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Statistics presented are derived from a survey of nine Provincial Research Organizations (PRO): the InNOVAcorp (formerly the Nova Scotia Research Foundation Corporation), the New Brunswick Research and Productivity Council, the "Centre de recherche industrielle du Québec (CRIQ)", the Industrial Technology Centre (Manitoba) (formerly the Economic Innovation and Technology Council), the Saskatchewan Research Council, the Alberta Research Council, the Yukon Research Institute, the NUNAVUT Research Institute (formerly the Science Institute of the Northwest Territories) and the Aurora Research Institute.

Businesses have embraced the use of information and communications technologies such as e-mail, and the Internet and the personal computer or PC are widely used in most businesses. Use of computers among enterprises was high at 81.9%. The Internet, originally designed as a communications medium for researchers, is now being adopted by many other groups. The Internet was used by 52.8% of enterprises and these enterprises accounted for three-quarters of economic activity.

The proportion of enterprises with Web sites was 21.7% and these enterprises account for 44.8% of economic activity for the private sector. Among other uses, the Internet was used to purchase goods and services by 13.8% of enterprises and by 10.1% to sell goods and services. Significant variation exists in the levels of information and communications technologies use across industries.

The public sector is a model user of information and communications technologies. The proportion of institutions in public health, education, and federal and provincial governments using the Internet and e-mail, and having Internet Web sites is significantly higher than it is for the private sector. Over 95 % of institutions in the public sector use the Internet, 96.6% use e-mail and 69.2% have an Internet Web site.

The volume of Internet-based sales reported was $4.4 billion, of which $4.2 billion was for the private sector and $200 million for the public sector. Total private sector Internet based sales accounted for 0.2% of economic activity in terms of total operating revenue.

For non-Internet users the most important reason for not using the Internet to purchase or sell goods or services was the belief that their goods or services do not lend themselves to concluding transactions over the Internet. Among Internet users, the most popular reason given for not using the Internet to purchase or sell was that they prefer to maintain their current business model.

This article compares the characteristics of the 10 largest independent film and video producers, as measured by production revenues, with all the others, over a 10-year period starting in 1988/89.

The economy was strong in 1999 and while consumers were interested in big-ticket items such as automobiles in the first quarter of the year their attention turned to services later in the year.

Canadians exhibited a dramatic shift in their sport participation rate from 1992 to 1998. According to the latest information released from Statistics Canada's General Social Survey (GSS), fewer Canadians aged 15 years and older reported participating in a sport in 1998 than six years earlier (down almost 11 percentage points).

In 1999, as part of its General Social Survey program, Statistics Canada conducted a survey on victimization and public perceptions of crime and the justice system. It was the third time that the General Social Survey (GSS) had examined victimization - previous surveys were conducted in 1993 and 1988.

For the 1999 survey, interviews were conducted by telephone with approximately 26,000 people, aged 15 and older, living in the 10 provinces. Respondents were asked for their opinions concerning the level of crime in their neighbourhood, their fear of crime and their views concerning the performance of the justice system. They were also asked about their experiences with criminal victimization. Those respondents who had been victims of a crime in the previous 12 months were asked for detailed information on each incident, including when and where it occurred; whether the incident was reported to the police; and how they were affected by the experience.

This Juristat presents an overview of the findings of the 1999 General Social Survey and makes comparisons to results from 1993 and 1988.

Retirement issues have risen to the forefront of socio-economic debate in Canada through the nineties and will likely gain importance as we enter the new millennium. Employer pension plans are one of the primary programs in place to provide workers with income after retirement.

Pension plans in Canada: statistical highlights and key tables presents information on the terms, conditions and membership on all employers sponsored pension plans in Canada. This supplement to publication Pension plans in Canada (74-401-XIB) provides analysis and data on registered pension plans. The topics covered include province of employment, labour force/paid workers coverage, type of plan (defined benefit and defined contributions), size of plan, public and private sectors, contributory and non-contributory plans, employee and employer contributions.

This publication presents current and constant price estimates of provincial gross domestic product (GDP) for over 50 industries covering the entire Canadian economy, including aggregates and special industry groupings. The document also includes a comprehensive analytical review of the economy of each province and territory with summary text, tables and charts.

This article looks at the fast-growing Computer Services industry in Canada, with a particular focus on software developers, data processing firms, systems consultants, and Internet service providers.

This article examines trends in teenage pregnancy in Canada, focussing on induced abortions, live births and fetal loss among women aged 15 to 19 in 1997.

This publication presents information on the income, expenditure and assets of all trusteed pension funds in Canada in both the public and private sectors. Data are presented at the Canada level. The publication contains an analysis of the funds based on the size of the fund, the number of members and the type of benefit. It is a continuation of a series of reports produced since 1957. As a single pool of investment capital in Canada, these funds are surpassed in size only by the aggregate reserves held by the chartered banks.

