05. Where are Toronto’s middle-income people? Did they move to the suburbs (the “905” region)?
The decline in the number of middle-income neighbourhoods has also occurred in the rest of the CMA, although to a smaller extent. The rest of the CMA includes the suburban municipalities around Toronto, often referred to by their area code as the “905 region.”
Figure 2 shows that in 1970 a vast majority (86%) of the neighbourhoods in the suburbs around the City of Toronto (the rest of the Toronto CMA) were in the middle-income group. As it did within the city, this share fell between 1970 and 2005, but by a smaller amount. As in Toronto, most of these neighbourhoods shifted to the low-income categories (from 0% in 1970 to 21% in 2005); neighbourhoods with higher average incomes also
became more numerous, increasing from 13% to 18%.
What this means is that middle-income people in the city have not simply moved to the outer suburbs. Neighbourhoods with incomes near the CMA average are far less numerous in 2005 than in 1970 in both the city and the outer suburbs, although the decline is more pronounced in the city. The overall trends are the same.
Figure 2, PDF
Figure 1, PDF