A Comparison of Inequality and Living Standards in Canada and the United States Using an Extended Income Measure

We use the Levy Institute Measure of Economic Well-Being (LIMEW) to compare living standards and inequality in Canada and the United States. LIMEW includes non-cash government transfers, public consumption, annuitized wealth, and household production and nets out all personal taxes. We compare our results to the standard US Census measure, gross money income (MI). We expected a smaller inter-country gap in median LIMEW than median MI and relatively lower LIMEW inequality in Canada because of the more extensive Canadian welfare state. Instead, we found that the measured gap in the level and inequality of economic well-being was higher based on LIMEW than MI.