The importance of including family caregivers in the cost of cancer
Employers must acknowledge the role of family caregivers to get a true picture of the costs of cancer care, according to a University of Alberta professor.
Janet Fast, a professor of department of human ecology at the University of Alberta, told the audience at Benefits Canada’s 2017 Employers Cancer Care Summit in February that the army of family and friends assisting patients with their everyday needs are an often-overlooked pillar of the medical system. Yet without them, the entire health system would collapse, she noted. Read more 
Replace bad financial habits
Most people have at least one bad financial habit. Whether it’s impulse shopping, forgetting to pay bills on time or putting off building that emergency fund balancing what you want to do and what you “should” do is never easy.
You might recognize a few of these common bad financial habits in your life:
- Paying bills after the due date
- Paying only the minimum required on bills
- Ignoring bills and letting them go to collections
- Putting off saving for retirement or a rainy day
- Impulse shopping or “retail therapy”
- Not keeping track of how much debt you have
- Taking on debt to pay for something you don’t currently need.
Supporting adult children takes its toll on boomers’ retirement plans: survey
As baby boomers approach retirement while their children look for financial help, many are feeling the financial strain.
A new TD survey found 62 per cent of boomers can’t save enough for retirement because they’re supporting adult children or grandchildren. Those kids, however, aren’t taking that money obliviously: 44 per cent of millennials who rely on their parents’ or grandparents’ support said they know that help means fewer retirement savings, and 43 per cent said they’d cut costs rather than asking for financial help.
Read: Canadians postpone retirement to support children
“As a parent or grandparent it’s natural to want to help our kids and grandkids who may be facing financial challenges such as finding full-time employment or paying their day-to-day expenses,” Rowena Chan, senior vice-president at TD Wealth Financial Planning, said in a news release. “It’s important that this desire to help is balanced with the goals you have when it comes to retirement.” Read more
Three trends that will drive Canada’s economy in 2017
There are three trends that will guide the Canadian economy in 2017. Those are:
- the strength, or lack thereof, of oil prices;
- domestic housing developments; and
- whether the U.S. economy continues to improve.
So says Russell Investments’ 2017 Global Market Outlook, which calls for modest growth in the coming year for Canada.
“Moderate improvement in the price of oil and reasonable growth of the U.S. economy are weighed down by debt-laden households,” says Shailesh Kshatriya, director of Canadian strategies at Russell Investments Canada Limited. “We expect domestic equities to be positive, but without the exuberance of 2016. However, domestic bonds likely will be challenged as lacklustre fundamentals may be partially offset by rising yields in the U.S. […] On balance, we see 2017 economic growth in the range of 1.6% to 2%.”
Start saving early
by Caroline Hanna
You’re never too young to make smart financial decisions. Whether you entered your 20s with a solid savings portfolio funded by your parents, saved up some of your own money, or spent it all on education, here are four tips on how to get ahead financially.
01 Start now
A lot of 20-somethings feel they’ve missed the savings boat. You haven’t. You may have missed out on high interest rates, but the principles of savings apply, even when rates are low.
