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- Articles and reports: 11F0019M2012344Geography: CanadaDescription:
This paper examines differences in postsecondary-participation rates between students with and without immigrant backgrounds in Switzerland and Canada. For both countries, a rich set of longitudinal data, including family background, family aspirations regarding postsecondary education, and students' secondary-school performance as measured by Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) scores, are used to explain these differences. Two groups are analyzed: all 15-year-old students; and all low-performing 15-year-old secondary-school students.
Release date: 2012-07-27 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M2001155Geography: CanadaDescription:
This study examines prominent and emerging labour market trends of the 1990s to see if they have reversed under the pressure of the robust economic growth of 1997-1999. Specifically, it looks at the dramatic rise in self-employment, trends in job stability, and the low youth employment rate over the 1990s. The strong economic growth in 1997-1999 does not appear to have slowed the rise in self-employment, affected job stability, or dramatically increased youth employment rates. For self-employment this suggests that the rise in the 1990s was not primarily driven by slack labour demand forcing workers to create their own jobs. Job stability rose through much of the 1990s, pushed up by a low quit rate associated with low hiring. The best data currently available show that quit rates in particular have remained relatively low (given the position in the business cycle), and job tenure has remained high. There is little evidence that among paid workers job stability has deteriorated in the 1990s. Lagging youth employment rates were due in large part to an increased propensity for young persons to remain in school. Students have a lower employment rate, and a compositional shift towards more young students lowers the overall employment rate for youth. This propensity for the young to be students has not declined in 1997-1999, and as a result youth employment rates remain low by historical standards.
Release date: 2001-04-04 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M2000144Geography: CanadaDescription:
In this paper, we revisit trends in low-income among Canadian children by taking advantage of recent developments in the measurement of low-income intensity. We focus in particular on the Sen-Shorrocks-Thon (SST) index and its elaboration by Osberg and Xu. Low-income intensity declined in the 1980s but rose in the 1990s. Declining earnings put upward pressure on low-income levels over much of the period. Higher transfers more than offset this pressure in the 1980s and continued to absorb a substantial share of the increase through 1993. In contrast, the rise in low-income intensity after 1993 reflected reductions in UI and social assistance benefits that were not offset by increased employment earnings, at least to 1996 the latest year used in this paper.
A major aim of the paper is methodological. We contrast results using the SST index with results produced by the more familiar low-income rate, the usual measure for indexing low-income trends. The low-income rate is embedded in the SST index, but unlike the index, the rate incorporates only partial information on the distribution of low-income. Consequently, the low-income rate is generally unable to detect the changes we describe and this is true irrespective of the choice of low-income cut-off. Compared to the low-income intensity measure, the rate is also relatively insensitive to changes in transfer payments and employment earnings.
Release date: 2000-03-30 - 4. Why Do Children Move into and out of Low Income: Changing Labour Market Conditions or Marriage and Divorce ArchivedArticles and reports: 11F0019M1999132Geography: CanadaDescription:
Child poverty is high on the government's agenda. In order to reduce the rate of low-income among children, one has to either reduce the number of children flowing into low-income, or increase the number flowing out. But what is behind such movement? Most analysts would immediately think of job loss among the parents, but obviously divorce and remarriage can also play a role. In order to favourably alter the flows, one has to have some understanding of what is driving them. This paper asks to what extent this movement of children is determined by (1) changes in family status of the parents of children, or (2) changes in the parent's labour market conditions (i.e. job loss and gain, changes in hours of work or wages). We find that for an individual child, a divorce or marriage can have a tremendous influence on the likelihood of entering or exiting low-income. At the level of the individual, changes in family composition (when they occur) are more important than changes in jobs held by parents. However, changes in family status are relatively infrequent compared to labour market changes. Parents are much more likely to lose or find jobs, and experience changes in hours worked or wages, than they are to marry or divorce. When this is accounted for we find that, in the aggregate, flows of children into and out of low income are associated roughly equally with family compositional changes and changes in wages and hours worked.
