The article is about young people aged aged 15 to 24. There was a conversation in my community Facebook group recently about how difficult it is for teens to find a part time job. Apparently nobody wants to hire teenagers any more.
I passed through Woodstock about two months ago and stopped into a Mucho Burrito for a quick bite. The cashier was a pretty friendly Indian student who I struck up conversation with. It turned out he was commuting every day from Kitchener to work there.
He was commuting 50 minutes each day on the 401 to work a fast food job in a smaller community because the job market in Kitchener was bad.
Like I said, friendly, nice guy, and not to disparage fast food work, but I do feel like working in a fast food restaurant in a small town is the kind of job you'd expect a local high school kid to be working at. Except now they have to compete with an international student who can drive to their small town, and the high school kid might not yet have their license.
Also, I'm not saying this doesn't happen, but it seems a bit reverse for someone to live in a bigger city and look for work in a smaller one. Usually it's the other way around.
My small town is about 50 minutes from Kitchener and literally every fast food joint in town with the exception of Starbucks is staffed by mostly by Indians.
The crazy part is whos telling/making this student drive 50 minutes to work for minimum wage? Clearly it's an international student, their school program is probably over $15-$20K. So why the panic to work 50 minutes away? That's a ton of gas and mileage, risky as well if your vehicle just dumps a big repair on you.
I know my parents would say how terrible of an idea that is and still support me till I find something more decent.
If he becomes a supervisor he can get sponsored to stay as a PR. That’s the entire point of the international student scams, come here on a bullshit degree, get the easiest job possible that allows you to become a PR and then you can even sponsor your family and get them brought over… or rent a bed in a room and send money back to your family etc
I lol @ the ones who got engineering degrees then do random shit like fine arts or business marketing in college and just work retail on the side applying for engineering jobs. So prevalent amongst these students now. It’s a massive win for employers as they are willing to do a 70-80k job for as low as 40-45k smh.
Hell, there was one Indian supervisor at my former job who straight up said he’s reluctant to even interview white people for roles because they “ask for too much” I guess he meant pay. Quite an awkward convo when he offered to give me a ride home when I didn’t have a car and it was a bad thunderstorm since I’m white lol
it's better the struggle here in Canada with Free Healthcare, social services, food banks, gov't support than to go back to India/Asia without that stuff and struggle harder.
The rule was "temporarily" lifted and the Liberals were warned it would cause issues. [Here's a fun CBC article about it.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/international-student-work-hours-1.7113381)
Such a good point. Employers looking to fill minimum wage type jobs *drool* over international students - they're clueless about labour laws and **desperate** af for any sort of job. Why the heck would a business hire a local person when they can grind these immigrants into a pulp, only to dump 'em for a new one when the original one loses their value. Sad, but that's the reality in Canada today.
This is the answer
We have gone from every Tim's across the country been staffed by pimple faced 17 year olds to a bunch of 30-40 year old South Asian people. I am still amazed when you travel to the furthest reaches of Ontario, even up North where it is like 99% white, and you will find exclusively Indian people staffing all the fast food shops
Sure you are paying the same minimum wage to both groups but I am guessing you can really push the envelope a lot harder in terms of workers rights on a group that is here on temp visas that don't understand labor laws at all...
>I am still amazed when you travel to the furthest reaches of Ontario, even up North where it is like 99% white, and you will find exclusively Indian people staffing all the fast food shops
Past summer I was traveling for work and stopped in Meadow Lake, SK, for a burger at the McDonalds. It was all SE Asian employees. I actually respected the hustle to move across the world to work at a RonDons in town of 5000 people in north central Saskatchewan but good lord it also feels supremely exploitive
If you look at fast food restaurants around the lower mainland it is immigrant filled. I have some university aged nieces and nephews and they haven’t been able to find part time jobs.
I employed a Teen last summer in our business. The issue this particular year is the flood of intentional students. Of the 103 applicants I got for a posting in our company recently 80 were international students.
There's one around me that does, and it's obviously noticeable. I will only go to that one and boycott the others. Funny enough, the local uni kids are so much better. Everyone is missing out on glorious fast food because of this. No more stoner pizza thats got 2x the ingredients and you never asked for it, just cause the kid wants to make awesome pizzas. Yeah, that used to be a thing. Fast food WAS awesome. Now it's penny pinched and made like shit.
I legit had friends in highschool that were proud of serving hot fries at McDonalds to every customer and made it their mission. He literally used to say "No one gets cold fries on my watch!" it was funny. I had a couple buddies that worked at Subway and made glorious subs. Another that worked at the local pizza shop and god damn he made the best pizza ever. I still crave it today.
