Stats Canada published their monthly stats about the Employment Insurance rolls and surprisingly more folks are claiming EI again last month.
In April, 697,000 people received regular Employment Insurance benefits, up 18,600 from a month earlier. This 2.7% increase was the smallest in six months.
However, it is nice to see it is the smallest rise in 6 months.
The disheartening news is:
Since October 2008, the number of regular EI beneficiaries has risen by 39.3%, increasing in all provinces and territories, with the largest percentage growth in Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Ontario.
Given one of the election argument points in the fall will be making EI claims easier, these numbers are bound to increase if the Financial Apocalypse continues until then.
RDSP Here But Not There
We have been researching RDSPs, but have found a very interesting issue with the large banks, only BMO, RBC and CIBC offer some sort of plan (which vary widely in what is offered, whether it is just GIC’s, mutual funds or a complete open trading account). The RDSP was introduced in the 2007 budget, but it is interesting that the banks seem to be dragging their feet on this service (for now).
The rules around the RDSP are very interesting as well, but I will elaborate on that more, after we research a little more. The Canadian Capitalist has already written about RDSPs as well.
