Skuterud et al: How We Subverted our Skills Based Immigration System

2025/12/11 Leave a comment

Valid critique:

In 2023, with little fanfare and no political opposition, the federal government gave itself the power to subvert Canada’s world-renowned skilled immigration system.

That system was formerly centred on the “points system,” called the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) in its most recent incarnation. 

Under the CRS, applicants for permanent residency were evaluated on their education, work experience, and language proficiency and the highest scoring applicants were admitted. The result was a continuous inflow of top talent chosen without political influence that benefited the Canadian economy and was admired by many countries (and emulated by some).   

But in 2023, the government created a new category-based feature in the system. That feature gave the immigration minister the power to prioritize categories of immigrants and move them to the front of the line. A rules-based system was replaced with a discretion-based system. 

The result is an opaque system that is exposed to political lobbying, looks like a lottery to prospective migrants, and squeezes out highly skilled candidates. In 2025, the leading category of immigrants under the new category-based system are francophones applying to live outside Quebec. 

Contributing to Canada’s patchwork immigration system, provincial nominee programs, which give provinces the ability to prioritize groups unable to meet the standard of the points system, account for an ever-increasing share of immigrant admissions. 

Admitting fewer skilled immigrants reduces our country’s productivity and tax revenue making it harder to fund social programs. It also affects Canada’s ability to attract the world’s best and brightest students to our post-secondary institutions, which are collectively reeling from plummeting international enrolment. 

Under the Canadian Experience Class (CEC) program, former international students with a Canadian postsecondary credential and one year of work experience in a skilled occupation are eligible to transition to permanent resident status without leaving the country. 

The CEC program’s intention is a good one – we attract whiz kids from around the world and provide them with an education that Canadian employers can easily evaluate. When this path works, it works well. International students pay high fees, lowering tuition costs for Canadians, and those who stay end up doing well in Canada’s labour markets. 

However, this approach can be abused when postsecondary institutions use immigration, not education, to lure foreign students. This has contributed to the growth of low-quality programs and distorted incentives on all sides. The problem lies in policy design.

In response to unsustainable growth in Canada’s non-permanent resident population and worries about housing, healthcare and labour market effects, the government has cut international student admissions for 2026 by 50 percent. 

The reduction is facing criticism from the postsecondary sector, but critics are overlooking that universities and colleges are not even reaching the quotas they have been given under the already reduced caps. New foreign student arrivals are on track to reach less than 160,000 in 2025, far below the government’s cap of 305,900. 

Foreign student applications to Canada’s universities and colleges have declined dramatically because prospective students no longer see a clear path to staying in Canada. Graduate students in computer science who want to stay are being told that learning French is their best option. And they fear that when they graduate, a different arbitrary category will be the priority. The current system discourages the best foreign students from applying to Canadian postsecondary institutions and blocks many of those who graduate from remaining in Canada.  

What should be done?

First, turn back the clock. Return to the immigration system that existed as recently as 2019 when immigrants were admitted through a single selection system that prioritized candidates with the highest future Canadian earnings. That system was transparent, predictable, and not easy for lobbyists to manipulate.  

Second, send a clear message that Canada welcomes foreign students. At a time when our goods exporting industries face major challenges, we should promote one of our most valuable services exports – educating international students. Education is an export that is uniquely dependent on trust, as students must live in Canada to consume the product.

Third, refine the points system to better target international graduates with the best earnings prospects. This would lead to increased demand by international students for programs with high post-graduate earnings and benefit our immigration program. Demand for programs that offer low earnings returns would moderate attracting only those international students who are coming solely for the education, since these programs would provide no realistic pathway to PR status.  

Canada needs immigration reform now. What we have now is a bungled system that prioritizes lobbying effort over the very real contribution that immigration can make to the Canadian economy.

David Green is a professor at the Vancouver School of Economics, Philip Oreopoulos is distinguished professor in economics at the University of Toronto. Craig Riddell is emeritus professor at the Vancouver School of Economics. Mikal Skuterud is economics professor at the University of Waterloo, and the Rogers Phillips Scholar of Social Policy at the C.D. Howe Institute and Christopher Worswick is professor of economics at Carleton University and a research fellow at the C.D. Howe Institute.

Source: How We Subverted our Skills Based Immigration System

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Worswick: Why the Temporary Foreign Worker Program needs to be eliminated

2025/10/09 Leave a comment

More sensible proposals from Worswick:

…The TFW program was controversial under both the Harper government and the Trudeau government. In both cases, the government of the day ultimately bent its will to employer lobbying to make the program larger until an understandable public backlash ensued. The result is that the TFW program’s brand is severely damaged and should be retired. In its place, smaller, targeted programs would make sense. Two, in particular, are worth considering. 

Retaining a separate agricultural temporary visa program has merits. These types of jobs are unique in that they are geographically remote and seasonal by nature. Filling them with Canadian citizens or permanent residents may require large increases in wages, putting many farm enterprises at risk. 

Having a standalone global talent temporary visa program would also benefit the Canadian economy so long as the earnings are above the Canadian average. Such a program should be limited in size to minimize any negative effects on wages of higher-income Canadians. The program could prioritize the highest-earning jobs, as has been suggested for the U.S. H-1B program. Individuals taking these jobs would be excellent candidates as economic permanent residents.