Release date: 1999-04-21 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M1998116Geography: CanadaDescription:
The increase in earnings inequality among men in particular in Canada has been well documented. This paper adds to our knowledge of inequality trends by addressing three issues. First, what has happened to earnings inequality among the employed population in the 1990s? We find that earnings inequality and polarization increased little in the population of all workers (men and women combined) between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. The second question relates to the impact of the changing propensity of Canadians to hold a job on earnings inequality. Put another way, if we focus on the entire population of working age Canadians (those with and without paid employment), what are the inequality trends. We find that earnings inequality among the working age population changed little over the 1980s and 1990s. This analysis incorporates both the influence of the changing employment/population ratio and inequality trends among employed workers on overall earnings inequality among the working age population. But this relative stability in overall earnings inequality since the mid-1980s masks a number of offsetting underlying trends. Some groups of workers are making earnings gains (notably older workers, and women) while others are losing (notably younger workers and men). This paper focuses in particular on the earnings trends among younger workers, and finds that the decline in annual earnings of younger male workers in particular is associated with a decline in real hourly wages.
Release date: 1998-06-29 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M1995082Geography: CanadaDescription:
Our aim in this paper is to resolve a paradox. Since the 1970s, there has been a downward secular trend in the average real and relative earnings of young adults under the age of 35. Despite the fact that most young children live in households headed by adults under 35, there has been no corresponding secular rise in the incidence of low income among children. Rather child poverty has followed the usual fluctuations of the business cycle.
We show that the relative stability in child poverty rates in the face of declining labour market earnings is a result of two factors. First, the decline in market income in young households with children has been offset by rising transfers. Since the 1970s, social transfers have replaced earnings as the main source of income among low income families with children.
Second, changes in the fertility behaviour and labour market characteristics of young adults have sharply reduced the risk of young children growing up in low income households. Today's young parents are better educated, working more hours, having fewer children, and postponing child-birth until later ages when earnings are higher. Although more children do find themselves in single parent families, this change has been swamped by other changes in family patterns and labour market behaviour that have reduced the risk of child poverty.
Thus, the upward pressure on low income among children stemming from the labour market has been offset by social transfers, on the one hand, and by changes in family formation and the labour market behaviour of young adults, on the other. Except for cyclical variations, the result has been relative stability in the incidence of low income among children over the 1980s and early 1990s. Whether these offsetting patterns will continue in the last half of the 1990s remains to be seen.
Release date: 1995-09-30
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Articles and reports (6)
Articles and reports (6) ((6 results))
- Articles and reports: 11F0019M2012344Geography: CanadaDescription:
This paper examines differences in postsecondary-participation rates between students with and without immigrant backgrounds in Switzerland and Canada. For both countries, a rich set of longitudinal data, including family background, family aspirations regarding postsecondary education, and students' secondary-school performance as measured by Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) scores, are used to explain these differences. Two groups are analyzed: all 15-year-old students; and all low-performing 15-year-old secondary-school students.
Release date: 2012-07-27 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M2001155Geography: CanadaDescription:
This study examines prominent and emerging labour market trends of the 1990s to see if they have reversed under the pressure of the robust economic growth of 1997-1999. Specifically, it looks at the dramatic rise in self-employment, trends in job stability, and the low youth employment rate over the 1990s. The strong economic growth in 1997-1999 does not appear to have slowed the rise in self-employment, affected job stability, or dramatically increased youth employment rates. For self-employment this suggests that the rise in the 1990s was not primarily driven by slack labour demand forcing workers to create their own jobs. Job stability rose through much of the 1990s, pushed up by a low quit rate associated with low hiring. The best data currently available show that quit rates in particular have remained relatively low (given the position in the business cycle), and job tenure has remained high. There is little evidence that among paid workers job stability has deteriorated in the 1990s. Lagging youth employment rates were due in large part to an increased propensity for young persons to remain in school. Students have a lower employment rate, and a compositional shift towards more young students lowers the overall employment rate for youth. This propensity for the young to be students has not declined in 1997-1999, and as a result youth employment rates remain low by historical standards.
Release date: 2001-04-04 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M2000144Geography: CanadaDescription:
In this paper, we revisit trends in low-income among Canadian children by taking advantage of recent developments in the measurement of low-income intensity. We focus in particular on the Sen-Shorrocks-Thon (SST) index and its elaboration by Osberg and Xu. Low-income intensity declined in the 1980s but rose in the 1990s. Declining earnings put upward pressure on low-income levels over much of the period. Higher transfers more than offset this pressure in the 1980s and continued to absorb a substantial share of the increase through 1993. In contrast, the rise in low-income intensity after 1993 reflected reductions in UI and social assistance benefits that were not offset by increased employment earnings, at least to 1996 the latest year used in this paper.
