An exit poll conducted for Investors Group reveals 37% of eligible Canadians made RRSP contributions during the 2007 tax year, a decrease of 5% from last year.

However, 83% of Canadians who made an RRSP contribution invested the same or more than they did a year ago.

“Many Canadians seemed to have taken a ‘wait-and-see’ approach due to current volatility in the stock market,” says Debbie Ammeter, vp, advanced financial planning support, Investors Group.

The poll found 26% of Canadians said they chose to park their RRSP contributions this year by investing in short term and typically low risk, low return vehicles such as bonds and money market funds.

Survey results indicate that of those who tend to park funds, about half park their money for more than a year and half for less than 12 months.


Canadians indicated that they continue to find working with a financial advisor to be helpful. Fifty-three (53)% of Canadians who made an RRSP contribution consulted a financial advisor, and 83% of those individuals said their advisor was helpful including 56% who indicated their advisor was “very helpful”.

The poll indicated that Prairie residents (41%) are most likely, and Maritime residents (26%) least likely, to have made RRSP contributions during the 2007 tax year. As well, Albertans (45%) are the most likely Canadians to have parked their money in short-term investments, while Quebec residents were the least likely (17%).

The Harris Decima data were gathered between March 1 and 3, through Decima teleVox. Results are based on a sample of 847 Canadians and the corresponding margin of error is 3.4%, 19 times out of 20.