How Young Canadians Are Navigating Their Financial Futures

The Canadian Press spoke with a group of young Canadians about the financial pressures shaping their lives: a difficult job market, housing that many cannot afford, and life goals that increasingly feel out of reach. Their experiences highlight how affordability, employment instability and the rising cost of living are reshaping expectations for a generation.

Waiting for everything to work out

A few hours into a night out with friends in downtown Toronto, 19-year-old Eleni Koumoundouros faces a familiar choice: end the evening early and begin the hour-long commute back to Oakville where she lives with her parents, or linger and deal with late-night transit and walking home in the dark. The commute, she says, dampens her social life and adds stress to an already busy schedule.

Koumoundouros, a third-year political science student at the University of Toronto, balances 30 hours of work a week alongside her studies. Still, downtown rent is beyond her reach. “I’m working so hard to make this money, even if it feels like the money is kind of going nowhere,” she says, describing the frustration of earning but not getting ahead.

Like many peers, Koumoundouros worries about a shortage of meaningful job opportunities. She has long hoped for a career in government where she can help shape policies to improve people’s lives, and she wants current policymakers to grasp the depth of Canada’s affordability crisis. “I think I could be happier. But right now, I’m not entirely disappointed. I’m just chugging along, waiting for everything to work out,” she explains, capturing the uneasy mix of determination and uncertainty felt by many students and young workers.

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Ghosted by employers, “the worst thing.”

Recent graduate Lauren Hood expected to be in her first professional role by now and moving toward independence. Instead, the 21-year-old, who finished degrees in political studies and philosophy with a law certificate from Queen’s University in June, finds the job market stubbornly unwelcoming.

Hood has been searching for months. While she has picked up work in a store and DJs on the side to cover bills, relevant opportunities in her field have been scarce. “The job market right now is very, very hard to get into,” she says.

Living with her parents in Aurora, Ont., Hood has faced discouraging experiences like being told an interview would only lead to hiring next April despite applying in September. She reports applying to more than 50 positions related to her degree and receiving only two interviews since graduating.

Rejection and silence from employers have taken a toll. “Being ghosted by the employers is, I think, one of the worst feelings,” Hood says, explaining that the uncertainty makes it difficult to plan next steps such as saving money, paying down debt and preparing for law school exams. “I feel behind,” she adds. “In my head, I pictured to be working and ideally, it would be nice to move out and not live at home anymore. But I can’t do that without a job.”

Those dreams are out of reach

Taylor Arnt, 27, describes how the rising cost of living has disrupted traditional life milestones for many young people: buying a home, getting married and starting a family no longer follow the predictable path they did for previous generations. “You went to school, you got a job, you got married, you had kids,” Arnt says. “A lot of those dreams, if we want to follow those, are out of reach.”

After losing a policy analyst position because of government funding cuts, Arnt now works as a contracted consultant and teaches group fitness. Living with family has become a necessity rather than a choice, and the idea of home ownership feels distant given rising housing costs and unstable employment.

Arnt also says the struggle to meet basic needs has forced a rethink of long-term plans like marriage and children. “It’s really difficult to plan for a future and think about those goals when you’re struggling to meet your day-to-day basic needs,” she says. That frustration — feeling that hard work does not guarantee progress — is shaping how many young people experience life and contributes to higher levels of unhappiness among this cohort.

I don’t want to spend on unnecessary things

For 25-year-old Thivian Varnacumaaran, the path to stable work was long: he sent out more than 400 job applications before finding employment this July as an electrical designer. The recent York University graduate now earns enough to cover phone bills and basic expenses, but little remains for saving or discretionary spending. “I’m still struggling, even with my amount of money that I’m making at the moment, because it is a starting salary,” he says. “It will take time to obviously increase that and put it in a wage where I can live comfortably.”

Living with family in Markham, Ont., he calls that situation a “privilege” that allows him to avoid unnecessary spending. Varnacumaaran points out that many young graduates face similar financial strain and notes that Ontario’s minimum wage, currently $17.60 per hour, feels inadequate for covering modern living costs. He believes raising the minimum wage is urgent to better reflect those realities.

Despite the challenges, Varnacumaaran remains hopeful. He reflects on his family’s history — his grandparents survived colonialism and civil war in Sri Lanka, and when his family immigrated to Canada they relied on community support before reaching a more secure position. Those experiences shape his belief that persistence and hard work can lead to a stable future. “Work hard enough,” he says, “and you’ll get what you want.”

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