Source: Why the Temporary Foreign Worker Program needs to be eliminated

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Worswick: Where’s this brain gain of elite U.S. professors we keep talking about?

2025/08/06 Leave a comment

Arguing for a more selective approach to international student recruitment while allowing numbers to rise again (most of the abuse happened at the college and satellite campus levels):

…Taken together, this is hardly an environment where we would expect professors from elite U.S. universities to go when they can move to almost anywhere in the world. The widely cited QS ranking places Harvard University 5th in the world, while nearby MIT ranks 1st. University of Oxford is ranked 4th and University of Melbourne is ranked 19th, while the highest-ranked Canadian universities are McGill at 27th and University of Toronto at 29th. It is unlikely that the extreme budget stresses these Canadian universities now face have yet to fully affect their global reputations, and so their rankings may not stay this high.

Universities are important parts of modern economies. In the case of Ontario, a 2021 Conference Board of Canada report found that universities’ annual activities and human capital development is equal in value to 11.7 per cent of the province’s GDP. Elite professors can raise the prestige of their institution and help attract international students, strengthening the economy through their tuition and expenditures. To gain more of these benefits, both the federal and provincial governments should adapt policies to help Canadian universities attract top academics from the around the world.

Provincial governments are clearly struggling to provide adequate funding for both health care and education, and health care is typically ranked by Canadians as the greater priority. In this context, provinces should focus public resources on reducing health care shortages and allow universities to operate more independently, setting tuition as appropriate to support their academic programs.

The Canada Research Chair program needs to be revamped. The annual transfer from the federal government to the university for a given category of chair has not changed since 2000, meaning that, in real terms, each chair has fallen in value by roughly 40 per cent and will continue to fall in real terms with future inflation. The Canada Excellence Research Chairs, introduced in 2008, are more generous, but the program needs to be expanded if it is going to attract many elite faculty members from the U.S. 

Finally, as I have argued before, international student numbers at universities should be allowed to rise again given the high tuition fees they raise and the fact that these students typically go on to be strong candidates as economic immigrants. This would generate higher revenue, allowing universities to make more competitive salary offers to top international candidates.

Source: Where’s this brain gain of elite U.S. professors we keep talking about?

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Worswick: In this economy? It’s time to welcome foreign students again

2025/02/26 Leave a comment

A more strategic approach to international students and rebalancing in favour of universities and college programs where there is high labour force needs:

…In the short term, we should prioritize international university students over their college counterparts, since they pay higher tuition. Algonquin College in Ottawa lists international tuition and book costs at $16,000 to $22,000, which is much less than across town at Carleton University, where international tuition ranges from $34,000 to $53,000. To be clear, these are both fine academic institutions that are important parts of the Canadian educational system. However, an international student at Carleton contributes more to Canadian national income through tuition revenue than does their counterpart at Algonquin.

Also, university students have higher average earnings upon graduation than college students and are more likely to meet the admission criteria under the Skilled Worker immigration program after graduation. And unlike college students, university students are more likely to be involved in academic research, which helps with our productivity challenges, and they are more likely to be the leaders of technology spin-off companies.

Should we have international students at colleges? Yes, but at lower numbers than in the recent past and concentrated in key fields. Students doing programs in the building trades should be prioritized given the need to expand our housing stock. International students in health care programs should also be prioritized, as this will help us to expand our strained health sector.

Will increasing international students create another population surge? Not necessarily. One sensible first step would be to quickly wind down the lower wage part of our Temporary Foreign Worker Program.

Each temporary foreign worker’s impact on housing and health care is similar to that of an international university student. Replacing temporary foreign workers with international university students in the same communities would lead to a boost in tuition revenue and improve our pool of highly skilled potential immigrants, but without affecting the demand for local housing and health care. This makes even more sense ahead of a possible tariff-driven recession where unemployed auto workers may wish they had access to jobs held by temporary foreign workers….

Source: In this economy? It’s time to welcome foreign students again

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Worswick: Ottawa needs to abolish the temporary foreign worker program

2024/08/28 Leave a comment

Worth consideration:

…While these statements, at first glance, may seem at odds, there are valid economic reasons to be in favour of skilled (permanent) immigration but opposed to less-skilled temporary foreign worker programs.

We must therefore redesign our international migration policies. Ottawa’s announcement on Monday to further restrict the temporary foreign worker (TFW)program is a step in the right direction but not enough. Canada needs to go further and abolish the program.

We need to quickly phase out the low-skill stream of the TFW program, which the government has expanded to let companies fill perceived labour shortages. Then we should merge the higher-skill part of the program into our economic immigration program.

This would retain the advantages of the TFW program for higher-skilled workers, which is that it provides for a trial period for prospective immigrants. It would also ensure the temporary foreign workers are admitted in line with the goals of the economic immigration program: that they have high-enough skills to become immigrants whose presence greatly benefits the Canadian economy.

