Claim: Most Canadians Now Better Off than Most Americans

[Malthus]

Article here:

https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/most-canadians-now-better-off-123010516.html

I don't have the economic chops to critique the thesis, but it strikes me that the high cost of living in major Canadian cities - and the high percentage of the Canadian population that lives in those cities - may put holes in this thesis.

[Barrister]

Interesting.  My first reaction was "I'm pretty sure the US still has a notably higher per-capita GDP than we do" - and indeed they still do.  Almost one third higher at $45k for Canada and $59k for the US (in USD).

The article makes the rather nuanced point that the median income (that is, the income of someone where half of the people make more, and half make less) is now slightly higher in Canada than the US - by a whopping $589.  Given that's a difference of about 1% (median income is around $58k in both countries) it's highly dependent on exactly which exchange rate you use.

[Malthus]

Interesting.  My first reaction was "I'm pretty sure the US still has a notably higher per-capita GDP than we do" - and indeed they still do.  Almost one third higher at $45k for Canada and $59k for the US (in USD).

The article makes the rather nuanced point that the median income (that is, the income of someone where half of the people make more, and half make less) is now slightly higher in Canada than the US - by a whopping $589.  Given that's a difference of about 1% (median income is around $58k in both countries) it's highly dependent on exactly which exchange rate you use.

Yeah, there is no doubt whatsoever that America has far more very, very wealthy people, both absolutely (of course) and relatively, which makes the GDP per capita exercise a less useful comparison.

[Valmy]

Yeah we have so many wealthy people whose wealth absolutely blows my mind. It is nuts. They seem to be everywhere.

Recently my beloved University of Texas started renovating their football stadium (again...) and they built a bunch of ridiculous luxury suites in the new South Endzone that cost $10 million a season. I was thinking "what the fuck has that kind of money to attend football games just to sit in the fucking endzone?) well they were sold out almost immediately. Incidents like that remind me that although I think I very blessed and have a wonderfully prosperous life, my money is a rounding error to a huge amount of people in my country.

[Eddie Teach]

How is your median income higher than per capita? 

[Admiral Yi]

That's median *household* income.

[grumbler]

How is your median income higher than per capita? 

Per capita is average, median is the point where half of the individuals are higher and half lower.  If the country had ten people, making $2, $2, $2, $4, $4, $6, $7 $7, $7, $7, the median income is $5 but the per capita is $4.8

[Eddie Teach]

In practice, distribution never looks like that, but Yi's explanation makes sense.

[Admiral Yi]

Course it does.  Average household is like 1.6 wage earners.

[grumbler]

Median per capita income and median household income are two separate measures.  Here's some numbers from 2017:

Current U.S. Statistics and Trends

The 2017 nominal median income per capita was $31,786. Because there are quite a few extremely wealthy individuals in America, the mean is much higher. In 2017, the mean income per capita was $48,150. The Census Bureau reports it in the Current Population Survey, Table PINC-01.

https://www.thebalance.com/what-is-average-income-in-usa-family-household-history-3306189

If there are more people well below the median than rich people well above it, then the mean can be lower than median.

[dps]

Yeah we have so many wealthy people whose wealth absolutely blows my mind. It is nuts. They seem to be everywhere.

Recently my beloved University of Texas started renovating their football stadium (again...) and they built a bunch of ridiculous luxury suites in the new South Endzone that cost $10 million a season. I was thinking "what the fuck has that kind of money to attend football games just to sit in the fucking endzone?) well they were sold out almost immediately. Incidents like that remind me that although I think I very blessed and have a wonderfully prosperous life, my money is a rounding error to a huge amount of people in my country.

I don't know for sure about UT's stadium, but my understanding is that most luxury suites at stadiums are bought up by corporations, not individuals.