Human Resources Development Canada Research Articles

Preparing for Tomorrow's Social Policy Agenda

This 2002 strategic planning paper was prepared under contract for Human Resources Development Canada, a federal government department with a broad mandate for income security, social and labour market policies and programs. While the historical analysis of the paper is now dated, the main findings related to policy challenges and responses have stood the test of time. The proposed directions for policy development, and the approach taken to strategic planning, remain relevant todayThe paper identified the main forces that were likely to dominate policy during the early 2000s: a continuation of the competitiveness and social cohesion pressures that had resulted in a preoccupation with lifelong learning; a new concern about a decline in percentage of the total population that will be employed; and a new shift towards incentives to later retirement. Five policy responses are indicated: First, the then current human development and skills agenda would continue as a dominant theme in the policy response for many years. In the medium-term, the emphasis should shift to learning (not skills) and to ways of translating the rhetoric of social investment into operational, evidence-driven programming. Second a policy shift towards encouraging life-course flexibility, which would reverse the trend toward policies that encourage longer schooling and earlier retirement. The goal of such a shift would be to support greater choice at the level of individuals and, at the level of society, more time being spent in work and learning over the course of people’s lives, with a more rational distribution of leisure over the course of life. Third, there should be a gradual shift towards a more integrated approach to social policy. Today income-at-a-point-in-time concepts still dominate income security policies, while active, preparing-for-life policies are mainly found in separate and fragmented systems – education, labour market integration, childcare, etc. Tomorrow there should be a more integrated, enabling-society, citizen-centred approach, including a new emphasis on life-course and asset perspectives. Fourth, emphasis should be placed on building a new capacity for making social investments effective. Today, policy has the rhetorical goal of social investment (getting payoffs in the future). However, policy designs are actually based on expenditures (getting payoffs in the present). Tomorrow, we should bring policy designs into line with their underlying social investment goals. This means switching to self-learning policies that use new information processing technologies to automatically incorporate lessons from what has worked best in similar circumstances in the past – i.e., real-time, evidence-driven programming. Fifth, is a new emphasis on using current information management technology to resolve a long-standing and central machinery-of-government problem – reconciling vertical integration (decision-making by or near the citizen/group most affected, while maintaining accountability and ministerial responsibility) and horizontal integration (harmonized action across a wide variety of program streams and responsible agencies)’The paper provides practical examples of what needs to be done in all of these areas. The paper deals with the inevitable risks of planning for an unknowable future by providing scenarios that are based not on the traditional approach of forecasting ahead based on past trends, but rather on the kind of futures that governments have indicated they would like to help construct.

Taking the Long View of Learning

When I was an undergraduate, one of my history professors told the story of an expert lecturing about the fall of the Roman Empire. At the end of the talk, the expert was asked what were the main results of the fall of the Roman Empire. There was a long pause, a worried look, and finally the response--Too soon to say. In some ways, the outcomes of education are like that. When do we know that education has been a success? Surely this happens long after a particular grade or course is completed; most people would say it's a lifetime matter. That's why it's important to analyze what happens to students over the longer term as well, not just their short-term achievement. In the past decade or so, Canada has developed a number of important longitudinal databases related to young people and education. The National Longitudinal Study of Children and Youth has provided important information on children's development from birth to adolescence. The School Leavers Survey traced young people through secondary school and into postsecondary. And more recently, the Youth in Transition Study (YITS) has tracked 30,000 young people from age 15 in 2000 to age 25 in 2010. As an additional feature, the YITS sample also was involved in writing the first round of PISA tests. PISA is OECD's influential Programme for International Student Assessment that assesses 15-year-olds on various lifetime skills. Combining these two data sets has allowed Canada to connect PISA results in reading, mathematics, and science to YITS data on postsecondary education and labor force participation over time. Earlier this year, Human Resources Development Canada and the OECD jointly released Pathways to Success, a report that analyzes the postsecondary education and early labor force activity of these 30,000 young people as of 2006, when they were about 21-years-old, and relates those to their PISA results six years earlier, when they were 15. Several important conclusions arise from this most recent analysis. First, despite a highly diverse population (58% English first language, 22% French, and 20% neither), Canada has high levels of student attainment with lower levels of inequality in outcomes than most countries. Not only are PISA scores very high, but Canada also has well above average participation in postsecondary education; only 20% of 21-year-olds had no involvement in postsecondary education. Also, education outcomes for immigrants are low initially but, after five years, are higher than for those born in Canada. The country is among several (others include Korea, Finland, and Japan) showing that high attainment doesn't have to mean high inequality. Still, one cannot be too self-congratulatory on this count. Canada's performance is better than most countries, but in Canada, too, socioeconomic status continues to be the single most powerful factor shaping education and other life outcomes--even though its impact is only about half of what it is in the United States. Socioeconomic status operates in many ways; income is only part of the story. In the PISA/YITS study, parental expectations for their children are much more influential than is parent's academic interest, supporting other research showing the importance for children's progress of high adult expectations, both at home and at school. PISA literacy scores at age 15 are strongly related to students' education and labor market outcomes at age 21, even after controlling for socioeconomic status and other background variables. In other words, literacy skills have an independent effect on students' lives, even taking into account years of education and school attainment. Literacy skills matter. The implication for schools is that there must be a sustained focus on helping students develop real skills; grades or credits must represent real learning. …