This must be done to reverse a long-standing, concerning trend. With support from the provinces and the business lobby, the federal government has greatly increased the numbers of immigrants and the number of temporary foreign workers coming to Canada, with 2022 levels that are more than 50 per cent higher than the 2017 levels in each case (according to the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration). Given that these remarkable increases have coincided with both a health care crisis and a housing crisis, it naturally raises the issue of redesigning our international migration programs….

Source: Ottawa needs to abolish the temporary foreign worker program

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Hardin: Breaking the Immigration Taboo

2023/06/14 Leave a comment

A bit of a rant and overly rambling and unfocussed but nevertheless a signal among some who consider themselves progressive are increasingly concerned given housing and other impacts:

….And as if that weren’t enough, Justin Trudeau keeps on increasing the number of immigrants, hiking it from 400,000 annually to half a million. When Eby began the frantic drumbeating for new housing, the figure for new immigrants arriving in Greater Vancouver was an estimated 30,000 to 40,000. That had already changed by the end of 2021, when the net inflow of people to B.C. was 100,797. Of those, 33,356 people came from other Canadian provinces and territories and the remaining 67,141 from abroad, with most ending up in Greater Vancouver. Not all of them would have been immigrants; net non–permanent residents like “temporary foreign workers” and net foreign students would be in the total.

In the subsequent year, 2022, the inflow into B.C. from international migration increased to 150,783, of whom 98,763 were non–permanent residents. Canada’s population overall increased by 1,050,110 people; almost all the increase – 96 per cent – came from international migration.

Eby has mentioned what lay behind what he was facing – federal immigration policy. No wielding of the hammer on that one, however. The new housing minister, Ravi Kahlon, has belatedly gone as far as to argue with Ottawa that immigration should be tied to housing availability. But without his tackling the underlying premises impelling Trudeau and company – without even following through on his own argument – he hasn’t, as of this writing, made much headway.

The taboo is great.

Nor is Eby the only one who shies away from speaking directly to the root issue.

With some exceptions, almost everyone publicly tearing their hair out over housing unaffordability or what the attendant pressure is doing to Vancouver avoids mentioning the “i” word as something that needs to be tackled first and foremost, in the same way that everyone, except a little boy, wouldn’t say out loud that the emperor had no clothes.

What’s really behind high immigration numbers

What underlies immigration to Canada and the current numbers is not humanitarianism but economics. Indeed, immigration to Canada, save for refugees, has always largely been economic. The argument is that immigrants boost the Canadian economy and are even needed to keep the Canadian economy going. That this might be a dubious argument doesn’t discourage its promoters.

Immigration Minister Sean Fraser was quite straightforward about this in a statement to Reuters late in 2021. “Canada needs immigration to create jobs and drive our economic recovery,” he said, as if simply saying so made it true.

Fraser has since doubled down on his message box, again without in fact making the case and again without addressing housing affordability and additional pressures on health care.

The need for immigrants to keep the economy going has now become a mantra, repeated casually at large (an “economic imperative,” a National Post columnist called it), to which has recently been added a submantra: the need for immigrants to fill unfilled job positions. It’s economics – unquestioned economics – again.

NDP leader Jagmeet Singh has also, naively, claimed we are dependent economically on immigration. He and the political left in Canada, captive to their routinized thinking on immigration, have failed to understand the dynamic at work. It’s important to realize that open immigration to serve economics isn’t left-wing at all. The free movement of labour is part of classical right-wing neoliberal doctrine, complementing free trade. If community is harmed or destabilized by the application of the doctrine, whether by free trade or inflated immigration levels, “So what?” says the market-doctrine right-winger: “It’s the market at work. You shouldn’t object.”

It’s not surprising, then, that the original recommendation for hiking the level of immigration to Canada to 450,000 annually came from the federal Advisory Council on Economic Growth, circa 2017, replete with neoliberals and with nobody as awkward as even a pale socialist or environmentalist to show any dissent. The Council was chaired by Dominic Barton, a former senior executive of management consulting firm McKinsey and Company.

The Council also recommended that Canada aim for 100 million people by the end of the century. This was without reference to the environment. The connection between another 60-odd million people in a northern, high-consuming country and its impact on global warming and the environment is not part of the neoliberal frame. The doctrine on this score – justifying immigration for economic reasons outside of the environmental context – is no different, schematically and ideologically, from justifying increased oil sands production and otherwise boosting the oil patch overall for economic reasons.

There’s a further irony underlying these other ironies. The economic rationale for immigration – the majestic declaration that newcomers are the key to the future – is faulty taken by itself.

It’s false to claim that increased immigration is essential to the Canadian economy in any ordinary sense; the evidence doesn’t sustain that and it doesn’t meet the standard of common sense.

There is nothing to prevent an economy with a stable or slowly growing population from functioning well. Indeed, it is arguable that the more stable a population, the more focus can be given to employment engagement, training and education, and downstream allocation of the workforce in order to produce the maximum economic, social and environmental payoff per capita and, at the same time, enhance the quality of life.

It also begs the theoretical question of whether Canada, and every country in the world, have to keep compounding their population growth forever and ever until Doomsday if they wish to prevent their economies from falling apart. The world’s population, then, would have to increase to 15 billion people, and then 20 billion, and so on, just to keep economically afloat – a notion that we know is absurd.

