Navigating Government Disability Programs across Canada

Effective and accessible disability programs are essential to supporting Canadians with disabilities and achieving Canada's commitment to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The limited availability of centralized data on disability programs in Canada makes it difficult to understand, let alone evaluate, existing programs. To address this issue, we used government publications to create a database that compiles expenditure data, caseload data, and information about disability programs for each Canadian province from fiscal year 1999/00 to 2017/18, where available. We discuss the value of these data by presenting preliminary analyses. We also detail limitations associated with our database and highlight areas for future study.