Immigration from Canada has made a significant contribution that cannot be overstated. Increasing immigration can mitigate the effects of Canada’s declining natural labor force. Nevertheless, recent Canadian immigrants were affected disproportionately due to COVID-19 when compared to their native citizens.
Loss of jobs due to pandemic lockdowns
As a result of pandemic lockdowns, Statistics Canada found that recent immigrants were more likely than Canadian-born workers to “transition out of employment” during the pandemic. The reason for this is that Canadian immigrants tended to hold jobs that were temporary and low-paying, especially in the food and lodging services industry.
Among recent immigrants working in February 2020, 31% had been there for less than a year, according to research mentioned in the most recent report from Statistics Canada. 22% of recent immigrants also had low-paying jobs, which were in occupations earning less than two-thirds of the annual median wage ($24.04/hour), in 2019. Comparatively, such figures among Canadian citizens were 15% and 12%, respectively. A study conducted in April 2020 revealed that “the rate of transition to non-employment” topped 13.5% among Canadian-born workers and 17.3% among recent immigrants.
An overview of the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit
The pandemic’s increased job loss also led to a higher number of recent immigrants filing for the Canadian Emergency Response Benefits (CERB) in 2020, suggesting future challenges with economic integration during COVID-19.
CERB payments were more likely to be requested and received by low-wage workers and workers who were most severely affected by economic lockdowns, two categories disproportionately represented by Canadian immigrants.
CERB benefits were provided to more than half (55.3%) of employees who “earned less than $5,000 in 2019 and… were in the poorest 10% of employment income distribution in 2019” in 2020. Sixty-six percent of lodging and food services workers (66.6%) received the CERB for 2019.
Decrease in new Canadians’ median entry salaries
In the tax year 2019, immigrants who arrived in Canada in 2019 reported median entry pay (of $30,000) which was 6.5% less than the median entry pay they reported in 2018 ($32,100). Between 2019 and 2020, the median wage increased by 0.8% for most Canadians.
Immigrant women were most affected by the decline in median entry salaries (11.1% from 2019 to 2020), while immigrant men experienced a 5.2% decline and Canadian women experienced a $10 drop from 2019 to 2020.
Immigration outcomes were better for economic principal applicants
Some immigrant groups fared better than others as a result of the pandemic’s economic effects. Let’s take the case of economic main applicants. Immigrants from this group enter Canada “based on their ability, professional experience, and economic contribution.” According to Statistics Canada, between 2019 and 2020, this group experienced the least significant decrease (3%) in median entrance wages. A decline of more than 10% was seen among refugees and immigrants sponsored by families (13.4% and 11.9%, respectively).
According to the 2020 survey, economic main applicants earned $54,800 (+3.8%) more than they did in 2019. It is unfortunate that immigrants in other admission categories have seen a decrease in median salaries.
- 7.9% decrease in refugees.
- The number of spouses and dependents of economic immigrants has decreased by 4.3%.
- 3% decline in family-sponsored immigrants
Pandemic effects were also less pronounced for immigrants with official language skills and pre-admission work experience
For immigrants fluent in French and English, the median entrance salary increased by 0.3% between 2019 and 2020. Meanwhile, the typical entry-level salary for non-native English speakers decreased by $2,900 years over years (18.6%). Immigrants who spoke at least one official language decreased by 6.5%.
According to the research, immigrants with previous work experience also benefited from this, while those without it “saw their median entry income fall significantly compared to the previous intake cohort.”
With the recovery of the economy, employment and incomes among immigrants are improving
As the Canadian economy begins to recover from the pandemic, recent Canadian immigrants are seeing improved economic and job prospects.
There was an increase of 9.3% in immigrants’ median annual income between 2019 and 2020. Between 2019 and 2020, even though the median entry wage fell between those years, the combination of their salaries and emergency aid programs like CERB from the government resulted in a $2,800 gain in median total income. Canadians enjoyed a 6.9% increase in median annual income during that period, which was greater than this year-over-year growth.
According to Statistics Canada, employment had recovered by the end of 2021 to pre-pandemic levels. There was an increase of 2.2% in employment among Canadians between 2020 and 2021, and a 4.8% increase in employment among immigrants with a residency of fewer than 10 years. It appears that as the Canadian economy has recovered from COVID-19, recent immigrants’ employment rates have rebounded more quickly than the rates of individuals born in this country as the economy has recovered from COVID-19.