The New Federal Framework For Aboriginal Economic Development: The Base Upon Which Future Canadian Government Policies and Programs Are Being Built

According to a Human Resources Development Canada (HRDC) report (1998), CAEDS started ... as a joint responsibility of the Department of Indian Affairs and Northern Development (DIAND), Employment and Immigration (EI) and Industry Science and Technology (IST). (p. 43) These, and other, deficiencies were previously reflected in the findings of The 1993 Report of the Auditor General of Canada (chapter 11): 11.3 Visible leadership for implementing the Strategy as a whole needs to be better established. 11.4 The three departments responsible for implementing the CAED Strategy could not demonstrate that the variety of funding methods and amounts provided under the Strategy were appropriate in the circumstances. [...]despite some positive examples of aboriginal economic development, they could not demonstrate that, after spending at least $900 million from the beginning of its implementation in 1989 to early 1993, they were meeting the Strategy's objectives. 11.5 The lack of appropriate performance and evaluation information impedes the necessary accountability within the aboriginal communities and between the government and Parliament. According to the FFAED, Advantage Canada is "a strategic, long-term economic plan designed to improve Canada's economic prosperity today and in the future".

Evaluating Programs for At-Risk Adolescents: Toward an Outcome-Based Assessment Framework

This article presents an outcome-based model for evaluating school and community programs serving at-risk adolescents, and a cost-effective technique for comparing the progress of youth receiving an intervention with youth in a pseudocontrol group. The outcomes considered most important for success were derived from the literature pertaining to at-risk youth, consultations with stakeholders who work with at-risk youth, and program leaders and teachers involved in a local program for youth disaffected from school. The analytic strategy entails matching children to comparable individuals participating in Canada's National Longitudinal Study of Children and Youth (Statistics Canada & Human Resources Development Canada, 1995). We provide information on the survey instruments used, discuss their reliability and validity, and describe our data collection issues and procedures. We conclude with the strengths, limitations, and implications of our approach for further research.

