Economic and Social Reports, January 2022

Released: 2022-01-26

The January 2022 issue of Economic and Social Reports is now available and contains five articles.

The majority of displaced workers who enter postsecondary education after job loss change their field of study

Approximately 10% of prime-aged postsecondary-educated workers who lost their jobs between 2009 and 2013 entered postsecondary education (PSE) within three years following job loss. Among them, almost 60% changed fields of study.

The study "Fine tuning or re-skilling? Educational strategies of prime-aged displaced workers" addresses gaps in information around strategies prime-aged (30 to 54 years) displaced workers use to cope with job loss. It found that the likelihood of entering postsecondary education or changing fields of study over a three-year period was between two and three percentage points higher among displaced workers compared with other workers.

Fields of study chosen post-job loss were different between men and women. Among men, 25.2% selected fields in architecture, engineering and related technologies, and 23.0% selected humanities-related fields. Among women, 21.7% selected fields related to humanities, and 21.1% opted to study in business, management and public relations.

Gender differences in early learning and child care occupations

There are also differences between men and women in the field of early learning and child care (ELCC), occupations which are primarily dominated by women. The article "Gender differences in sociodemographic and economic characteristics of early learning child care workers" found that male ELCC workers were less likely than their female counterparts to be in prime working age, with a higher share of workers under the age of 25 (30.4% for men, 13.5% for women) and above 54 (22% for men, 16.3% for women).

Female ELCC workers were more likely to have postsecondary education (69.1%) than male ELCC workers (54.7%), but men were more likely to hold a university degree (21.5% for men, 19.3% for women).

Meanwhile, 2% of female ELCC workers earned $60,000 or more, compared with 6% of their male counterparts. However, men in the ELCC workforce were more likely to earn less than $20,000 than women (53.6% for men, 47.6% for women).

Canada–U.S. comparisons in parenting early in the pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic challenged families with young children on both sides of the border. The article "A comparison of parenting concerns in Canada and the United States during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic" looks at the differences in parental concerns, including their children's well-being, learning and behaviour, in the spring of 2020.

Three-quarters (74.9%) of Canadian parents with children aged 0 to 5 reported being very or extremely concerned about balancing child care, schooling and work; 58.9% were very or extremely concerned about managing their children's behaviour and emotions; and 31.4% were very or extremely concerned about their children's school year and academic success.

In the U.S., 50.5% of parents of young children agreed or strongly agreed that they often couldn't handle things very well regarding parenting; 11.6% reported being very much concerned about their child's behaviours, and 9.4% were very much concerned about their child's learning and development.

Lower-skilled temporary foreign workers are more likely to make the transition to permanent residency compared with the higher skilled

Even though higher-skilled temporary foreign workers outnumbered their lower-skilled counterparts in Canada over the 2000-to-2014 period, they had a lower rate of transition to permanent residency.

The article "Transition to permanent residency by lower- and higher-skilled temporary foreign workers" also found that the gap in numbers between higher-skilled and lower-skilled temporary foreign workers narrowed over that time period. Among new temporary foreign workers who arrived from 2000 to 2004, 58% were higher skilled and 32% were lower skilled. A decade later, among the 2010-to-2014 arrivals, the share of higher-skilled workers declined to 44% while the share of lower-skilled workers increased to 39%.

Comparing weekly earnings of Canadian-born individuals in designated visible minority and white categories

Another article in today's release of Economic and Social Reports shows that Latin American men and women have the lowest weekly earnings in a comparison of Canadian-born individuals in designated visible minority and White categories. To learn more, see The Daily release "Comparing weekly earnings of Canadian-born individuals in designated visible minority and white categories."

Products

The January 2022 issue of Economic and Social Reports, Vol. 2, no. 1 (Catalogue number36280001) is now available. This issue contains the articles "Gender differences in sociodemographic and economic characteristics of early learning child care workers," "Transition to permanent residency by lower- and higher-skilled temporary foreign workers," "A comparison of parenting concerns in Canada and the United States during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic," "The weekly earnings of Canadian-born individuals in designated visible minority and White categories in the mid-2010s," and "Fine tuning or re-skilling? Educational strategies of prime-aged displaced workers."

Contact information

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