Promoting Precarity or Creating Cushions? Examining Canadians' Experiences With Financialization and Insecurity Across the Life Course.

Abstract

This study examines experiences and perceptions of economic insecurity across individual social trajectories within the context of pervasive financialization in Canada. Drawing on a comprehensive pan-Canadian survey (n = 7483) and set of interviews (n = 127) collected as part of the Great Canadian Class Study (GCCS), we use a mixed-methods approach to explore how inflation, the housing crisis, and labor market precarity combined with the expansion of consumer credit, student loans, and mortgage debt shape people's immediate experiences with insecurity and their perceptions of future insecurity. Although insecurity was pervasive across respondents with many reporting heightened stress about financial futures and increased reliance on credit mechanisms, the experiences and perceptions of insecurity varied across the life course. Older adults over age 65 tended to be the most secure, in part due to being retired homeowners with savings. Younger adults experienced greater insecurity, especially when they were unemployed, held stressful amounts of debt, or were priced out of home ownership opportunities. Qualitative findings both confirmed and contradicted these results. In addition to illustrating how renting and debt promoted precarity for young adults, and highlighting how home ownership and personal safety nets often created cushions for respondents, qualitative findings also pointed toward conflicting situations that included the need for family supports and the limitations of home ownership and savings in periods of inflation.