A Scale of Occupational Prestige in Canada, Based on NOC Major Groups

Abstract: Human Resources Development Canada (now Human Resources and Social Development) developed in the early 1990s a classification of having a more sociologically sensitive major groups structure than older codes such as the CCDO of the 1970s or the SOC of the 1980s. This National Occupational Classification (NOC) was updated in 2001, but the system is not used as widely as might be expected. Researchers seem to want major groups that are ordered, such as the Pineo, Porter, McRoberts scale of 1977. In 2005, a national study of occupational prestige in Canada was collected by telephone interviews. The survey included prestige ratings of the 26 major groups of the NOC. With ratings at the major group level, every occupation in the Canadian labour force can be assigned a prestige score. The focus on NOC major groups also avoids problems that otherwise might arise in disclosure analysis in public use versions of Statistics Canada data sets. The paper describes the construction and validation of the scale. Resume: Developpement des ressources humaines Canada (maintenant Ressources humaines et Developpement social Canada) a developpe au debut des annees 1990 une classification des professions dont la structure repose sur des groupes principaux plus sensibles sur le plan sociologique que les anciens codes comme ceux de la CCDP dans les annees 1970 ou la CTP dans les annees 1980. Cette classification nationale des professions (CNP) a ete raise a jour en 2001, mais son utilisation du systeme n'est pas aussi repandue que l'on aurait espere. Les chercheurs semblent vouloir des groupes importants classes comme l'echelle de Pineo, Porter, McRoberts de 1977. En 2005, une etude nationale sur le prestige professionnel a ete effectuee au Canada au moyen d'interviews telephoniques. L'etude comprenait le classement de prestige des 26 principaux groupes de la CNP. Dans le cas de classements par principaux groupes, chaque profession de la population active du Canada peut se faire attribuer une cote de prestige. Les principaux groupes de la CNP evitent aussi les problemes pouvant autrement surgir au moment de l'analyse des divulgations dans les versions d'usage public des ensembles de donnees de Statistique Canada. L'article decrit la construction et la validation de l'echelle. Introduction and Objectives Most occupational classifications use some branching format which first differentiates among broad types of and then moves within successive digits to increasingly fine distinctions. In the case of the Canadian Classification and Dictionary of Occupations (CCDO) from the 1970s, the broad groups were criticized for being multi-dimensional and heterogeneous. The CCDO was a bete noire for John Porter (Pineo, 1981:621), and along with Pineo and McRoberts, Porter devised his own scale of major groups (Pineo, Porter and McRoberts, 1977) which remained popular during the 1980s. The Pineo, Porter, McRoberts scale, with its grounding in the CCDO, has been slipping out of date for years. For social scientists in Canada, the National Occupational Classification (NOC) introduced by HRDC (1) in 1993 and revised in a year 2001 edition should therefore have been a welcome step. This new approach, along with its close cousin the NOC-S, built in a skill level dimension along with differentiation by skill type sectors such as health occupations and sales and service occupations. The mapping of the two dimensions was emphasized within a cross-classification disseminated as a fold-out chart accompanying the coding manual for the NOC (HRDC, 2001). (2) The NOC major groups scale has not been as widely adopted as might have been expected. There is a tendency among academic researchers to favour the Blishen scale even though that scoring of the education and income of occupational incumbents is based on the census of 1981 and is normed against occupational prestige data collected as far back as 1965. …

Exploring Motivation and Success Among Canadian Women Entrepreneurs

This paper presents preliminary findings on the reasons why Canadian women start businesses, and the relationship between their motivations and economic success. The analysis draws on The Survey of Self-Employment, a nationally representative survey of 3,840 Canadians conducted in 2000 by Statistics Canada and Human Resources Development Canada. Drawing on existing studies which identify three broad groups of motivation—classic, work-family, and forced—the paper examines how prevalent these motivations are amongst Canadian women, and how motivations are linked to the types of businesses women build and the economic rewards they receive. The findings suggest diversity in the motivations and success of women entrepreneurs.

The Work Stoppages Data from Human Resources and Skills Development Canada [HRSDC]: A Research Note

As part of a research program on worker militancy, this note presents an overview of the data on work stoppages from Human Resources and Skills Development Canada [HRSDC] (previously Human Resources Development Canada [HRDC]) with reference to the 21261 strikes from 1966-2001. It unpacks the definitions embedded in 'work stoppage', considers how to group strikes by number of workers and duration, comments on the contract status and result variables, and discusses how strike issues are coded.Several themes emerge. The state's major interest in strikes relates to their economic impact, which is operationalized through 'person days lost'. A shift from 'person days lost', to worker militancy allows for revealing re-interpretations of the data which will help make visible the relevance of such stoppages to workers, unions and communities. Examining the HRSDC data in this new light also underscores the political nature of data collection (what is seen to be germane and not), and data presentation (what is made visible and what is concealed).