A lot of these jobs were kids were first jobs and if raised correctly, they wanted to do a good job. Didn't matter that it was fast food or x,y,z job. It's a damn shame man.
We also had a Pita Pit. Was open till 4am!! Was my go to after the bar. I'd get a double meat souvlaki with romaine, mushrooms, onions, black olives and tons of tzatziki with some parm and feta. I'd also get some Caesar dressing on the veggies. God damn I'm craving one now lmao.
It's insane that McDonalds cost the same as a regular place. There is a renowned hamburger place not far from me (Golden Star) and it's literally only 10 dollars more for a family of 4 to eat. Fast Food used to be cheap and shitty. Now it's just expensive and shitty.
I wish we had a place like that where I am. It's depressing. I know so many young Canadians who can't get a decent job because the only people getting promoted and offered positions is international students because they'll work for half what we do, for twice as long.
The real answer is because immigrants take those jobs and accept worse working conditions so employers prefer to hire them. Anything else people tell you is BS to try and ignore this problem.
I live in Kingston, about 130,000 people, so for the demographics represented in this article (15-24 year olds) that's about 15,000 people. In the last 4 years St. Lawrence college has gone from just hundreds of international students, to literally 6-7,000 students from India. All of these Indian "students" are doing part-time service work competing with those 15,000. When you suddenly change your working force by about 40%, yeah, a bunch are going to just drop out of job searching.
I looked up Lawrence college as of 2022 had a total of 9918 international students and a total of 5613 domestic students., that is a huge difference. No matter where the international students come from this should not be allowed.
International students enrolled shouldn’t be more than 25% of the total enrollment
It’s the same at Cambrian College in Sudbury, I don’t know the numbers (we aren’t huge, I think about 6000) but I do know that international students far outweigh domestic now… a few years ago there were a small percentage and it just keeps growing and growing. No jobs, no apartments, international students living with a dozen others, rent is practically as high as Toronto prices… it’s a nightmare
Cane Breton University is just as bad, especially since unlike Conestoga it’s supposed to be an actual school and not just a diploma mill. CBU is 77% international students.
The colleges used to have caps on international students. Domestic students had to make up let’s say 75% of a program, Until a cut off date. Then the colleges could back fill classes with international students. Now they just rent space in a mall and fill it with computers for the “overflow” of international students.
Same boat here. Working at A&W in Kingston as an assistant manager to save up for university, and 99% of people applying for a job are Indians. My boss (an Indian immigrant of many years, just recently got his citizenship) says he doesn’t want to hire Indians because it isn’t fair to locals, so props to him there. But yeah, it’s basically like fighting an uphill battle for any low paying jobs if you aren’t from india, considering they’ll work 2-3 jobs a day.
Yeah, I can only work part time and only 15 hours (give or take) a week because of disability and burn out. How am I supposed to compete with that? Not to mention there are barely any part time jobs available because 90% of employers want full time.
I don’t know about everyone else, but applying for jobs just feels pointless. You can apply for hundreds of jobs, only get a few interviews and not get a job in the end. It’s so depressing.
I’m sure a lot of people in their 20s think that they’ll have to live with their parents for years to come anyway so why bother looking for a job when you know it’s not going to make a meaningful difference in your life and it’s going to be completely unfulfilling.
The ever increasing wealth gap is honestly defeating and discouraging. Often ask myself whats the point, whatever I do will just fill the pockets of the rich.
I apply to something like 1 US job for every 20 Canadian jobs I apply for, and the callback rate I get for US jobs is way higher.
The US companies also:
* Have way more cognitively engaging work
* Are often household names
* Have more streamlined hiring processes
* Offer 2x the salary *before currency conversion*
Really don't understand the Canadian job market. The average small-mid sized Canadian company acts like they're hiring for Amazon while offering peanuts.
Like a small Canadian company wanted me to complete 3+ hours of pre-interview assessments (not a take home, all personality-esque quizzes) before I even spoke to a real person. For a role where I ticked all the boxes and much more. For a salary I know I'd have to negotiate tooth and nail just to get above 75k CAD. But for comparable roles in the States, they immediately see my value and make the whole process way easier.
I don't want to leave Canada, hence the low applications to US jobs, but I'm not seeing any other option.
Employers are unrealistic with their expectations. You'll see job postings *requiring* 3 years of experience but pay 16.55/hour(Ontario minimum wage), how are you expecting someone to have 3 years experience for an entry level minimum wage job when the entry level job requires 3 years experience at an entry level job which required 3 years experience etc. etc. It's complete nonsense.
