Splinter, Mahboubi – Confronting Canada’s Crippling Shortage of Truck Drivers
From: Angela Splinter and Parisa Mahboubi To: Canadian Logistic Watchers Date: February 15, 2023 Re: Confronting Canada’s Crippling Shortage of Truck Drivers Trucking and logistics are key to Canada’s economic growth. With more than $850 billion in goods transported each year by truck, nearly everything Canadians consume travels on tires, but chronic labour shortages in the trucking sector are […] Mahboubi, Zhang – Where Have the Jobs Gone in These Five Sectors?
From: Parisa Mahboubi and Tingting Zhang To: Canadian Labour Force Observers Date: February 14, 2023 Re: Where Have the Jobs Gone in These Five Sectors? Since the return to pre-pandemic employment levels in November 2021, Canada’s economy has added more than 600,000 new jobs. Even so, employment in some sectors remains below 2019 levels. Why the uneven recovery? […] Why is employment still down in these five industries? – Financial Post Op-Ed
Since Canada’s return to pre-pandemic employment levels in November 2021, the labour market has added another 600,000-plus jobs. But employment in some industries still isn’t back to pre-pandemic levels. Why the uneven recovery?
The overall recovery in jobs was rapid, with total employment reaching 19,770,300 by December 2022 — 3.3 per cent above its pre-pandemic level (February 2020). But in five broad industries jobs are still down. These are: accommodation and food services, which is still 126,900 jobs short of its pre-pandemic employment; “other services” excluding public administration (52,700 short); business, building and other support services (48,500 short); agriculture (37,200 short) and…
Joseph Marchand – Final Call to Release Alberta’s Minimum Wage Expert Panel Report
From: Joseph Marchand To: Brian Jean, Alberta Minister of Jobs, Economy and Northern Development Date: February 9, 2023 Re: Final Call to Release Alberta’s Minimum Wage Expert Panel Report In its successful 2015 campaign, the NDP pledged a $15 minimum wage, and moved swiftly to lift Alberta’s $10.20 an hour to $15 over three years. […] Aksoy, Barrero, Bloom, Davis, Dolls, Zarate – How Remote-Working Canadians Use Commute Time Savings
From: Cevat Giray Aksoy, Jose Maria Barrero, Nicholas Bloom, Steven J. Davis, Mathias Dolls, and Pablo Zarate To: Canadian Commuters Date: February 1, 2023 Re: How Remote-Working Canadians Use Commute Time Savings COVID-19 brought a large, lasting shift to work from home. Clearly, this shift reduces the amount of time that workers spend commuting. But […] Roger Pizarro Milian – Surging Demand for Hybrid Learning in Canadian PSE
From: Roger Pizarro Milian To: Canadian Education Watchers Date: January 20, 2023 Re: Surging Demand for Hybrid Learning in Canadian PSE COVID-19 forced Canadian post-secondary education (PSE) to make a near-overnight shift to online education. In doing so, it overrode deep-rooted concerns among faculty members, PSE administrators and policymakers alike about the method’s efficacy in promoting learning, its appeal […] David Gray – Reforming Canada’s EI System
From: David Gray To: The Hon. Carla Qualtrough, Minister of Employment, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion of Canada Date: January 11, 2023 Re: Reforming Canada’s EI System Recent major economic shocks have exposed shortcomings in Canada’s employment insurance system. During the Great Recession of 2008, the oil price collapse in 2014 and the most recent pandemic, Employment Insurance (EI) […] S4 E18: Uneven Odds: Men, Women, and the Obstacles to Getting Back to Work with Kids
Women find it substantially harder to get back into the workforce than men. But why? According to economics professors Ana Ferrer and Tammy Schirle, when the Employment Insurance system was built in 1940, it didn’t have working women in mind. But there are four key solutions to the problem.
Higher interest rates will cause a recession – how do we pick up the pieces? – Globe and Mail Op-Ed
While many have challenged the pace of the Bank of Canada’s interest-rate hikes, their likelihood of success and the extent to which further increases are merited, it has already become clear that, regardless, a recession is imminent. And while it remains to be seen how deep and how long that recession will be, there is no question it will hurt some more than others.
Will governments be there to pick up the pieces and manage the consequences of higher interest rates? If so, how, and in what ways can they help, given their rather precarious fiscal position, with Ottawa carrying $1.1-trillion in debt?
Among the many things that concern us are the distributional impacts of the looming downturn – some groups are…
Drummond, Sinclair – Troubles in Canada’s Health Workforce: What the Data are Saying
From: Don Drummond and Duncan Sinclair To: Canada’s Ministers of Health Date: November 10, 2022 Re: Troubles in Canada’s Health Workforce: What the Data are Saying Media reports abound with accounts of severe shortages of healthcare workers leading to cries of crisis, even collapse of the system, as Canadians suffer through long wait times for almost every facet of […] Troubles in Canada’s Health Workforce: The Why, the Where, and the Way Out of Shortages
COVID-19 has piled troubles on top of troubles for Canada’s health-care sector and its workforce. Some believe it to be in crisis, collapsing even, the result of a shortage of workers, who have become ill themselves, burned out, resigned or retired early, or the result of having too few educated and trained workers in the […] Schirle, Ferrer – Helping Moms Find Their Way Back to Work
From: Tammy Schirle and Ana Ferrer To: Canadians Concerned About Gender Equity Date: October 14, 2022 Re: Helping Moms Find Their Way Back to Work More than 900,000 married parents ages 25 to 59 were either unemployed or not participating in the labour force in 2019. Among them, 21 percent were unemployed (actively searching for employment, waiting for […]