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Literacy for Life, is the second report from the Adult Literacy and Life Skills Survey. It presents additional results on the nature and magnitude of the literacy gaps faced by OECD countries and how these gaps have evolved over the medium term.

It offers new insights into the factors that influence the formation of adult skills in various settings - at home and at work - for the eleven countries participating in the first and last round of data collection between 2003 and 2008. The study offers comparative evidence on the impact of various factors on the supply of skill. The study offers a special focus on numeracy skills and problem solving skills. It explores the relationships between numeracy and key socio-demographic factors as well as labour market outcomes and earnings.

It highlights the importance of problem solving skills by defining this foundational skill and by exploring its determinants as well as its relative role in influencing important labour market outcomes.

The report offers also an analysis of performance across multiple skill domains. It investigates the skill profiles of various population groups defined in terms of the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of those who score at levels deemed to be low in one or more skill domains and explores the resulting consequences.

The report concludes by investigating the issue of skill mismatch in the labour market and its relationship to adult learning. The extent and distribution of mismatch between the day to day literacy related requirements of workers and the literacy skills they have obtained is an important issue that is being explored in this study.

This study examines how the risk of job loss and the short-term earnings losses of laid-off workers evolved between the late 1970s and the mid-2000s.

This series provides detailed documentation on income developments, including survey design issues, data quality evaluation and exploratory research for the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics in 2009.

This update provides unionization rates for 2010 and the first half of 2011. It also includes data on earnings, wage settlements, inflation, and strikes and lockouts.

The chapter provided a statistical overview of the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the female visible minority population in Canada. Drawing mainly data from the 2006 Census, the chapter looked at the growth and the geographical distribution of the population, its family situation and language characteristics as well as its diversity in terms of generational status and country of birth. The chapter also presented results of the analysis on educational attainment, labour market experience and economic well-being such as earnings and components of income. The analyses compared the situations of visible minority women with those of women who did not report visible minority status and those of visible minority men. Where applicable, immigrant status was taken into account in the examination of the experience of visible minority women, i.e., comparison was made between visible minority women who were born in Canada and those who came to live as immigrants. As well, the differences among the groups that made up the visible minority population were highlighted.

The chapter provided a statistical overview of the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the immigrant women in Canada. Drawing data from the censuses and administrative sources, the chapter looked at the socio-demographic trends of the female population who came to live in Canada as immigrants. The information included growth and geographic distribution of the female immigrant population, the changing make-up of immigrant women in terms of their language profile, country of birth and visible minority status, as well as the categories under which female permanent residents were admitted to Canada. The socio-economic conditions of immigrant women, such as educational attainment, field of study, occupational group, labour market participation, earnings and component of income were examined and compared with women who were born in Canada. While census was the main data source for the analysis of the population's socio-economic situations, where applicable, data from the Labour Force Survey and the Longitudinal Immigration Data Base were also included.

This companion volume contains historical annual series that correspond to those published in the monthly tables. It includes Canada-wide data on the national accounts, prices, international and domestic trade, labour and financial markets, as well as provincial data on employment earnings, retail trade, housing and consumer price indexes.

In this study, the long-term impact on earnings of attending post-secondary education institutions following job loss is estimated using a large longitudinal administrative database of Canadian workers. A difference-in-difference model is used for this purpose. The results suggest that, over the period spanning five years preceding and nine years following job loss, workers who attended post-secondary education shortly after displacement saw their earnings increase by almost $7,000 more than displaced workers who did not. Significant benefits are found by sex, age, marital status, and union coverage, with the exception of men aged 35 to 44 years. Despite the benefits of education, job displacement is found to be associated with only a modest increase in post-secondary education attendance for all groups examined.

Current knowledge about the favourable socioeconomic attainment (in education and earnings) among children of immigrants is based on the experiences of those individuals whose immigrant parents came to Canada before the 1970s. Since then, successive cohorts of adult immigrants have experienced deteriorating entry earnings. This has raised questions about whether the outcomes of their children have changed over time. This study shows that successive cohorts of childhood immigrants who arrived in Canada at age 12 or younger during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s had increasingly higher educational attainment (as measured by the share with university degrees) than their Canadian-born peers by age 25 to 34. Conditional on education and other background characteristics, male childhood immigrants who arrived in the 1960s earned less than the Canadian-born comparison group, but the two subsequent cohorts had similar earnings as the comparison group. Female childhood immigrants earned as much as the Canadian-born comparison group, except for the 1980s cohort, which earned more.

This paper compares changes in wages of university-educated new immigrant workers in Canada and in the U.S. over the period from 1980 to 2005, relative to those of their domestic-born counterparts and to those of high school graduates (university wage premium). Wages of university-educated new immigrant men declined relative to those of domestic-born university graduates over the entire study period in Canada, but rose between 1990 and 2000 in the U.S. The characteristics of entering immigrants underwent more change in Canada than in the U.S. over the 1980-to-2005 period; as a result, compositional changes in the immigrant population had a larger negative effect on the outcomes of highly educated immigrants in Canada than in the U.S. However, even after accounting for such compositional shifts, most of the discrepancy in relative earnings outcomes between immigrants to Canada and immigrants to the U.S. persisted. The university premium for new immigrants was fairly similar in both countries in 1980, but by 2000 was considerably higher in the U.S. than in Canada, especially for men.

