2005 Data

The table below compares immigration to Canadian cities over 19 years to the real unemployment, not the official unemployment, and the resultant immigrants that were actually needed and absorbed into employment. The conclusion is the cost to family income is very large, a second fiscal deficit. The data is for the 19 years to 2005. The real unemployment is relative to the gold standard of 72.7% adult participation in the labour force which has been reached by the best cities. All cities in Canada that have had good economies had their labour force go up to or above this 72.7% standard. In a good economy they all went up above what was considered full employment. Not only that but the same can be said for cities in the USA, the UK, Australian and New Zealand. It’s a startling and interesting bit of economic behavior. It’s a gold standard with several policy implications.

…………………………Official………………Real……..Immigrants….Immigrants

………………………Unemployment……Unemployment…(since……..absorbed

……………………………………………….Estimate….……1987)………into

……………………………………………(vs best cities)………………….employment

Montreal……......................8.7%.......................15.6% ……….13.2%............  0.6%

Toronto……........................7.0%........................13.5%.............26.5%……… 16.0%

Vancouver….......................5.7%.......................13.9%............. 22.9% ………12.0%

Ottawa-Gatineau..................6.6%.......................11.2%………..13.3%............ 5.1%

Oshawa……........................6.4%.......................11.7%……….. 4.0%...............nil

Hamilton……......................5.5%.......................11.7%………..9.2%................0.5%

St. Catherines.......................7.0%.......................13.9%………..5.5%............... nil

London…………………….6.6%.......................10.4%………..10.4%...............3.0%

Windsor……........................7.9%.......................17.9%………..13.9%............. nil

Kitchener……......................5.7%.......................8.4%…………12.1%.............6.7%

Sudbury……………………..7.7%.......................19.6%……….1.7%.............  nil

Thunder Bay………………..7.0%.......................12.4%………..3.2%............. nil  

Winnipeg……......................4.8%.......................9.2%………….9.2%..............3.0%

Regina……….......................4.9%.......................7.3%………..  5.4%...............1.1%

Saskatoon……......................5.0%.......................8.8%………..  5.6%...............nil

Calgary………......................3.9%.......................8.2%…………11.9%............6.7%

Edmonton……......................4.5%.......................10.8%………..8.2%..............0.4%

Victoria……………………..4.4%.......................9.4%…………5.6%..............nil  

St. John’s.…………………..8.9%.......................19.3%………..2.8%..............nil 

Halifax……………………..5.8%.......................11.9%………..6.6%...............nil  

St. John……………………..7.1%.......................17.3%………..1.7%..............nil  

Saquenay……………………9.9%.......................24.2%………..2.7%.............nil  

Quebec……………………..5.6%.......................11.4%………...4.2%..............nil  

Trois-Rivieres………………8.8%.......................15.3%………..1.8%..............nil  

Sherbrooke………………….7.3%.......................15.7%………..8.4%..............nil

Over 19 years there were some 3,711,000 immigrants to the main cities for which there were jobs available for 1,328,000 (that’d be a corresponding work force of 810,000).

Allowing that 15% of immigrants returned home, the immigrant population is similar to the Canadian population demographically so the same proportion will work and that immigrants earn as much as Canadians over the long term  a figure for the annual cost to the economy of the unemployment associated with inappropriate immigration accumulated over 19 years is arrived at. I allow 3% baseline unemployment as full employment, which is an additional 3% of the urban population as absorbed immigrants in good cases. It is well known that immigrants do not go on welfare disproportionately rather they work which means some else sits out of employment in the case of a soft economy, so there’s that cost to family income of this employment musical chairs. The jobs market is very dynamic, people being trained and retrained all the time, so except for true skills shortages, which are rare in the modern situation, ill-timed immigration just displaces citizens. Some 51% of immigrants were needed for jobs or returned home while 49% of immigrants were absorbed into unemployment indirectly after 19 years. This unemployment is 6.4% of the 2005 labour force nationally, mostly in hidden unemployment. The cost of the inappropriate immigration is thus 6.4% of the annual national Labour Income of $694 billion (50.47% of the GDP of $1.375 trillion) for a sum of $45 billion annually circa 2005.  That’s 3.24% of the GDP, an amount equal to 19% of all federal taxes. It’s a second deficit, completely ignored by economists and politicians.

In soft economies people drop out of the labour force and this is what I mean by hidden unemployment. Statistics Canada tries to measure this group but I have found the drop in bad economies is greater than Statistics Canada says, indicating that their measure is not accurate. The measure comes from a telephone survey that does not properly capture what people will do years down the road about working.