In the here and now, the argument for inflated immigration to Canada is also a counterproductive notion, economically speaking, because it measures by mass rather than by per capita economic performance and quality of life. Canada (using the International Monetary Fund measure) is 26th in the world rankings of GDP per capita, adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP), as of current estimates. Denmark, which has strictly limited immigration, is 11th. Norway is seventh, Switzerland sixth, the United States eighth and so on. All the Scandinavian countries are higher than Canada; so are Austria and Taiwan. Singapore is second.

In 1986, just prior to immigration to Canada spiking, Canada was 15th; we’ve lost 11 places since. Our GDP per capita in 1986, again adjusted for purchasing power parity, was 89 per cent of the American one; since then it has fallen to 75 per cent.

Perhaps more instructive are the IMF’s projections through to 2027, where Canada is projected to fall to 28th place. It will also have lost, once more, a few percentage points to the United States, which itself is predicted to fall a few places in the IMF rankings. By way of explanation, the OECD has Canada dead last among the 38 OECD members in GDP per capita growth for 2020–30 (and also dead last for 2030–60).

Don Wright, former deputy minister to B.C. Premier John Horgan and a Harvard-trained economist, takes this one step further in a recent paper for the Public Policy Forum. Wright points out that by counting on immigrants and foreign workers for low-wage jobs, average per capita income and what goes with it (from quality of life to per capita tax revenue) are lowered and the professed desire to help the middle class is betrayed. He references stagnant real wages, their direct relationship to housing unaffordability and the coincidental ascendancy of neoliberalism. Raising the per capita standard of living should be the goal, he argues. He goes on to debunk the argument of the open-ended need for more and more labour:

When businesses complain about having difficulty finding enough workers, what this really means is that they cannot easily find the workers they want at a wage they want to pay. But, within reasonable limits, this is a good thing. It forces employers to pay higher wages, provide better working conditions and drives the creative destruction that leads to higher productivity, more valuable products and better business models.

A subsequent study in Policy Options by labour economists Fabian Lange of McGill, Mikal Skuterud of the University of Waterloo and Christopher Worswick of Carleton elaborated on the argument, focusing in particular on the economic case against low-wage temporary foreign workers.⁶

The submantra that we need inflated immigration levels to fill unfilled jobs nevertheless keeps resurfacing, cited as a given both by ostensible experts and by politicians desperate to rationalize consequences like the housing crisis. David Eby himself, just before being sworn in as B.C. Premier, mentioned it by way of explaining why he needed to act aggressively on housing.

It overlooks how the necessary adjustment in the labour market would happen, per Don Wright’s thesis. It’s as if there is no alternative to the neoliberal ideological fix behind the current excessive immigration level.

Well here, schematically, is the alternative, as would happen in a normal economy. Jobs are posted and if they’re more important relative to other jobs, the market or public allocation rises until they’re filled. At the same time, other jobs that cannot compete, because they’re relatively unimportant or not important at all, so that they don’t have sufficient competitive draw on the market or on public revenue, disappear. Over time, one ends up with a far more productive economy and a far more appropriate economy that dynamically follows market demand and public need.

But none of the alternatives to the current immigration level can be properly discussed, nor can a proper public debate take place, until we bury for good the neoliberal legend that we need immigration to keep our economy going. Once we do that, we can then get started on framing public policy accordingly, dramatically cutting back immigration and freely charting another course. We might even conclude that what makes most sense, for a high-energy-use country like Canada, is a stable population. But that’s for another analysis.

Source: Breaking the Immigration Taboo

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What’s the right number of immigrants for Canada?

2023/06/06 Leave a comment

In contrast to Globe editorial, Immigration: Canada needs more newcomers and (much more) housing, this article asks the needed questions, featuring business and academic economists who are increasingly challenging the current general political and economic consensus:

How many immigrants should Canada be admitting?

Economists are asking that question with increasing intensity – and for good reason. Canada’s population jumped by more than a million people last year. The surge was the largest annual increase in the country’s history, and one that was driven nearly entirely by immigration.

The skyrocketing number of new Canadians is putting added pressure on an already drum-tight housing market. People are scrambling “for a place to live in a market with no housing supply,” Bank of Nova Scotia warns. Home prices are climbing, while the rental vacancy rate is at “a generational low,” according to National Bank of Canada.

For now, the Liberal government in Ottawa is sticking to the aggressive pro-immigration policy that it introduced after being elected in 2015. It is targeting nearly half-a-million immigrants a year– roughly double the 261,000 that Canada admitted annually in the 2010 to 2014 period.

However, a growing number of critics are challenging the logic behind Ottawa’s great immigration ambitions.

Prominent business economists say they are baffled by the government’s insistence on sticking to supersized immigration quotas at a time of widespread housing shortages. Stéfane Marion, chief economist at National Bank of Canada, and David Rosenberg, president of Rosenberg Research, have urged Ottawa to consider revising its targets to allow housing supply to catch up to demand.

Meanwhile, a new working paper from a trio of Canadian academic economists digs deeper into the issues around immigration. The paper, currently circulating in draft form under the title, The Economics of Canadian Immigration Levels, offers a scholarly but withering critique of current policy.

