The number of women in Canadian registered pension plans reached a record high of 3.2 million as of January 2018, bringing them up to 50.5 per cent of plan members, according to new data from Statistics Canada.
It also found the number of Canadians in registered pension plans surpassed 6.3 million in 2017, increasing by 62,800 members, or one per cent. Public sector plans made up the vast majority of that total, with more than 49,000 new members — 34,100 women and 15,200 men. And public sector plans made up 52.6 per cent of total membership in registered pension plans.
In 2017, two-thirds (67 per cent) of employees in a registered pension plan were still in a defined benefit plan. That total, 4.2 million workers, is up 0.7 per cent from 2016. Defined contribution plan membership is also growing, up 3.5 per cent in 2017 to 18.4 per cent of all registered pension plan membership. The majority of the almost 1.2 million Canadians in DC plans work in the private sector.