NAFTA Professional Mutual Recognition Agreements: Comparative Analysis of Accountancy Certification and Licensure

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) countries have worked toward the signing of Professional Mutual Recognition Agreements (PMRA) allowing for accounting professionals to practice across borders. On September 27, 2002, the representatives of the United States NASBA/AICPA International Qualifications Appraisal Board, the Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants' International Qualifications Appraisal Board, Mexico's Instituto Mexicano de Contadores Publicos, and Comite Mexicano para la Practica Internacional de la Contaduria signed the PMRA for the accountancy profession agreeing on the principal elements for granting accounting certification and licenses: education, examination, and experience. NAFTA's Free Trade Commission affirmed the PMRA on October 7, 2003. This paper reports on the certification and licensing requirements that currently exist for Canada, Mexico, and the United States. Since it is NAFTA's 10th Anniversary it is important to discuss the implementation of the PMRA for foreign accounting professionals to gain permits to practice in the other NAFTA countries. The authors are working under the NAFTA Challenges of Accounting and Business Systems grant from the United States Department of Education Fund for the Improvement of Post-Secondary Education (FIPSE), Human Resources Development Canada (HRDC), and Mexico's Secretaria de Educacion Publica (SEP).

Exposure to inhalable flour dust in Canadian flour mills.

In 1999, the American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH(R)) proposed a Threshold Limit Value (TLV(R)) of 0.5 mg/m(3) for flour dust with a sensitization notation. The Labour Program of the Department of Human Resources Development Canada (HRDC), following notice of the intention to set a TLV, conducted a study of the levels of exposure to flour dust in flour mills across Canada to verify existing conditions, as well as to decide whether to adopt the proposed TLV or reference some other value. As part of the study, a relationship between flour dust concentrations obtained by using Institute of Occupational Medicine (IOM) samplers and closed-face 37-mm cassettes was examined and the literature on the health effects of exposure to flour dust was reviewed. A total of 104 millers, packers, sweepers, bakery mix operators, and others (mixed tasks) from 14 flour mills were sampled over an 8-hour work shift using IOM samplers. The results indicate that 101 employees (97.1%) were exposed to levels exceeding 0.5 mg/m(3), 66 employees (67.3%) to levels exceeding 5 mg/m(3), and 44 employees (42.3%) to levels exceeding 10 mg/m(3). For comparison purposes, flour dust measurements were also taken in a highly automated flour mill using state-of-the-art technology. The results suggest that even with the most up-to-date technology and proper cleaning operations in place, the flour milling industry may not be able to reduce the flour dust levels to below the TLV of 0.5 mg/m(3). According to the measurements of inhalable and total dust concentrations, the IOM sampler appears to be a more efficient collector of inhalable airborne particles up to 100 microm than the closed-face 37-mm cassette.

Is Anyone Listening

C J H P – Vol. 56, No. 4 – September 2003 J C P H – Vol. 56, n 4 – septembre 2003 positive message to legislators and bureaucrats across the country is key, and the template letter is one way to do this. Along with many other pharmacy organizations, CSHP has confirmed its support of and participation in the Pharmacy Sector Study, sponsored by Human Resources Development Canada. This study will examine practice model and human resources issues involving pharmacists and pharmacy technicians across a variety of practice settings. Later this year, members will be faced with another important opportunity to advocate for our profession. In late 2003 or early 2004 the results of the Canadian Adverse Events Study, funded by the Canadian Institute for Health Information and the Canadian Institutes for Health Research, will be released. Until now, there have been no comprehensive studies of adverse events in Canadian hospitals. The study will provide information on the rate and types of adverse events occurring in acute care in Canada, drawing attention to the issue of safety in Canadian hospitals. When the study is made public, hospital leaders, the media, and patients will all be searching for information on how to enhance patient safety. CSHP and its members are well positioned to supply such information, through our standards, position papers, and expertise. Patients and administrators will be turning to you and your hospital pharmacy colleagues for advice, and CSHP will be there to provide individual members and branches with the background information they will need to answer questions and to advocate for the role of the hospital pharmacist. So why do we speak up? Very simply, it is because people listen. Take the opportunity to help advocate PRESIDENTIAL OFFICER’S REPORT

