If you're counting dollar signs as you face another sleepless night of fretting over your finances, you might want to open your eyes and count the lights on in the houses on your street -- chances are your neighbours are awake and worrying, too.
Millions of Canadians -- 65% of the population -- lose sleep because of money troubles, according to Royal Bank of Canada's Canadian consumer outlook index, released Thursday.
While economists seem to be convinced that the future is bright, Canadians are not at all persuaded that the economy is going to get better any time soon -- with 46% of Canadians saying it's in bad shape and 20% expecting it will get worse in the next 12 months.
"Perhaps it's a bit of a reality check for Bay Street from Main Street," Craig Wright, RBC's senior vice-president and chief economist, said about the bank's "flatlined" consumer index, which in March sat at 108, down from 109 in February.
The insomnia-inducing lumps in Canadians' mattresses include high levels of personal debt, ongoing economic uncertainty, "a relatively elevated level of job anxiety" and the prospect of rising interest rates, Wright said.
"I think when people are worried and losing sleep, perhaps some of those economic fundamentals are still causing some discomfort and once the economic recovery becomes more entrenched and more people are convinced of it, then hopefully we'll see some easing in those numbers as well."
Wright said he found results of the March outlook surprising, since reports over the course of the month -- including better-than-expected 0.6% growth in gross domestic product announced Wednesday -- have been an "upside surprise" for analysts.
Job anxiety continues to have an impact on consumer confidence with 22% of Canadians saying a member of their household is worried about losing their job or being laid off, down from 25% in February.
"Economists say the recession's over when the GDP turns positive, and people probably don't believe that until they see it actually impacting on them, and that's where we kind of look at that job-anxiety index," said Wright.
"The job anxiety index did improve, which is a good-news story, but we'd like to see further improvements there. Usually what you see is the GDP numbers turn positive and firms aren't convinced of the recovery -- and until they get convinced you don't see aggressive employment increases. So maybe that's what it will take to give the next lift to consumer confidence as we move ahead."
Still, Wright doesn't think Canadians are pessimistic. He prefers to call the two-steps-forward-one-step-back growth in confidence "cautious optimism." Given the strength of the Canadian economic recovery so far, he expects to see the RBC index improve as growth advances and unemployment declines.
"I think that over time, better news eventually gets picked up and as people see and hear more of it, it may get reflected in their confidence. I'd argue that right now it's still a view of cautious optimism and given the strength we see in the data, it should turn at some point before too long into outright confidence."
As for those Canadians losing sleep over their debt or worries about their retirement prospects, Wright has some advice: get some advice. While he suggests turning to bankers, there are also a number of credit-counselling organizations that will help you work through your financial problems, usually for free.
He says Canadians' concerns about the stability of their retirement finances are valid. And he notes that with the amount of unused contribution room in the average registered retirement savings plan or tax-free savings account, "that could well suggest it's not a savings problem as much as it's an income problem -- that people aren't saving because they're not making enough over and above their day-to-day needs."
The RBC outlook is based on an online survey of 1,020 Canadians aged 18 and over conducted by Ipsos Reid between March 9 and 15. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points, 19 times out of 20.
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