Both have outpaced inflation. Canada's had the same commodities boom as Australia, Chile and Russia. Housing bubble obviously hadn't hit. yet. ( I hear they balance their budget and don't give away tax deductions for going into debt so maybe they won't have as bad a one).
Other obvious question is : have houses improved over almost 30 years making the question of average priced house then vs average prices house now a bit cloudy.
$6000 for tuition??? Not a bad deal. Canadian government must be subsidizing it. Maybe it was higher subsidies back then.
Bottom line cherry picking your comparisons are hard.
Unemployment was worse then: http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/fredgraph.png?...
But duration was better : http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/fredgraph.png?...