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July 13, 2022 - 9:38 AM
The median total income for residents of Kamloops, Kelowna and a number of other southern Interior cities was higher than for most B.C. and Canadian residents in 2020.
The latest data release from Statistics Canada shows the national median income was $41,200 in 2020 (the reference year used for income reporting).
B.C.’s median income was lower at $40,800.
The Kamloops area did better with a median total income of $42,800 while the Kelowna area came in at $41,600.
Both cities are classified as Census Metropolitan Areas, which means they have more than 100,000 people with a large central city.
For Kelowna, that means the entire Central Okanagan regional district while the Kamloops area reaches as far as Logan Lake, Chase and Sun Peaks.
READ MORE: Why it's a good thing the Kamloops area now has a population of over 100,000
As for the rest of the Okanagan’s largest cities, West Kelowna came out on top at $44,000, Vernon was at $40,000 while Penticton came in at $38,400.
Incomes in Canada, as a whole, actually got a boost in 2020 with COVID-related government support programs.
READ MORE: Canadian incomes went up in 2020 amid uptake of pandemic benefits: census data
Thompson-Okanagan incomes also grew faster than the Canadian average from 2015 to 2020.
Canadian incomes increased by 10.8%. Kamloops area incomes jumped by 11.5% and the Central Okanagan by 11.8%.
Those rates of growth, however, were slower than for B.C. as a whole, where wages grew by 14.6%.
Penticton saw the biggest increase of the five largest cities at 14.3% while Vernon recorded a 13.6% increase.
The 2015 data was not provided for West Kelowna.
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