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Recent assessments of the federal government's social policy leadership fail to provide a satisfactory linkage between its unilateral actions and its ongoing involvement in intergovernmental bargaining. This paper argues that the federal government is honing old and new tools to shape the direction of provincial policy development. Indeed, many unilateral initiatives appear tied to a broader strategy of assuring the federal government an important place in intergovernmental negotiations. The paper unpacks four key tools (new money, accountability, creation of expertise, and structuring investments) and assesses how they have been employed to rebuild federal leadership to various degrees in the health, child, and labour market policy fields. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper compares employment match rates for immigrants educated in a regulated profession with those of their Canadian-born and -educated counterparts. In particular, it examines Statistics Canada data for 2006 and 2011, analyzing trends and provincial comparisons over the five years following the implementation of Ontario's fair access legislation. Overall, the findings support a continued role for fair access legislation to hold regulators accountable, stronger engagement with employers to promote immigrant hiring and retention, specialized advisement and training for alternative careers, and thoughtfully designed pre-arrival initiatives that reduce time away from professional practice without increasing barriers to immigration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper studies the effects of occupational licensing in Canada on the earnings of immigrants and nonimmigrants. The econometric model is estimated for immigrants and non-immigrants as well as between joiners and leavers from occupationally licensed jobs using a large panel data set. The results suggest that occupational licensing raises wages more for immigrant workers than for non-immigrants with similar observed characteristics. However, the probability of being in an occupationally licensed job is lower for immigrants as compared to non-immigrants. The implications of these findings for whether immigrants gain or lose from occupational licensing are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the impact of a recent recommendation made by Quebec's Comité consultatif de lutte contre la pauvreté et l'exclusion sociale to guarantee every individual an income equal to 80 percent of Statistics Canada's Market Basket Measure (MBM). Workers with earnings at least equivalent to 16 hours at the minimum wage would be entitled to 100 percent of the MBM. We also investigate the impact of three alternative proposals: (a) a change in the above hours cut-off from 16 to 30 hours; (b) a guaranteed income equal to 100 percent of the MBM, irrespective of earnings; and (c) a $3/hour conditional wage subsidy. To do this, we first estimate a structural labour supply model using the existing tax code and predict the labour supply of a representative sample of individuals based upon the parameter estimates of the model. Simulations show that the original recommendation would have strong negative impacts on participation rates of low earners and that its cost would exceed $2 billion. Increasing the hours cut-off is predicted to have little impact beyond that of the original recommendation. Providing a guaranteed income equivalent to 100 percent of the MBM, on the other hand, would have a large impact. We find that contrary to what is usually assumed, guaranteed income schemes may increase the incidence of low income rather than decrease it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper considers whether Canadian immigrants are particularly vulnerable to mandatory retirement (MR) rules. Because of their relatively late entry into the Canadian labour market, many immigrants have less time to accumulate sufficient savings for retirement if forced to retire at a specific age. We utilize the General Social Survey (Cycle 21 2007) to examine the extent to which MR has been a binding constraint on the retirement decision of Canadians. We find a significant “MR effect,” especially for late-arriving immigrants, who are more likely to suffer financial hardship when they are forced to reitre. Accordingly, recent legislation restricting the practice of MR can be expected to result in important welfare gains for many older workers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a decomposition of the changes in the Canada-US unemployment rate gap using measures of the flow rates into unemployment (the inflow hazard) and out of unemployment (the outflow hazard). The estimates indicate that most of the changes in the unemployment rate gap between 1981 and 2009 are due to changes in the outflow hazard (i.e., the duration of unemployment spells). The relative importance of the inflow and outflow hazard effects on the unemployment rate gap changes over time, but the outflow hazard tends to account for most of the changes in the unemployment rate gap since 1997. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Temporary foreign worker programs are typically seen as short-term solutions to shortages of regional or occupational labour. During the past decade, Canadian regions experienced unequal economic growth, and some suffered from significant excess labour demand. The Canadian Temporary Foreign Worker Program was thus expanded and conditions to access it made easier. During the same period, the pattern of regional disparities in unemployment rates became more persistent. This paper shows that some of the persistence is due to the increased availability of temporary foreign workers. This suggests that policy makers did not price them correctly to avoid adverse effects on the Canadian labour market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses the child sample of Statistics Canada's 2001 Participation and Activity Limitations Survey to study the economic costs of caring for children with disabilities in Canada. Both explicit out-of-pocket expenditures and implicit costs in the form of foregone labour market opportunities are considered. Results indicate that, despite universal health insurance in Canada, a majority of families of children with disabilities incur significant economic costs. Additional financial support might be offered, particularly when the child's condition is severe, and costly therapy and specialized aids could be covered. Our results also support the need for respite as well as help in balancing work and caregiving for Canadian parents of children with disabilities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]