“Biggest Scandal in Canadian History": HRDC Audit Starts Probity War

The article describes the nearly year-long political and media uproar that followed on the release in January, 2000 of a qualitative or soft “audit" of management control in the federal government department, Human Resources Development Canada, and analyses the contributing factors. The article argues that the auditors’ examination of project files for programs delivered by grants and contributions was so abstract and poorly executed that nothing whatever can be concluded from the work. Factors that favoured the “scandal" interpretation include across-government new public management reforms where accountability has not been re-theorized for Canada’s Westminster system of government; Canada’s electoral volatility that starves the country of experienced politicians and spurs the tradition of political compensation for electoral support; and the political role of the office of the Auditor General.

Women and Work

Women and Work offers analyses of women and the labour market with respect to a wide range of topics that include technological change, skill requirements, and training; income security programs and work decisions of lone parents; the dynamics of welfare participation; school-to-work transitions; equality legislation; and collective bargaining, remuneration, and workplace benefits. Contributors include Gordon Betcherman (Canadian Policy Research Networks and Ekos Research associates), Marie-Therese Chicha (Universite de Montreal), Ross Finnie (Queen's University and Statistics Canada), John Greenwood (Social Research and Demonstration Corporation), Andrew Jackson (Canadian Labour Congress), Constantine Kapsalis (Data Probe Economic Consulting), Darren Lauzon (HRDC and Statistics Canada), Norm Leckie (Ekos Research Associates), Brenda Lipsett (Human Resources Development Canada), Mark Reesor (Human Resources Development Canada), Ted Wannell (Statistics Canada), Caroline L. Weber (Queen's University), and I'ik Urla Zeytino'lu (McMaster University).

A Response to Elizabeth Sloat and Douglas Willms' "The International Adult Literacy Survey"

Based on the results of the 1994 International Adult Literacy Survey (IALS) and Canada's National Longitudinal Study of Children and Youth (NLSCY), Sloat and Willms (Canadian Journal of Education, volume 25, number 3) argue convincingly for early intervention to compensate children from disadvantaged backgrounds so these children will enter school better prepared for success. They also argue for changes in school practices and workplace opportunities to encourage the development of literacy skills and workplace values. The authors express alarm over the survey's finding nearly 20% of Canadians function at the lowest literacy level, Level 1, and more than 40% of Canadians have literacy skills. Finally, they focus on the link between parents' low socioeconomic status (SES) and low literacy skills, and the effect of these factors on children's school achievement. Who exactly makes up the undereducated 40% of the population? And why aren't these individuals lining up at the doors of literacy programs? The IALS results show a significant percentage of people deemed to have inadequate literacy skills rate their own skills as good to excellent (Statistics Canada, Human Resources Development Canada, & National Literacy Secretariat, 1996, p. 64). This means that, in their work and social context, many people believe they have the literacy or decoding skills they need. Here we face an epistemological dilemma of what the literacy reality is and who defines it. The IALS uses a positivist epistemology to describe literacy as a technical skill. The implication is with the right strategies, literacy levels will improve if appropriate public interventions are taken and if literacy programs are effective. Furthermore, literacy programs face the challenge of demonstrating improved outcomes when the next survey results are reported. The survey cannot offer an understanding of what literacy means to the individuals who make up the statistics. To understand literacy from this perspective would require a phenomenological approach that connects generalizations with local contexts and viewpoints. Postpositivism . . . means trying to find ways to move beyond positivism's limitations (Sleeter, 2001, pp. 240-241).

Reforming Employment Insurance: Transcending the Politics of the Status Quo

Incremental changes to the Unemployment Insurance program during the 1990s have resulted in a substantial retrenchment of the program, along with significant changes in the balancing of its objectives. The EI reforms of 1994-96 in introducing structural change through a strategy of purposeful incrementalism illustrate both the relative autonomy of the federal government and Human Resources Development Canada from major societal interests and the limits on that autonomy imposed by regional interests and the dynamics of federal-provincial relations. Internal competition within the federal bureaucracy, Cabinet, and caucus played a more significant role in sharing the EI reform agenda than external interests.

