VANCOUVER — A sharp increase in the region’s cost of living—primarily due to soaring housing costs and highlighting the region’s affordability crisis—has led Metro Vancouver’s living wage to rise to $27.05 per hour, 5.3 per cent higher than last year.
Although inflation has decreased from historic highs, cost increases for essentials continue to push up the living wage, which is calculated by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, BC Office and Living Wage BC. It is the hourly rate that each of two parents working full-time must earn to support a family of four based on the actual costs of living in a particular community.
The financial relief provided by government measures, such as affordable childcare programs and increases in income-tested benefits, was intended to help offset rising costs, but is outpaced by the rising cost of rent.
“Rent has been the most expensive item in the Metro Vancouver living wage family budget since the calculation was first produced in 2008 and this year is no exception,” says Iglika Ivanova, Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, BC Office senior economist and the report’s lead author.
Shelter costs for the Metro Vancouver living wage family increased 9.5 per cent this year—an additional $276 per month.
Metro Vancouver’s living wage is the third highest in the province, behind Whistler at 28.09 per hour and Clayoquot Sound at 27.42 per hour. Grand Forks has BC’s lowest living wage at $20.81 per hour.
A strikingly large gap exists between the 2024 Metro Vancouver living wage and BC’s current minimum wage of $17.40 per hour. Nearly half a million workers—37 per cent of all paid employees in Metro Vancouver— earn less than the living wage.
“Hundreds of thousands of BC workers earn less than the living wage and face impossible choices like buy groceries or heat the house, keep up with bills or pay the rent on time.” says Anastasia French, Provincial Manager of Living Wage BC. “Racialized workers and women are disproportionately affected by low wages in a region where the cost of living keeps climbing.”
Over 450 certified living wage employers across the province have stepped up to pay both direct and contract employees wages sufficient to support families. Employers who pay their workers a living wage have found real benefits from doing so, says French.
“Voluntary action alone, however, cannot solve the serious affordability crisis felt across the province. We need coordinated efforts from all levels of government to both increase wages and lower cost pressures so that all workers can thrive,” she adds.
The Metro Vancouver living wage calculation is based on the needs of two-parent families with young children, but it is also meant to support all workers so that young adults are not discouraged from having children because of low wages and older workers have extra income as they age, Ivanova explains.
“Some preliminary estimates we have produced, however, suggest that the living wage may not be sufficient to support single parents and single people in Metro-Vancouver. In other communities this is not the case and we want to explore this in more detail in the future.
“The living wage affords a decent, but modest, standard of living without the extras many of us take for granted. It does not cover credit card, loan or other debt payments, savings for retirement or for children’s future education or the costs of caring for a disabled, seriously ill or elderly family member,” Ivanova says.
25 BC communities calculated living wages for 2024.
* There was a change in how transportation costs were calculated in Kamloops, leading to a large percentage increase in the 2024 living wage.
To arrange interviews please contact Jean Kavanagh at 604-802-5729, [email protected]
