WORST YEAR EVER?
As the clock winds down toward the new year, many Canadians say they’ll be happy to see the end of 2016
Some years are remembered as the best of times, others as the worst — and most Canadians are happy to see the end of 2016, according to a new poll.
But while most folks across Canada agree it’s been a terrible year, British Columbians are the least negative compared to other provinces, where crashing oil prices and unemployment have hit hard.
In a poll conducted by the Angus Reid Institute and released this week, an equal 31 per cent of poll respondents in B.C. said 2016 was good and bad in their personal lives, while 37 per cent said they felt neutral about their past year.
Across the country, 37 per cent of Canadians felt that 2016 was more of a bad year than a good one for Canada, while 25 per cent felt it was more good than bad.
Feelings about how each province fared in 2016 also varied, with the most negative rankings in provinces where the oil industry tanked, leading to widespread unemployment.
In Newfoundland and Labrador, 78 per cent of respondents felt the year was bad, compared to only six per cent who felt it was good. Alberta, which suffered the Fort McMurray fire this year, followed with 77 per cent agreeing it was a terrible year, and six per cent who felt it was good.
Despite B.C.’s struggles with real estate, pipelines, and an opioid crisis, only 35 per cent of residents felt the year was more terrible than it was decent. A total of 15 per cent felt the year was good for B.C.
Shachi Kurl, with the Angus Reid Institute, noted events like the Fort McMurray fire and celebrity deaths, while they seem very different, still play into a person’s view of 2016 and has far-reaching effects for Canadians.
“Those have ripple and tidal effects that we are still continuing to feel and may well continue to feel into the new year,” said Kurl.
But Canada isn’t doing as badly as our neighbours to the south, according to respondents — 65 per cent of Canadians say 2016, which saw Donald Trump elected to become the new U.S. president, as being a terrible year for that country, compared to only 11 per cent who felt the year was good.
Vancouver illustrator Carmen Bright hoped to put things in perspective when she shared a new cartoon Wednesday on her Instagram.
The four-panel illustration shows a man with a quote bubble that says, “This is the worst year ever” — followed by a Syrian refugee, a plague doctor and a dinosaur facing extinction, all voicing the same thought.
“I got really, really mad because people who are complaining about it being the worst year ever, including myself — it’s tragic and all — but we’re not the ones who are really, really suffering, in perspective,” said Bright, whose father died this year following a battle with cancer.
Kurl said it’s true that many will head into 2017 with a renewed perspective, but a lot of uncertainty remains.
“We’re getting to the end of a year where a number of really key things still have not been resolved. We still don’t know what a Trump administration is going to look like, we don’t know where the war in Syria is going to end. What will Brexit look like?”
The Angus Reid poll was conducted online from Dec. 5 to 12, and collected answers from 5,128 Canadians from the Angus Reid forum. A probability sample of this size would carry a margin of error of +/- 2 percentage points, 19 times out of 20. Samples were weighted to provide a national snapshot.