A major aim of the paper is methodological. We contrast results using the SST index with results produced by the more familiar low-income rate, the usual measure for indexing low-income trends. The low-income rate is embedded in the SST index, but unlike the index, the rate incorporates only partial information on the distribution of low-income. Consequently, the low-income rate is generally unable to detect the changes we describe and this is true irrespective of the choice of low-income cut-off. Compared to the low-income intensity measure, the rate is also relatively insensitive to changes in transfer payments and employment earnings.
Release date: 2000-03-30 - 4. Why Do Children Move into and out of Low Income: Changing Labour Market Conditions or Marriage and Divorce ArchivedArticles and reports: 11F0019M1999132Geography: CanadaDescription:
Child poverty is high on the government's agenda. In order to reduce the rate of low-income among children, one has to either reduce the number of children flowing into low-income, or increase the number flowing out. But what is behind such movement? Most analysts would immediately think of job loss among the parents, but obviously divorce and remarriage can also play a role. In order to favourably alter the flows, one has to have some understanding of what is driving them. This paper asks to what extent this movement of children is determined by (1) changes in family status of the parents of children, or (2) changes in the parent's labour market conditions (i.e. job loss and gain, changes in hours of work or wages). We find that for an individual child, a divorce or marriage can have a tremendous influence on the likelihood of entering or exiting low-income. At the level of the individual, changes in family composition (when they occur) are more important than changes in jobs held by parents. However, changes in family status are relatively infrequent compared to labour market changes. Parents are much more likely to lose or find jobs, and experience changes in hours worked or wages, than they are to marry or divorce. When this is accounted for we find that, in the aggregate, flows of children into and out of low income are associated roughly equally with family compositional changes and changes in wages and hours worked.
Release date: 1999-04-21 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M1998116Geography: CanadaDescription:
The increase in earnings inequality among men in particular in Canada has been well documented. This paper adds to our knowledge of inequality trends by addressing three issues. First, what has happened to earnings inequality among the employed population in the 1990s? We find that earnings inequality and polarization increased little in the population of all workers (men and women combined) between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. The second question relates to the impact of the changing propensity of Canadians to hold a job on earnings inequality. Put another way, if we focus on the entire population of working age Canadians (those with and without paid employment), what are the inequality trends. We find that earnings inequality among the working age population changed little over the 1980s and 1990s. This analysis incorporates both the influence of the changing employment/population ratio and inequality trends among employed workers on overall earnings inequality among the working age population. But this relative stability in overall earnings inequality since the mid-1980s masks a number of offsetting underlying trends. Some groups of workers are making earnings gains (notably older workers, and women) while others are losing (notably younger workers and men). This paper focuses in particular on the earnings trends among younger workers, and finds that the decline in annual earnings of younger male workers in particular is associated with a decline in real hourly wages.
Release date: 1998-06-29 - Articles and reports: 11F0019M1995082Geography: CanadaDescription:
Our aim in this paper is to resolve a paradox. Since the 1970s, there has been a downward secular trend in the average real and relative earnings of young adults under the age of 35. Despite the fact that most young children live in households headed by adults under 35, there has been no corresponding secular rise in the incidence of low income among children. Rather child poverty has followed the usual fluctuations of the business cycle.
We show that the relative stability in child poverty rates in the face of declining labour market earnings is a result of two factors. First, the decline in market income in young households with children has been offset by rising transfers. Since the 1970s, social transfers have replaced earnings as the main source of income among low income families with children.
Second, changes in the fertility behaviour and labour market characteristics of young adults have sharply reduced the risk of young children growing up in low income households. Today's young parents are better educated, working more hours, having fewer children, and postponing child-birth until later ages when earnings are higher. Although more children do find themselves in single parent families, this change has been swamped by other changes in family patterns and labour market behaviour that have reduced the risk of child poverty.
Thus, the upward pressure on low income among children stemming from the labour market has been offset by social transfers, on the one hand, and by changes in family formation and the labour market behaviour of young adults, on the other. Except for cyclical variations, the result has been relative stability in the incidence of low income among children over the 1980s and early 1990s. Whether these offsetting patterns will continue in the last half of the 1990s remains to be seen.
Release date: 1995-09-30
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