Alternative work arrangements: Meeting the challenges.

Abstract This article first examines the forces behind the emergence of alternative work arrangements in Canada in the past two decades. It then focusses upon five alternative work arrangements: part-time employment, temporary or contingent employment, flextime, compressed work weeks, and teleworking. Each alternative work arrangement is discussed in terms of its prevalence and predicted future status in Canada, the existing research findings from studies using Canadian data, and the challenges that each alternative work arrangement poses for I-O psychology. In general, there is a need to develop integrative theoretical models that incorporate factors relevant to alternative work arrangements and to conduct more empirical research comparing different alternative work arrangements and assessing alternative work arrangements across different organizations and industries. I-O psychologists need to take a more proactive role in the planning, implementation, and evaluation of alternative work arrangements.We are currently witnessing a major structural change in work forms in Canada. The standard work form -- full-time, full-year permanent jobs -- is being supplanted by various forms of 'non-standard' work such as part-time work and temporary or contract work. These alternative work arrangements now account for approximately 30 percent of total employment in 'Canada and represented half of all the new jobs created between 1981 and 1986 (Economic Council of Canada, 1990). Moreover, it is predicted that the 'non-standard' job of today will become the standard job of the future (Human Resources Development Canada, 1994). It is therefore incumbent upon policy-makers, managers, and I-O psychologists to be prepared to meet the challenges that alternative work arrangements will pose for society as a whole, for organizations, and for individual workers.This article first provides an overview of alternative work arrangements in Canada, the forces that have contributed to their emergence and growth, and the concerns that have been raised about such arrangements. I then focus upon five alternative work arrangements: part-time work, temporary or contingent work, flextime, compressed work weeks, and teleworking. Each alternative work arrangement section deals with the definition of the term and the various forms that the particular work arrangement may take, a general overview which provides a selective review of the literature and issues, prevalence in Canada and predicted future status, research findings from studies using Canadian data, and the challenges posed by each alternative work arrangement for I-O psychologists. This paper is not intended to provide an exhaustive review of the five alternative work arrangements but to present a Canadian perspective based upon the Canadian experience with each of these alternative work arrangements.There are several reasons for the rapid growth of alternative work arrangements in Canada. According to Human Resources Development Canada (1994), one of the primary reasons is the current trend of organizational restructuring and downsizing and the desire of employers for greater flexibility in controlling their labour costs. The use of alternative work arrangements allows employers the freedom to bring in workers on an as-needed basis and to avoid laying off their full-time permanent employees. Another major reason for the growth of alternative work arrangements is the increase in the service economy which has traditionally relied upon non-standard employment. The dramatic growth in alternative work arrangements is not totally employer driven but also reflects the desires of employees for greater flexibility in their own lives. The increased participation of women in the labour force, especially women with children, has created a need for different working arrangements that allow women to balance their work and family responsibilities. …

Developing and using a facilities planning guide

The Canadian federal department of Human Resources Development Canada required a Facilities Planning Guide to support the re‐engineered national Income Security Program. The challenge was to produce a guide to address a widely varied audience in regions across Canada, to satisfy a range of stakeholders ‐ and to do it in 60 days in two languages.

A Comparison of Self‐Esteem, School Achievement, and Friends Between Intercountry Adoptees and Their Siblings

Self‐esteem, school achievement, and friends are important factors in social development. A cohort of 123 Canadian families who had adopted 155 international adoptees during the 1970s participated in a recent research project. 1 The project tested these areas and then compared their results with 121 Canadian‐born siblings in these adoptive families as well as adolescents and young adults in the general population. These international adoptees fare as well as or better than adolescents and young adults in the general population but not quite as well in some areas as their siblings. Differences were found in some instances between male and female respondents. The authors discuss these findings from a developmental perspective. 1The authors wish to thank National Welfare Grants, Human Resources Development Canada, for funding this research.