Canada Trust Survey Finds Only 1 In 3 Believe They Will Be Better Off In 5 Years – HuffPost Canada

LeoPatrizi via Getty ImagesIn this stock photo, pedestrians cross a busy street in downtown Toronto.Canadians have serious doubts about their financial future and the economy as a whole, a new survey from Edelman has found.

MONTREAL Despite a strong economy that has churned out a record number of jobs in recent years and a housing market that has fattened many households assets, Canadians have serious doubts about their financial future and the economy as a whole.

Those are the key findings in the latest edition of the annual trust barometer from public relations firm Edelman, which measures public trust in the system government, business, non-governmental organizations and the media.

Watch: Its easier to get rich in Canada than in the U.S., but it comes at a cost. Story continues below.

The survey of 1,500 Canadians was carried out from Oct. 19 to Nov. 18, 2019, well before the coronavirus outbreak and the Wetsuweten solidarity protests placed large question marks on the economic outlook.

It found that 76 per cent of Canadians are worried about losing their jobs, with the gig economy, a lack of training or skills, and fears of a recession the top reasons for the concern.

EdelmanThis chart from Edelman ranks the top causes for why 76 per cent of Canadians are worried about losing their job.

It found that barely more than a third of Canadians 35 per cent expect they will be better off in five years time. Thats lower than the U.S., where 43 per cent expect to be better off, but higher than in some developed countries, such as the U.K. and Japan.

EdelmanThis chart from Edelman's 2020 trust barometer ranks countries according to the percentage of people who believe they will be better off in five year's time. Canada is among the countries where a majority are pessimistic.

There is a narrative in Canada that while there are indicators of a strong-performing economy, there are some underlying issues, said Lisa Kimmel, CEO of Edelmans Canada and Latin America operations.

She listed off the countrys high household debt levels, the still-unratified new North American free trade deal, trade tensions with China and obviously the whole pipeline issue in a conversation with HuffPost Canada.

The reality is we are a resource-based economy still, our future economic prosperity to a large degree is dependent on our ability to get oil out of the country. Those are issues that cause great anxiety.

And there seems to be an inability were seeing it play out around these [pipeline] protests in coming to an agreement as to what were going to do as a country about that issue, Kimmel said in a phone interview.

Edelmans survey breaks down respondents into two groups: The informed public those who tend to consume a lot of news and who tend to have higher incomes and education and the mass public, which is everyone else.

One use of this breakdown is that it offers an insight into how the countrys elites are thinking, and its among this group that pessimism is particularly on the rise in Canada a trend that Kimmel describes as concerning.

As in most other countries, Canadas informed public has more faith in institutions such as government, business and media than the mass public, but that faith dropped sharply among Canadians in the latest survey.

Faith in government, business and media fell by eight percentage points each, and the share of informed public who believe they will be better off five years from now dropped to 47 per cent from 53 per cent a year earlier though thats still more optimistic than the public as a whole.

Kimmel thinks that may have had to do with last years federal election.

For many people among the informed public and this extends to the mass public as well we didnt have great options to choose from, she said. You had to choose the best of not great options. That to me demonstrates there is not a lot of confidence and trust thats being placed in political leaders today in Canada.

What people demand from leaders is changing, Kimmel acknowledged.

Expectations of leadership have evolved. The characteristics that defined leaders in the past [for example] delivering strong financial results arent necessarily going to be the qualities that make a good leader in the future.

Business leaders, for instance, are expected not only to deliver financial results, but to prioritize the well-being of the communities in which they operate. And more than ever, politicians need to be collaborative, [to] lead with purpose and understand the issues that are most concerning to their stakeholders, Kimmel said.

The expectations are greater than they once were.

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Canada Trust Survey Finds Only 1 In 3 Believe They Will Be Better Off In 5 Years - HuffPost Canada