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Damn Rich Civil Servants

This is from some older data, but still a fascinating view of the National Capital Region.

Before we all go off on the Big C8j let us remember that I am a Civil Servant, so I feel I can publish that kind of inflammatory title (even with more cuts going on in the Civil Service (although 540 are at the CRA, so that is actually financial news as well)).

So why am I dragging this topic out again? Don’t blame me, it is our friends at Stats Canada again, pointing out in their Family Income and Income of Individuals report that:

In 2010, Ottawa–Gatineau had the highest median total family income (before tax) of all the census metropolitan areas (CMAs), at $90,790, according to data derived from personal income tax returns.

Yes, not all folks who live in Ottawa/Gatineau are Civil Servants, however with the demise of Nortel as a percentage there is effectively many more Civil Servants living in the region.

Now let us all remember what Median means (in an arithmetic sense):

“… the middle number in a given sequence of numbers, taken as the average of the two middle numbers when the sequence has an even number of numbers: 4 is the median of 1, 3, 4, 8, 9….”

So it could well be that the average income of cities might show a much larger difference, in that there may be many cities where the Upper-income group makes significantly more and thus would move the mean (not median ) up much higher.

What is even more interesting is that the Median Income for Ottawa-Gatineau has actually dropped from 2009 to 2010 (I guess reflecting the drop in private sector jobs here).

Yes Minister! Those Civil Servants and their seats of power!

Yet Another Big Table

So I really like this Big Table from Stats Canada because it points out the differences between lone-income families and couple-income families (a sore topic with me as well).

Table 2: Median total income of couple families and lone-parent families, by census metropolitan area

  Couple families Lone-parent families
2009 2010 2009 to 2010 2009 2010 2009 to 2010
  2010 constant dollars dollars % change 2010 constant dollars dollars % change
Canada 76,700 76,950 0.3 36,760 37,050 0.8
St. John’s 87,700 88,890 1.4 35,050 34,960 -0.3
Halifax 85,090 85,170 0.1 35,590 35,330 -0.7
Moncton 74,240 74,740 0.7 33,960 34,270 0.9
Saint John 79,380 78,670 -0.9 32,300 31,930 -1.1
Saguenay 73,470 74,130 0.9 37,870 38,780 2.4
Québec 81,880 81,620 -0.3 45,110 45,410 0.7
Sherbrooke 68,300 68,980 1.0 36,480 36,820 0.9
Trois-Rivières 69,120 69,130 0.0 35,570 35,670 0.3
Montréal 73,850 73,690 -0.2 39,000 38,930 -0.2
Ottawa–Gatineau 100,350 99,880 -0.5 45,500 46,250 1.6
Kingston 84,300 84,880 0.7 37,980 38,760 2.1
Peterborough 75,920 76,200 0.4 34,630 35,860 3.6
Oshawa 91,850 91,320 -0.6 41,040 41,300 0.6
Toronto 75,470 75,580 0.1 38,950 39,340 1.0
Hamilton 84,180 84,930 0.9 38,980 39,900 2.4
St. Catharines–Niagara 72,320 72,730 0.6 35,250 35,930 1.9
Kitchener–Cambridge–Waterloo 82,670 84,210 1.9 38,580 39,600 2.6
Brantford 75,880 76,730 1.1 32,530 33,570 3.2
Guelph 87,340 89,620 2.6 41,390 41,990 1.4
London 79,090 79,710 0.8 35,660 36,740 3.0
Windsor 77,120 78,500 1.8 32,930 34,590 5.0
Barrie 82,680 83,350 0.8 36,420 37,290 2.4
Greater Sudbury 84,940 85,560 0.7 36,710 38,000 3.5
Thunder Bay 82,790 84,310 1.8 35,590 37,950 6.6
Winnipeg 80,540 79,680 -1.1 37,560 37,330 -0.6
Regina 95,910 95,260 -0.7 40,080 39,840 -0.6
Saskatoon 89,180 89,350 0.2 37,720 37,610 -0.3
Calgary 97,390 97,070 -0.3 46,580 45,090 -3.2
Edmonton 96,510 96,750 0.2 43,730 42,690 -2.4
Kelowna 74,400 73,750 -0.9 35,680 34,710 -2.7
Abbotsford–Mission 69,540 68,250 -1.9 32,560 32,200 -1.1
Vancouver 74,410 72,610 -2.4 38,880 38,080 -2.1
Victoria 85,670 84,410 -1.5 41,900 41,220 -1.6
Note(s): 
All figures for previous years have been adjusted for inflation, as measured by the Consumer Price Index. Go online to view the census subdivisions that comprise the 2006 census metropolitan areas.

Feel Free to Comment

  1. I worked for the federal government in my younger days. From what I saw people took it really easy. I wonder what the cost-per-work-unit (kind of like CPA) would look like? I.e. what kind of bang for the buck do we get?

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