The authors – Matthew Doyle and Mikal Skuterud of the University of Waterloo, and Christopher Worswick of Carleton University – argue that policy makers are mistaken to conclude “that if some immigration is good for the economy, then more must be better.”

Granted, how you view this issue depends on how you define “better.” The three economists acknowledge that if Ottawa’s goal is simply to swell Canada’s geopolitical clout then, yes, it does make sense to fling open the doors and welcome a massive influx of newcomers. More workers and more consumers will mean a larger economy.

But size isn’t everything. Imagine a case in which Canada’s economic output doubled while its population did, too. Would this improve life for a typical Canadian? Not really. The average person would wind up seeing no improvement in their standard of living. The increase in the size of the economic pie would be matched by an equivalent increase in the number of people sharing it.

There is also morality to consider. On paper, it’s possible to show that a country can generate an “immigration surplus” by bringing in masses of low-skilled workers to take menial jobs. This underclass of low-paid immigrants can free up the existing population to pursue better-paid occupations.

However, it’s questionable how far this idea can or should be pushed in an egalitarian country such as Canada. The notion of an immigration surplus downplays the stresses faced by low-paid immigrants. It ignores issues of income inequality and focuses only on the benefits reaped by the people already in the country.

The three professors argue for a more equitable, more inclusive approach. They say the fairest and most reasonable test of Canadian immigration policy is whether it helps to grow output per person – or gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, in the jargon.

Research has demonstrated that measures of per capita GDP are closely tied to feelings of well-being and life satisfaction. If immigration offers a surefire way to boost this number, then there is good reason to think it is benefiting the nation as a whole.

Unfortunately, for the pro-immigration camp, there is no evidence that it does much of anything to help accelerate growth in GDP per capita.

The opposite is often true. When immigration is limited and labour is in short supply, businesses can find it profitable to invest in new capital – tools, computers, factories and other gear – to boost the productivity of scarce workers. This capital investment can help to swell per capita GDP.

In contrast, when immigration is surging, the case for capital investment may look less attractive. Businesses can find it cheaper to hire an additional worker to meet new demand instead of investing in new equipment. The result can be a larger work force, but one with lower productivity and lower per capita GDP.

The three professors look back at past decades and see nothing to indicate that immigration has ever been an economic tonic.

“Using evidence for Canada and the U.S., we find either a negative relationship, or no relationship, between periods of high immigration and subsequent growth in GDP per capita,” they wrote in their paper.

Just to be clear here: The lack of any obvious economic payoff from immigration doesn’t mean Canada should slam the door shut on newcomers.

The economists point out that federal legislation lists 12 goals for immigration, ranging from family reunification to supporting minority official languages communities. Many of those goals aren’t economic in nature and can still justify substantial levels of immigration.

But the dubious economic case for immigration raises questions about why Ottawa has been basing so much of its immigration policy on economic rationales. The government’s most recent targets allot roughly 60 per cent of immigrant slots to economic-class applicants – that is, people who are, in theory, being chosen for their ability to contribute to Canada’s prosperity.

This emphasis on economic-class immigrants may reflect misconceptions.

Consider, for instance, the idea that immigration is needed to fill low-skill, essential jobs. This doesn’t make a lot of sense, according to the economists. Admitting people to fill low-wage jobs pulls down, rather than pushes up, GDP per capita.

Just as questionable is the idea that immigration can offset the effects of Canada’s aging population.

Immigrants age and eventually retire just like anyone else. While there may be a short-term demographic dividend from immigration, “leveraging this demographic dividend to produce ongoing growth would require a Ponzi-type strategy of continually increasing the immigration rate to undo the increasing size of the retirement-age population,” the economists wrote.

So what can Canada do to improve its economic-class immigration system?

The three co-authors suggest that Ottawa should focus on admitting immigrants with higher levels of skills and education than it is currently targeting. They argue that the goal should be to select immigrants who can earn at least as much as, if not more, than the average Canadian within 10 years of arrival. Over time, this policy should boost GDP per capita.

The economists don’t offer any estimate of how such a policy would affect the number of immigrants being admitted, although Prof. Skuterud and Prof. Worswick both acknowledged in interviews that the impact, at least at first, would likely be a significant decline in the number of newcomers.

They suggest this might be wise, given the stresses being put on social systems by today’s massive influx of immigrants. Their paper cautions that “the strains currently being placed on the public health care system, the public education system and the highly regulated housing sector suggest even more reason to be cautious about setting high levels of economic immigration.”

Pro-immigration voices can, of course, find plenty here with which to take issue. That is absolutely fine. A vigorous debate over immigration is exactly what Canada now needs.

Source: What’s the right number of immigrants for Canada?

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Canada launches new immigration program to fill ‘in-demand’

2023/06/02 Leave a comment

As expected:

Immigration applicants with experience in any of five sectors could be selected for permanent residence through a new system designed to better align newcomers with Canada’s labour market needs.

On Wednesday, Immigration Minister Sean Fraser launched the highly anticipated “category-based selection” — better known as the “targeted draw” of skilled immigrants — which was first announced last June.

