Canadian Labour Market Research Articles

The Social Patterning of Work-Related Insecurity and its Health Consequences

This study examines the association between work-related insecurity and health, with a focus on how this relationship is moderated by social location (gender, age and race). Drawing on longitudinal data from a Canadian labour market survey (1999–2004) the findings show that certain groups have a higher prevalence of exposure to certain types of work-related insecurity including (among others) low earnings, poor job mobility and the absence of union protection. Results from regression analyses indicate that the negative health impact of work-related insecurity is also unevenly distributed across different social locations. In some cases, older age and visible minority status significantly elevated the health risk posed by work-related insecurity. The implications of these findings are discussed in terms of major shifts in the demographic composition of the labour market due to workforce ageing and the increased participation of women and visible minorities.

An Explanation for the Lower Payoff to Schooling for Immigrants in the Canadian Labour Market

This paper examines the difference between the payoffs to schooling for immigrants and the native born in Canada, using 2001 Census data. Analyses are presented for males and females. Comparisons are offered with findings for the US. The paper uses the Overeducation/Required education/Undereducation framework (Hartog, 2000) and a decomposition developed by Chiswick and Miller (2008). This decomposition links overeducation to the less-than-perfect international transferability of immigrants' human capital, and under-education to favourable selection in immigration. The results show that immigrants have a lower payoff to schooling because of the different effects under-education and over-education have on their earnings. The effects of under-education, or selection in immigration, are, however, twice as large as the effects of over-education, or limited international transferability of human capital. Favourable selection in immigration appears to be less important in Canada than in the US, where it predominates among the least educated.

Overeducated Immigrants in the Canadian Labour Market: Evidence from the Workplace and Employee Survey

This paper addresses the overeducation of recent immigrants in the Canadian labour market. Data from the 1999 Workplace and Employee Survey are used to explore the determinants and earnings consequences of overeducation. Although a well-developed body of literature examines the earnings consequences of overeducation, this paper presents the first Canadian estimates of returns to years of schooling that are contingent upon perceived job requirements. Compared with Canadian-born workers, recent immigrants are found to have a relatively high incidence of overeducation and to earn relatively low returns for surplus schooling. These are shown to be major contributors to the earnings gap between recent immigrants and workers born in Canada.

Immigration from China to Canada in the Age of Globalization: Issues of Brain Gain and Brain Loss

Historically, waves of immigrants who contributed to the labour supply needed for agricultural settlement and industrial expansion. Since the end of the Second World War, there has been a change in how immigrantreceiving countries have framed immigrant selection policies. As advanced industrial economies experienced an increased demand for skilled workers, the shift has been to an evaluation of the human capital and skill of prospective immigrants, rather than criteria based on national or racial origin. Under the influence of economic globalization, the recruitment of highly skilled workers has become a more pressing issue for immigrant-receiving countries like Canada and the US. The purpose of this paper is to examine the recent trends of immigration from China to Canada and to analyze the economic worth of human capital transfer to Canada. The paper provides estimates of the value of human capital transfer to Canada as a result of immigration from China, and assesses how the transferred human capital is being evaluated in the Canadian labour market. The analysis suggests that international migration in the global age involves the transference of human capital and the embedded economic value of such capital, but whether this capital is utilized is contingent upon how the labour market of the receiving country can fully recognize the productivity of such labour.

An Examination of Factors Affecting Perception of Workplace Discrimination

This study investigates perceptions of workplace discrimination among racial minorities in Canada. Specifically, the study examines how objective experiences of disadvantage and expectations for equity influence racial minorities’ perceptions of discrimination. The results indicate that while both of these factors affect perceptions of discrimination, expectations for equity may be especially important. Although new immigrants are among the most disadvantaged groups in the Canadian labor market, they are less likely to perceive discrimination than longer term immigrants, who may have higher expectations for equitable treatment. Education also increases the perception of discrimination among immigrants, perhaps due to the higher expectations of educated immigrants. Lastly, objective income inequity is not found to be related to perceived discrimination.

The substitutability of labor between immigrants and natives in the Canadian labor market: circa 1995

This paper examines the substitutability or complementarity between Canadian-born and immigrant workers. These are examined by estimating a set of wage equations using a generalized Leontief production function. The paper finds that, in general, there is no displacement of Canadian-born workers by immigrants. Recent immigrants affect the native-born positively, while older immigrants are neither substitute nor complement for natives. However, the effects differ across industries. Overall, the evidence that immigrants harm the opportunities of native-born workers is scant.