Often identified as an emerging sector, the environment industry continues to evolve into a complex industry that offers a wide range of technologies and services aimed at protecting the environment and improving environmental quality. This paper analyses Canada's trade in environmental goods and services and compares it with the trade profile of the world's largest environmental market, the United States. What is Canada's trade balance among the different segments of the environment industry? What are the market drivers for environmental goods and services? The relevance of this research is magnified by the current focus on environmental technologies and their key sub-sectors such as climate change technologies, water and wastewater systems and hazardous waste management. The government recently identified these sectors as targeted growth areas for Canada.

The ports handled a total of 274.3 million tonnes (Mt.) of cargo. Strong increases in domestic shipments, particularly in the forest sector were sufficient to offset a decline in international shipments, which were strongly affected by a decrease in iron ore shipments to US ports.

For the Canadian bus industry as a whole, the first six months of 1999 produced marginal financial improvements over the same months of the previous year. Gross revenues excluding subsidies grew by just over one half of one percent, rising from $1.58 billion in 1998 to $1.59 billion in 1999. Expenditures decreased slightly from $2.38 billion for the first two quarters of 1998 to $2.37 billion in 1999.

This online publication presents detailed annual financial and operating statistics on the Canadian cable television industry. Operational data are published on subscribers, households passed by cable, kilometres of cable, channel capacity and program hours. Financial statistics include detailed revenue and expense accounts, balance sheet and statement of retained earnings. The preamble to the publication consists of statistical highlights, a written analysis and text tables which display a financial and operating summary of the cable television industry. Also included is a glossary of terms for the industry.

This publication analyses interprovincial and international trade flows with provincial highlights enhanced by charts, contains tables that illustrate: how trade has evolved annually from 1992 to 1998; the types of goods and services traded; and, developments of economic linkages among the provinces.

Nearly 50,000 or one in five (22%) Canadian truck drivers on the road in 1998 were independent truckers or "owner-operators". However, similar to other forms of self-employment, the net-earnings and socio-economic characteristics of owner-operators have often been ignored by researchers for reasons of analytical convenience or data limitations. New data products recently released by Statistics Canada such as the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics (SLID) have the potential to fill much of this gap. The 1997 SLID cross-sectional micro-data files offer a limited but meaningful insight into the work patterns of the owner-operator population, complementing and validating well-established business surveys such as the annual Small for-hire carrier and Owner-operator Survey (SFO). The purpose of this study, through a multivariate analysis of the 1997 SLID and the 1997 SFO survey, was to compare the work patterns and backgrounds of owner-operators to company drivers (paid truck drivers employed by carriers). The study found that while drivers may choose to be self-employed to gain independence, owner-operators tend to work longer hours to meet fixed and variable costs, in return for lower after-tax earnings and a greater likelihood of high work-life stress. The analysis also found that the odds of self-employment among truckers were highest among drivers over 40 years of age with no post-secondary training.

Statistics on hotels, motels, tourist camping grounds and other types of traveller accommodation (e.g., receipts, employment, expenses, occupancy) are provided in this publication. Also included are definitions, methodology, and notes on data quality.

Sub-provincial employment dynamics uses longitudinal data to produce year-to-year changes in the number of employer businesses, employment and payrolls in Canada. Changes are shown by size of business and by business life status, which includes entry, exit, growth and decline.

Censuses of Canada, 1665 to 1871, Statistics of Canada, Volume IV was printed in Ottawa, in 1876, from the Censuses of Canada, 1870-71. This volume contains about 343 statistical tables on the social and economic conditions in Canada from the earliest settlements to Confederation and onto 1871. The results from 98 censuses are arranged in chronological order, with some explanatory notes. In most cases, there are sufficient descriptions of the individual series to enable the reader to use them without consulting the numerous basic sources referenced in the publication.

An electronic version of this historical publication is accessible on the Internet site of Statistics Canada. The Introduction is a free downloadable document in text as HTML pages for on-line viewing and Adobe Acrobat (PDF) files for printing. The statistical tables are available through E-STAT* (which allows both on-line viewing and downloading).

This article examines the issue of non-union members who are covered by collective agreements, comparing the Canadian picture in the late 1990s with that of the United States. An accompanying update, which covers the first half of 2000, provides Perspectives annual socio-demograhic and economic profile of union members.

For some time, concerns have been raised about the movement of young people away from rural areas, mainly to find work. This article provides information on the extent to which youths stay, leave or return to rural communities. (Adapted from a recently published analytical report.)