In additional to focusing on picking those with strong French language proficiency, the new tool will target those in the talent pool with a background in five key occupational sectors:

  • Health care;
  • Science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) professions;
  • Trades, such as carpenters, plumbers and contractors;
  • Transport; and
  • Agriculture and agri-food.

“Everywhere I go, I’ve heard loud and clear from employers across the country who are experiencing chronic labour shortages. These changes to the Express Entry system will ensure that they have the skilled workers they need to grow and succeed,” Fraser said in a news release.

“We can also grow our economy and help businesses with labour shortages while also increasing the number of French-proficient candidates to help ensure the vitality of French-speaking communities. Put simply, Canada’s immigration system has never been more responsive to the country’s social or economic needs.”

The job categories have been determined following public consultations, as well as a review of labour market needs. A complete list of eligible jobs for the new categories is available on the immigration department website.

Currently, applicants for skilled immigration programs enter into the Express Entry pool, where they are given points and ranked based on attributes such as age, educational achievements, language proficiency, work experience and availability of a job offer.

Regular draws are conducted to invite those with the highest scores to apply for permanent residence. However, the system doesn’t allow the immigration department to overrule the ranking system and pick a candidate in an “in-demand” profession if the person’s score doesn’t meet the thresholds of those draws.

According to Statistics Canada, the number of job vacancies in the fourth quarter of 2022 decreased by 78,600 or 8.2 per cent to 876,300, marking the second consecutive quarterly decline.

The number of unfilled jobs fell in 16 of 20 broad industrial sectors, particularly in accommodation and food services (-21,400) and administrative and support, waste management and remediation services (-15,800).

Job vacancies also fell in seven of 10 broad occupational groups, including trades, transport and equipment operators and related occupations (-22,200) and sales and service occupations (-20,100).

There were 147,300 job vacancies in health occupations in the fourth quarter, little changed from the record high reached in the third quarter.

Fraser said further details on the timing of invitations for individual categories and how to apply will be announced in the coming weeks.

Source: Canada launches new immigration program to fill ‘in-demand’ jobsCanada launches new immigration program to fill ‘in-demand’ jobs

And criticism from labour economists:

MIKAL SKUTERUD, the director of the Canadian Labour Economics Forum, took issue with a minister meddling in a system for grading talent that is supposed to be apolitical. He wrote that he was concerned the immigration system will fall unduly under the influence of business lobbyists.

“If the objective of the policy is to target skilled candidates with work experience in the sectors listed in the news release, why were these applicants unable to satisfy the selection criteria of the existing Express Entry system?” he wrote to PTM. 

“The only possible answer I can think of is that this reform seeks to bypass the [Comprehensive Ranking System] which, in effect, means providing eased pathways to PR status for immigrants with lower skill levels and lower expected earnings.”

The Comprehensive Ranking System is the existing method by which the government scores the workforce potential of prospective economic immigrants.

Bringing in immigrants who earn less than would otherwise be the case could inhibit GDP per capita and standard of living growth, wrote Skuterud. 

CHRISTOPHER WORSWICK, who teaches the economics of immigration at Carleton University, wrote: 

“I am generally not in favour of this novel, category-based selection method. It would be better to focus on improving the Comprehensive Ranking System. This seems like a step backward from what had been a human capital-based (or expected earnings-based) selection process. I suspect this is designed to allow the government to choose less-skilled applicants to satisfy the demands of different business lobby groups.”

Worswick wrote that he suspected that some of the newly prioritized industries and occupations in trades contracting, transport, and agriculture could lead to an influx of low-earning immigrants.

“If we bring in workers whenever employer groups say there is a ‘labour shortage,’ we risk keeping wages low and hurting lower-wage workers in Canada who may need wage growth, especially given our challenges with inflation. We should focus on bringing in economic immigrants with the highest human capital (as measured by expected earnings),” he wrote.

Source: https://hilltimes.us10.list-manage.com/track/click?u=a90bfb63c26a30f02131a677b&id=0071de5ea4&e=685e94e554

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‘Too much, too quickly’: economists warn of Liberal ‘pro-business’ immigration policy

2023/03/18 Leave a comment

Great counterpoint to the simplistic and misguided arguments of the government and immigration arguments in favour of the current high levels, with Mikal Stuterud, Chris Worswick and David Green being cited extensively:

The Liberal government’s move to admit record numbers of immigrants to fill a purported “labour shortage” has prompted warnings from economists with years of experience studying immigration to Canada.

The government is selling the policy change as a way to boost economic growth and “help businesses find workers.”

But there’s no evidence, the economists said, that the plan to eventually accept a half million new residents per year will benefit the average Canadian resident—though it might help businesses looking for low-cost labour.

The higher immigration targets—along with a growth in the use of temporary foreign workers and working international students under the Liberal government—have the potential to push down wages for the lowest-paid workers in the country, many of whom are recent immigrants or refugees, they said.

Source: ‘Too much, too quickly’: economists warn of Liberal ‘pro-business’ immigration policy

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Immigration levels plan: Reactions

2020/11/03 Leave a comment

Have been following the various reactions to date regarding the government’s (overly) ambitious targets for the next three years. Relatively few op-eds and commentary, possibly due to the focus on COVID and the US presidential election which are taking up most of the oxygen.

