for the fifty thousand plus persons living on reserves, incomes are especially low among the Indigenous population of the province.

For more information see http://uregina.ca/~gingrich/skp2018r.pdf