The correlation of occupational gender composition and wages is the basis of pay equity/comparable worth legislation. A number of previous studies have examined this correlation in US data, identifying some of the determinants of low wages in "female jobs", as well as important limitations of public policy in this area. There is little evidence, however, from other jurisdictions. This omission is particularly disturbing in the case of Canada, which now has some of the most extensive pay equity legislation in the world. In this paper, we provide a comprehensive picture, circa the late 1980's, of the occupational gender segregation in Canada and its consequences for wages. We also draw explicit comparisons of our findings to evidence for the United States. We find that the link between female wages and gender composition is much stronger in the United States than in Canada, where it is generally small and not statistically significant. The relatively more advantageous position of women in female jobs in Canada is found to be linked to higher unionization rates and the industry-wage effects of "public goods" sectors.

This paper addresses the topic of inter-provincial migration in terms of the basic question: "who moves?" Panel logit models of the probability of moving from one year to the next are estimated using samples derived from the Longitudinal Administrative Database covering the period 1982-95. Explanatory variables include "environmental" factors, personal characteristics, labour market attributes, and a series of year variables. Separate models are estimated for eight age-sex groups.

The major findings include that: i) migration rates have been inversely related to the size of the province, presumably capturing economic conditions, labour market scale effects, and pure geographical distance, while language has also played an important role; ii) residents of smaller cities, towns, and especially rural areas have been less likely to move than individuals in larger cities; iii) age, marriage, and the presence of children have been negatively related to mobility, for both men and women; iv) migration has been positively related to the provincial unemployment rate, the individuals' receipt of unemployment insurance (except Entry Men), having no market income (except for Entry Men and Entry Women), and the receipt of social assistance (especially for men); v) beyond the zero earnings point, migration has been positively related to earnings levels for prime aged men, but not for others, and these effects are generally small (holding other factors constant); vi) there were no dramatic shifts in migration rates over time, but men's rates dropped off a bit in the 1990s while women's rates (except for the Entry group) generally held steadier or rose slightly, indicating a divergence in trends along gender lines.

There has been for some time substantial concern regarding the loss of young people in rural communities. There is a sense that most rural communities offer few opportunities for their younger people, requiring them to leave for urban communities, most likely not to return. While there is a considerable body of research on interprovincial migration, relatively little is currently known about migration patterns in rural and urban areas in Canada.

According to our analysis, in virtually all provinces young people 15 to 19 years of age are leaving rural areas in greater proportions than urban areas - in part to pursue post-secondary education. While there are more complex migration patterns affecting the 20-29 age group, the net result of all migration is that the Atlantic provinces - as well as Manitoba and Saskatchewan - are net losers of their rural population aged 15-29. The problem is particularly acute in Newfoundland. In the Atlantic provinces, rural areas which fare worse than the national average - in terms of net gains of youth population - do so not because they have a higher than average percentage of leavers but rather because they are unable to attract a sufficiently high proportion of individuals into their communities.

Of all individuals who move out of their rural community, at most 25% return to this community ten years later. The implication of this result is clear: one cannot count on return migration as a means of preserving the population size of a given cohort. Rather, rural areas must rely on inflows from other (urban) areas to achieve this goal. Some rural communities achieve this; that is, they register positive net in-migration of persons aged 25-29 or older, even though they incur a net loss of younger people.

Individuals who move out of rural areas generally experience higher earnings growth than their counterparts who stay. However, it remains an open question in which direction the causality works: is the higher earnings growth the result of the migration process itself or does it reflect the possibility that people with higher earnings growth potential are more likely to become movers?

This article explores regional differences among students who drop out of Canadian universities and community colleges.

This article explores the effects of increasing costs on university attendance and the subsequent labour market outcomes of graduates.

This paper examines the characteristics of young people who responded to the 1991 School Leavers Survey (SLS), but who subsequently failed to respond to the 1995 School Leavers Follow-up Survey (SLF).

Fabricated metal products industries remain in the middle of an expansion period. The construction sector's vitality, as well as the high North-American demand for industrial products, allow metal products manufacturers to live glorious days. However, where competitiveness is concerned, there could be trouble in paradise. In the last few years, the cost of labour has been on the rise, while the value added for each paid hour has been weakening. Moreover, imports have been increasing at a higher pace than exports in the last two years.

The Survey of Household Spending (SHS), which replaced the periodic Family Expenditure Survey (FAMEX) in 1997, is an annual survey that collects detailed expenditure information from households for a given calendar year. Due to the heavy response burden placed on respondents of this survey, it was decided for the 1997 survey to perform a test of incentive effect on response rates. Two incentives were used: a one-year subscription to the Statistics Canada publication Canadian Social Trends and a telephone calling card. The response rate data was analysed using Fisher's exact test and some non-parametric methods. After controlling for a discovered interviewer assignment effect, it was found that there was some evidence of a telephone card effect in the western and eastern most regions of Canada, while there was no evidence of any effect for the magazine. These findings were somewhat corroborated by a separate study testing effects of incentives on respondent relations. All these results will be discussed in this paper.

This paper describes the issues around updating the low income cut-offs as well as Statistics Canada's findings and proposes a course of action.