And much of the commentary focusses overly on the administrative issues, not the more substantive issues related to economic integration of immigrants during an economic recession, one that is likely to linger for a few years.

Have grouped these by constituency:

Business-oriented

The plan was welcomed by the business sector.

“There is widespread agreement across party lines that immigration is essential to long-term economic growth,” said Goldy Hyder, president and CEO of the Business Council of Canada, which represents some of the country’s largest businesses.

“Newcomers bring energy, skills, new ideas and entrepreneurial spirit. They start companies, fill skill shortages, buy houses and pay taxes, … The minister’s plan will allow Canada to make up lost ground as the pandemic eases. It will inject new dynamism into our economy.”

The Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters even went one step further, saying Ottawa’s objectives were too modest and will not allow the country to catch up quickly enough over the coming months to compensate for the reduced number of immigrant admissions this year.

“Manufacturers are increasingly using immigration to supplement their workforce but there are not enough immigrants to meet the demand,” said Dennis Danby, its president and CEO, who represents 2,500 leading manufacturers in the country.

“If manufacturing is to be at the core of the economic recovery following the COVID-19 crisis, we must do more in prioritizing immigration from the economic stream.” (Toronto Star)

As Canada’s leading voice on smart population growth, Century Initiative continues to advocate not just for increasing our population, but for policies to support that growth through investments in education and in the national and urban infrastructure that will allow our communities to grow in a sustainable manner. We also need to prioritize supporting parents with a national childcare strategy, and our children with early education programs.

Now is the right time to invest in growing our population. Environics Institute’s recent Focus Canada survey shows that a record two-thirds (66%) of Canadians reject the idea that immigration levels are too high, and that Canadians recognize the critical contribution immigrants make to our economy and our social fabric. We have a tremendous opportunity before us and welcome the opportunity to continue working with gover(nment to seize it in the interest of future generations of Canadians. (Century Initiative)

Opposition critics

Opposition MPs took aim at the way the government has handled immigration throughout the pandemic and questioned how the new targets would be achieved.

Conservative immigration critic Raquel Dancho said the government is announcing new levels without a plan for how they will be safely implemented.

Jenny Kwan, immigration critic for the NDP, said she believes the numbers are “a bit of a hoax” because the backlog to process applications is so great that the targets will be hard to meet.

Christine Normandin, the Bloc Québécois immigration critic, said in French that Ottawa is taking the opposite approach to the Quebec system. She said the province takes only as many immigrants as it can process in one year, while Ottawa sets goals without taking into account its capacity to do the paperwork. (Globe)

That lower-end target is actually below the low end of the number of immigrants, pre-pandemic, the Liberals had planned to admit in 2021, pointed out NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan. 

“The Liberals demonstrate a lack of conviction in their targets and left the door wide open for immigration levels to decrease,” she said in a statement.

It’s also not clear how unused room is being carried over. 

For example: the Liberals had planned to admit 49,000 refugees this year. Next year, according to Friday’s plan, they are aiming for 59,500. 

While that looks like an increase of 10,000, the number of refugees who have actually arrived in the first eight months of this year was down nearly 60 per cent from 2019 arrivals. 

So it’s possible that the 2021 figures merely incorporate the shortfall from this year, as opposed to being an overall increase. Mendicino wasn’t clear when asked about that issue Friday.  (Canadian Press)

NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan said the government must not overlook the compassionate aspects of the immigration system, such as removing travel restrictions for asylum seekers and ensuring permanent residence status for migrant workers in recognition of their contributions during the pandemic.

“The immigration department’s processing abilities is still spotty at best and serious investment in staffing, far beyond what we’ve seen so far, is needed,” said Kwan.

“Without these investments, applicants are to expect significant increases in processing times for years to come, which were already long before the pandemic.” (Toronto Star)

Tweets from CPC critic Dancho:

The Liberals have failed to layout a plan to  bring in newcomers to Canada safely. No widespread access to rapid tests and the 14 day quarantine is not a financial option for many people. #cdnpoli https://twitter.com/RaquelDancho/status/1322270115921055746?s=20

They have no plan to better resource immigration department to fulfil the levels promised.  Liberals are simply adding to their massive, years-long immigration backlogs that fail to provide potential newcomers with certainty, dignity or respect. #cdnpoli https://twitter.com/RaquelDancho/status/1322270117384851456?s=20

The ministers announcement did not acknowledge the economic devastation caused by COVID-19 or the hundreds of thousands of Canadians facing unemployment since the pandemic hit and how these new ambitious immigration numbers will impact them. #cdnpoli https://twitter.com/RaquelDancho/status/1322270118290903040?s=20

International organizations

Either way, that Canada even continues to open its arms is welcome, said Rema Jamous Imseis, the UN refugee agency’s Canadian representative. 

“In an era of travel restrictions and closed borders, refugees continue to be welcomed by Canadians,” she said in a statement.

“The significance of this lifeline and the deep generosity of Canadians cannot be overstated.” (Canadian Press)

Academics

While experts had expected Ottawa to stay the course with its immigration goals — given the government had publicly stated immigration would be key to restarting the post-COVID-19 economy, they were surprised the Liberals would decide to take it up a notch.

