Canadians often misunderstand the true cost of our public health care system. This occurs partly because Canadians do not incur direct expenses for their use of health care, and partly because Canadians cannot readily determine the value of their contribution to public health care insurance.
In 2026, preliminary estimates suggest the average payment for public health care insurance ranges from $6,464 to $21,115 for six common Canadian family types, depending on the type of family.
Between 1997 and 2026, the cost of public health care insurance for the average Canadian family increased 2.3 times as fast as the cost of food, 1.7 times as fast as the average income, and 1.5 times as fast as the cost of shelter. It also increased much more rapidly than the average cost of clothing, which has fallen in recent years.
The 10 percent of Canadian families with the lowest incomes will pay an average of about $637 for public health care insurance in 2026. The 10 percent of Canadian families who earn an average income of $88,572 will pay an average of $8,644 for public health care insurance, and the families among the top 10 percent of income earners in Canada will pay $66,350.
<p><strong><em>The Price of Public Health Care Insurance, 2026</em></strong> finds that the typical Canadian family will pay over $21,000 for public health-care insurance this year. The cost of healthcare has increased substantially since 1997, the first year for which data is available. In fact, it has increased 2.3 times as fast as the cost of food, 1.5 times as fast as the cost of housing and 1.7 times as fast as the average income.</p>
Jakub Porzycki | Nurphoto | Getty Images Paramount Skydance has agreed to delay its proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery to as late as June 2027 — a multi-month delay that will ultimately raise the deal price — as the tie-up faces a legal challenge. In a statement Friday, Paramount called the agreement a “significant…
Thursday, August 7, 2025 How GAO Serves Congress On this special episode of the podcast, we sit down with GAO’s Managing Director of Congressional Relations Nikki Clowers to discuss how GAO serves Congress.
Thursday, May 29, 2025 A New Nuclear Waste Cleanup Plan Could Save Billions For decades, the Department of Energy has been working to clean up dangerous nuclear waste left behind by U.S. nuclear weapons production and energy research. But finding space to dispose of this waste is an obstacle. We’ll get an update on DOE’s…
Photo by Brett Hondow, Pixabay The US federal government’s Technology Modernization Fund (TMF) has asked agencies to submit “high-impact and shovel-ready” project proposals for improving the use of technology in permitting and planning decisions, and in AI adoption. The TMF – a funding initiative created in 2017 by the General Services Administration (GSA) to modernise…
Image: Canva Studio/Pexels The third in a series of extracts from Global Government Forum’s new study on future-proofing digital capability examines how a level of digital capability is now needed by all civil servants, not just technical staff, and how governments are working to achieve this Governments are moving from treating digital as a technical…
