A new study by the Canadian Payroll Association suggests fewer Canadians are living paycheque to paycheque compared with last year.

Of those polled, 42 per cent said they would be in financial trouble if their pay was delayed by even one week, down from 47 last year.

However, the Canadian Payroll Association says the long-term financial outlook for many Canadians remains "troubling."

The survey, released Wednesday, says 40 per cent of employed Canadians are spending all of — or more than — their net pay.

And almost half — 45 per cent — of those polled are putting only five per cent or less of their pay into savings.

The online poll surveyed 2,863 employees between July 26 and August 16. The polling industry's professional body, the Marketing Research and Intelligence Association, says online surveys cannot be assigned a margin of error because they do not randomly sample the population like traditional telephone polls.

Meanwhile, the survey also noted that a "disturbing" 47 per cent of respondents age 50 or older are still less than a quarter of the way to their retirement savings goals.

"There is a huge gap between how much money people say they will need to retire and how much they are actually saving for retirement," the survey said.

The Canadian Payroll Association represents payroll professionals, who are responsible for ensuring the timely payment of wages and benefits.