Cyclical Behavior of Unemployment and Job Vacancies: A Comparison between Canada and the United States

As long as workers do not value their leisure much, the Mortensen-Pissarides search and matching model implies that unemployment and job vacancies would be much less responsive to changes in labor productivity than what we observe in the business cycles of the Canadian labor market. These findings parallel the work of Shimer (2005) for the United States. The combined data from both countries present an additional difficulty for the model. Even if the unobserved value of leisure is allowed to be as high as required to fit the business cycle in the United States or in Canada, as proposed by Hagedorn and Manovskii (2007), another failure arises. The model lacks ability to reconcile the similar labor cycles with the large policy differences in the UI benefits and income taxes in the two countries when the value of leisure is assumed to be the same in both countries.

Women’s job‐related training in Canada: returns to human capital investments

The prevailing discourse informing most Canadian training and labour market policy assumes a positive link between individuals’ training and their labour market returns in the new knowledge economy. The primary objective of the study is to test the current rhetoric by developing a statistical model of women’s job‐related training. Training participation is a complex and multi‐dimensional social phenomenon. Within the arsenal of existing statistical methods, structural equation modeling is one of the few methods with a capacity to represent complex phenomenon by simultaneously testing cause‐and‐effect hypotheses. The study uses structural equation modelling to develop, test, and evaluate a model of the determinants and rewards of women’s job related training. Empirical studies of job‐related training in Canada are few. Until the recent launch of a linked, employer–employee survey, there had been a paucity of data sources that facilitate a national level analysis of job‐related training. By using this new data source, the study makes a significant contribution filling the existing gap in our understanding of the determinants of, and returns to women’s training in Canada. The study confirms that women are deriving significant economic benefits from their training participation. The conclusion drawn from the national‐level patterns in Canada is that training is a crucial element in the reward structure of the labour market for women, as it plays a dual role of being both a reward in itself and a predictor of other labour market rewards.

The Extent of Economic Vulnerability in the Canadian Labour Market and Federal Jurisdiction: Is There a Role for Labour Standards?

This paper characterizes vulnerable workers in Canada and the federal jurisdiction, based upon characteristics such as employment status, demographic characteristics, and job characteristics, and identifies areas in which labour standards may have a role. Based on this analysis, the paper evaluates the potential for labour standards to address economic vulnerability, focusing on labour standards policies aimed at wages and benefits, hours, and employment arrangements. In addition, the analysis considers the extent to which labour standards are likely to reach vulnerable workers. The results suggest several potential roles for labour standards and highlights policy implications.

Partisanship, Globalization, and Canadian Labour Market Policy: Four Provinces in Comparative Perspectives—A Review Article

Partisanship, Globalization, and Canadian Labour Market Policy: Four Provinces in Comparative Perspectives—A Review Article

Book Review: Industrial Relations, Politics, and Government: Partisanship, Globalization, and Canadian Labour Market Policy: Four Provinces in Comparative Perspective

Book Review: Industrial Relations, Politics, and Government: Partisanship, Globalization, and Canadian Labour Market Policy: Four Provinces in Comparative Perspective

Training the Excluded for Work: Access and Equity for Women, Immigrants, First Nations, Youth, and People with Low Income

Training the Excluded for Work: Access and Equity for Women, Immigrants, First Nations, Youth, and People with Low Income, Marjorie Griffin Cohen, ed., Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2003, pp. 276.Training the Excluded for Work is an important contribution to debates about the importance and viability of job training policies and programmes that are directed to those who are “excluded” in the Canadian labour market. It is also timely insofar as job training, in contrast to post-secondary education policy, remains somewhat underexamined in Canada. This is particularly ironic, as job training has emerged as a key issue for policy makers, industry, workers and activists. Training is frequently touted as a panacea that will address a host of economic ills including unemployment, low productivity levels and lagging investment. On the one hand, many employer and industry groups view training measures as part of a larger strategy to address the imperatives of a global economy. Here, neoliberal rationales tend to prevail—job training becomes an investment in individual human capital. But on the other hand, job training can also be an important means by which marginalized groups, including youth, women, indigenous groups and racialized minorities, address the terms of their exclusion from (or limited inclusion in) the labour market. In doing so, other rationales come to the fore, most notably the need to address social inequities in the labour market. This edited book addresses this latter aspect of the training policy debate.