Although critics have raised concerns about high immigration given that the country’s jobless rate hovered at nine per cent in September — after peaking at 13.4 per cent in May — from 5.6 per cent before the pandemic, some experts say the government is on the right track.

“The timing for expanding the program now is good. But I’m surprised how high the targets are they have set. I don’t know how realistic it is from a bureaucratic administrative perspective,” said Carleton University economist Chris Worswick, who specializes in the economics of immigration.

“I commend the government for thinking about immigration again. I was worried that it wouldn’t happen. I wonder if they’re being too ambitious. I’m cautiously optimistic that we’ll end up at a good place.” (Toronto Star)

Immigration lawyers and advocates

Immigration and refugee experts welcomed the move to grant permanent residency to those already in the country.

“I’ve always thought, even before COVID, that it makes a lot more sense to target people who are already educated here, or have work experience here, or at least have lived here. … These are people who are already demonstrating their genuine interest in Canada,” immigration lawyer Chantal Desloges said.

Janet Dench, executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees, said her organization has urged the government to give permanent residency to those in Canada.

“What we need to see is that realization actually reflected in actual operations, actual policies, because at this point, the way the Immigration Department is working is running in completely the opposite direction,” she said. (Globe)

We need #StatusforAll and Fairness.
Today’s Canada’s Immigration Plan does neither. pic.twitter.com/xhsJtrZBtj— Migrant Workers Alliance for Change (@MWACCanada) October 30, 2020

Contrary to what the government is saying, there is NO INCREASE in IMMIGRATION LEVELS. Instead, there was a 150,000 shortfall in immigrants in 2020, and the government is trying to catch up for it by increasing 50,000 each year for the next three years. But as COVID-19 continues, these promises are unlikely to be kept.+

The overall proportion of new immigrants remain the same, with the primary focus on “high waged” immigrants. However, to qualify for these immigration programs, migrants must show 12-24 months of high-waged work. With COVID-19-related job losses disproportionately impacting racialized people, many migrants don’t have access to these jobs and won’t qualify. No plan has been announced to ensure full and permanent immigration status for all migrant and undocumented people right now.+ Many migrants — including care workers and former international students — were not able to complete requirements for permanent residency in 2020 due to COVID-19. However, there is no meaningful increase in numbers on fixing of rules for these migrants in today’s announcement. (Migrant Workers Alliance)

On the right

Recent polls have shown that Canadians are weary about increasing immigration levels in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic. 

A poll commissioned by True North found that an overwhelming 76% of Canadians strongly agreed with the idea of a temporary pause until a coronavirus vaccine is developed and unemployment drops to pre-coronavirus levels. Note: Polling firm unknown and thus is not credible

The poll results show a surprising consensus among political parties as well with 67% of Liberals wanting to impose a temporary pause, 66% of NDP voters and 89% of Conservatives. 

“Given today’s global circumstances of a public health pandemic and severe economic crisis, now is the perfect opportunity to revert back to our successful historic immigration model, listen to the majority of Canadians, and take another pause,” True North’s founder Candice Malcolm wrote when the poll was released. 

“It’s time for our leaders to listen to the people and do what’s best for our country.” (“True” North)

While the government touted the need for migrants to strengthen the economy, the unemployment rate in Canada, the unemployment rate currently stands at 9%, from an all-time high of 14% in May. Over 8 million Canadians applied for emergency COVID relief benefits in the form of the CERB. Canada’s unemployment rate was around 5% prior the pandemic. (Rebel Media)

Links:

https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2020/10/30/canada-raises-immigration-targets-to-record-level-eyeing-covid-19-recovery.html

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-canada-aims-to-accept-far-more-immigrants-in-next-three-years/

https://www.nationalnewswatch.com/2020/10/30/open-arms-in-an-era-of-closed-borders-pandemic-era-immigration-plan-to-be-released/

https://www.centuryinitiative.ca/2020/10/30/statement-by-century-initiative-in-response-to-todays-announcement-on-canadas-new-immigration-levels-plan/

http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=001wUHdkm-IXhLQEDQQhHpPJhE–4be9O4na7CSu_HTVJ3_exdE79deJOSGOJuSUNNsN2Kyv6MminY8b3ZDHu8DM9TGHexgqGeeBUCXHuy27RYBCI-BRCMGbxRMO8W0SFV_XPzTYGrQIne9FbHal1yf8rrcwd-MXsuLeH4Fzl_PgfnaCEGuS-EQHtOZFosriLs2F2fD7I5SSQmHyPu_wFCSO41BzQhC5I239Ca0wAobATOVIJEaeA88nho7-TYizcB4jknHzUYtwtI=&c=txZf0oGWeZ1X5ztO3otmqvEvK8YJL1ma7RV4l1hGL3rk-9JDwktWlQ==&ch=1L007y2aOfrZ_cYWIZ1jFuVTes-jYN_q9L_2UgIgYktrYzC-D519og==

https://www.rebelnews.com/canada_to_increase_immigration_targets_after_covid_disruption

https://www.facebook.com/notes/migrant-workers-alliance-for-change/immigration-announcement-fails-to-ensure-fairness-status-for-all/10101179406532842/

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