This companion volume contains historical annual series that correspond to those published in the monthly tables. It includes Canada-wide data on the national accounts, prices, international and domestic trade, labour and financial markets, as well as provincial data on employment earnings, retail trade, housing and consumer price indexes.

Literacy for Life, is the second report from the Adult Literacy and Life Skills Survey. It presents additional results on the nature and magnitude of the literacy gaps faced by OECD countries and how these gaps have evolved over the medium term.

It offers new insights into the factors that influence the formation of adult skills in various settings - at home and at work - for the eleven countries participating in the first and last round of data collection between 2003 and 2008. The study offers comparative evidence on the impact of various factors on the supply of skill. The study offers a special focus on numeracy skills and problem solving skills. It explores the relationships between numeracy and key socio-demographic factors as well as labour market outcomes and earnings.

It highlights the importance of problem solving skills by defining this foundational skill and by exploring its determinants as well as its relative role in influencing important labour market outcomes.

The report offers also an analysis of performance across multiple skill domains. It investigates the skill profiles of various population groups defined in terms of the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics of those who score at levels deemed to be low in one or more skill domains and explores the resulting consequences.

The report concludes by investigating the issue of skill mismatch in the labour market and its relationship to adult learning. The extent and distribution of mismatch between the day to day literacy related requirements of workers and the literacy skills they have obtained is an important issue that is being explored in this study.

This study examines how the risk of job loss and the short-term earnings losses of laid-off workers evolved between the late 1970s and the mid-2000s.

This update provides unionization rates for 2010 and the first half of 2011. It also includes data on earnings, wage settlements, inflation, and strikes and lockouts.

The chapter provided a statistical overview of the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the female visible minority population in Canada. Drawing mainly data from the 2006 Census, the chapter looked at the growth and the geographical distribution of the population, its family situation and language characteristics as well as its diversity in terms of generational status and country of birth. The chapter also presented results of the analysis on educational attainment, labour market experience and economic well-being such as earnings and components of income. The analyses compared the situations of visible minority women with those of women who did not report visible minority status and those of visible minority men. Where applicable, immigrant status was taken into account in the examination of the experience of visible minority women, i.e., comparison was made between visible minority women who were born in Canada and those who came to live as immigrants. As well, the differences among the groups that made up the visible minority population were highlighted.

The chapter provided a statistical overview of the demographic and socio-economic characteristics of the immigrant women in Canada. Drawing data from the censuses and administrative sources, the chapter looked at the socio-demographic trends of the female population who came to live in Canada as immigrants. The information included growth and geographic distribution of the female immigrant population, the changing make-up of immigrant women in terms of their language profile, country of birth and visible minority status, as well as the categories under which female permanent residents were admitted to Canada. The socio-economic conditions of immigrant women, such as educational attainment, field of study, occupational group, labour market participation, earnings and component of income were examined and compared with women who were born in Canada. While census was the main data source for the analysis of the population's socio-economic situations, where applicable, data from the Labour Force Survey and the Longitudinal Immigration Data Base were also included.

In this study, the long-term impact on earnings of attending post-secondary education institutions following job loss is estimated using a large longitudinal administrative database of Canadian workers. A difference-in-difference model is used for this purpose. The results suggest that, over the period spanning five years preceding and nine years following job loss, workers who attended post-secondary education shortly after displacement saw their earnings increase by almost $7,000 more than displaced workers who did not. Significant benefits are found by sex, age, marital status, and union coverage, with the exception of men aged 35 to 44 years. Despite the benefits of education, job displacement is found to be associated with only a modest increase in post-secondary education attendance for all groups examined.

Current knowledge about the favourable socioeconomic attainment (in education and earnings) among children of immigrants is based on the experiences of those individuals whose immigrant parents came to Canada before the 1970s. Since then, successive cohorts of adult immigrants have experienced deteriorating entry earnings. This has raised questions about whether the outcomes of their children have changed over time. This study shows that successive cohorts of childhood immigrants who arrived in Canada at age 12 or younger during the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s had increasingly higher educational attainment (as measured by the share with university degrees) than their Canadian-born peers by age 25 to 34. Conditional on education and other background characteristics, male childhood immigrants who arrived in the 1960s earned less than the Canadian-born comparison group, but the two subsequent cohorts had similar earnings as the comparison group. Female childhood immigrants earned as much as the Canadian-born comparison group, except for the 1980s cohort, which earned more.

This paper compares changes in wages of university-educated new immigrant workers in Canada and in the U.S. over the period from 1980 to 2005, relative to those of their domestic-born counterparts and to those of high school graduates (university wage premium). Wages of university-educated new immigrant men declined relative to those of domestic-born university graduates over the entire study period in Canada, but rose between 1990 and 2000 in the U.S. The characteristics of entering immigrants underwent more change in Canada than in the U.S. over the 1980-to-2005 period; as a result, compositional changes in the immigrant population had a larger negative effect on the outcomes of highly educated immigrants in Canada than in the U.S. However, even after accounting for such compositional shifts, most of the discrepancy in relative earnings outcomes between immigrants to Canada and immigrants to the U.S. persisted. The university premium for new immigrants was fairly similar in both countries in 1980, but by 2000 was considerably higher in the U.S. than in Canada, especially for men.

This series provides detailed documentation on income developments, including survey design issues, data quality evaluation and exploratory research for the Survey of Labour and Income Dynamics in 2009.