Shocking Aspects of Canadian Labor Markets

We analyze the flexibility of the Canadian labor market across provinces in both an interand intra-national context using macroeconomic data on employment, unemployment, participation, and (for Canada) migration and real wages. We find that Canadian labor markets respond in a similar manner to their U.S. counterparts and are more flexible than those in major euro area countries. Within Canada, the results indicate that labor markets in Ontario and provinces further west are more flexible, particularly with regard to migration, while those further east are less so.

Exploring the relationship between educational credentials and the earnings of immigrants

The study uses the 2002 Ethnic Diversity Survey (EDS) to examine the relationship between immigrants’ educational credentials and earnings. Three aspects of an individual’s credentials are considered: country of origin, level of education, and field of study. In addition, we examine the constraining effects of gender and visible minority status on the ability of immigrants to negotiate the value of their educational credentials in the Canadian labour market.

Chinese Immigrants in Canada: Their Changing Composition and Economic Performance1

ABSTRACTUsing landing records and tax data, this paper examines both the changing composition of the Chinese immigrants in Canada in the past two decades and their levels of economic performance. Our research found that, in addition to a shift in origin, economic immigrants have been on the rise and other classes of immigrants have declined. This has been accompanied by a significant increase in their educational qualifications and proficiency in a Canadian official language. Yet, despite their increased human capital, Chinese immigrants still experience very different economic outcomes in the Canadian labour market compared to members of the general population of Canada. For one thing, they have much lower employment and self‐employment income than the general population. Moreover, these earning differentials hold true for all age groups, both genders, and Chinese immigrants from all origins. While their levels of economic performance increases with length of residency in Canada, this study suggests that it would take more than 20 years for Chinese immigrants to close the earning gaps with the general population. Evidence also suggests that Canadian‐specific educational credentials are indeed worth more than those acquired in the immigrants' country of origin, and are much better remunerated by Canadian employers.

Reservation Wages in Canadian Labour Markets

Job search theory has been offered in recent years as one explanation of unemployment. A key element of the theory requires that workers behave as if they operate on a reservation wage strategy. The authors verify this hypothesis.

Labour Market Imbalances in Canada, 1966-1983

This paper considers two questions. First, what imbalance trends have characterized the Canadian labour market since 1966? And, second, what factors explain these trends.

Does Race Matter? Earnings of Visible Minority Graduates from Alberta Universities

Using data from the 1997 Alberta University Graduate Survey, this study compares earnings of visible minority graduates and their non-visible minority counterparts who received degrees in 1994. The central question is whether investments in human capital in the form of Canadian post- secondary education by visible minority members and other graduates yield similar returns in the Canadian labour market. Multiple regression analysis results indicate that earnings of visible minority graduates do not differ significantly from those of other graduates, although several interesting interaction effects are observed. Overall, this study provides no evidence of racial discrimination against visible minority members who obtained their post-secondary educational credentials in Alberta.

Divergence in the Canadian and US Labour Markets

Comparisons between Canada and the United States are of interest to many Canadians, accustomed to regularly comparing many aspects of life with their neighbours to the south. Because the United States is viewed by many as the world's leading economy, Canadians and others around the world will often make comparisons to the economic benchmarks of the United States. One particular aspect of Canada-US economic comparisons that receives much attention are Canada-US labour market comparisons. A great deal of concern was expressed in the 1990s about the gap that developed between the Canadian and US labour markets especially in the early 1990s, when the Canadian economy experienced a more severe recession than the US economy. This paper will review the continuing divergent patterns in the two labour markets, including a general recovery in Canada's relative labour-market performance in more recent years, and the detailed sectoral, age, and regional developments that underlie that recovery.

Habitus, rules of the labour market and employment strategies of immigrants in Vancouver, Canada

Workplace conventions and hiring practices are barriers confronted by immigrants in the Canadian labour market. This paper considers these barriers in the context of Bourdieu's concept of habitus. The empirical research presented examines immigrants from South Asia and the former Yugoslavia in the labour market of Greater Vancouver. A statistical analysis of census data and immigrant landing records is supplemented by an analysis of interviews with community leaders, settlement and employment counsellors, and employers. Immigrants admitted to Canada for family-reunion and humanitarian reasons tend to be less familiar with Canadian labour market ‘rules’ than immigrants recruited for their skills and education. In response to this cultural labour market barrier, South Asian immigrants develop ethnic networks while immigrants from the former Yugoslavia mobilize other cultural resources.