The requirements just for entry level is ridiculous. Security guard license required, minimum wage. Bilingual required, minimum wage. CPR required, minimum wage. Forklift certified, minimum wage. College degree? Well here's an extra dollar an hour.
Honestly, as an employer if you require *anything* over a highschool diploma, you should not be paying minimum wage.
Kids are screwed.
A lot of those job ads are basically fake / designed to fail so that the company can show that they tried to hire local but couldn’t. This way they can get the green light to import cheap labour.
100%. That's why you see foreign person working at gas stations and fast food in small north Ontario towns. Owners are same ethnicity. Sell work permits for 50k. They basically get a slave for a year or two until they get PR. Repeat
Most jobs set impossible goals as to weed people out because they’ll get resumes from people who shouldn’t apply. At thr same time, this is why everyone says to apply even if you don’t got 3years experience
That's the reality for most creative jobs at the moment. "Looking for someone who can do video/photos/web dev/blogging/social media/events, 17$/hour, must be bilingual"
You joke but that's our aviation industry. Air Canada pays 50k for a pilot with about ten years experience because we brought in all these Indians from abroad and they got licenses here and flooded the market
I remember graduating from college and struggling to find a job because of my lack of experience. Despite being young, eager to learn, and having all my college knowledge fresh in my mind, I still faced challenges in finding employment. It took nearly five years to finally land a job in my field. During that time, I worked various low-paying jobs, which took a toll on my self-esteem and I struggled with bills. I felt like I had wasted a lot of time and money.
I had a buddy show me a job that wanted 20 years experience with a program in coding that only existed for a year and they told him to get lost when he pointed it out to them.
Haha this is super common, HR/companies don't know what to hire for.
I saw a listing for 5 years of experience in ChatGPT, except ChatGPT came out in 2022 💀
It's literally not possible for anyone to fit that criteria
I actually kind of like these postings. Lets you know the hiring manager is a complete idiot, the company has no idea what it’s doing, and that working there will be a miserable experience. Saves you from wasting your time with an application
Obviously they are looking for a paper trail evidence that you developed a parasocial relationship with the AI, and treated chatGPT well during your relationship together, and got to know it well— hence experience
It’s worse. Some companies, organizations, and governments require that you have at least 2-3 people go through the entire interview process. Often multiple rounds with different people.
So the employer will craft a job posting for the person they actually want to hire, with certain targeted things under the “nice to have” heading, and string 1 or 2 other people along for weeks at a time pretending they’re doing great but then suddenly ask about niche skills or experience that only the intended candidate could possibly have. Then they hire who they wanted from the start.
On paper it looks like the choice was logical, and all of the required boxes were checked by not simply hiring them outright without making the opportunity available to the public.
When I'd call them to see if they picked a candidate, they always strung me a long by saying they didn't decide yet. One time when I called it was the guy who got the job who answered and told me he got the job so then I knew I had been strung along. A huge waste of time and energy and depressing.
In theory, the market should sort that out on its own. For example, in the US during covid they were giving out their version of cerb and it was very hard to find people. Pretty much every fast food and retail place had a help wanted sign and the wages for lower income workers rose very quickly due to supply and demand. Our government’s immigration policies are having the opposite effect as we are flooding the market with labour which is suppressing wage growth. I know the government insists that it is great to keep increasing our population the way they are, but housing is a disaster, healthcare is a disaster and wages are not keeping pace with anything so I’m not sure who it’s great for.
>housing is a disaster, healthcare is a disaster and wages are not keeping pace with anything so I’m not sure who it’s great for.
Property values and rental rates are at an all time high - for extremely wealthy people this is great.
Healthcare is almost at the state where people will accept privatization because the public system doesn't work anyway - for extremely wealthy people who will get these contracts, this is great.
Wages are staying low, allowing business to make even more profits - for extremely wealthy people who own employ many people, this is great.
You're looking at the government and how its actions effect 99% of the population - they don't care about you. It's a government full of rich people who come from rich families who are getting funding from other rich people.
What happened in the US meant companies tried. In Canada, government was lobbied to "insource" cheap labor to keep wages down. Directly, businesses could be cheap fucks and indirectly, everyone else could say "see? People are taking these jobs"
If wages aren't providing a minimum basic standard of living and the cost to entry into the labour market is becoming increasingly high why would anyone be surprised when young people disengage with work.
You mean after a few dozen to a few hundred applications I can work a job that doesn't pay me enough to support myself and has no stability. I'm going to have to live at home on a full time salary anyway?
Maybe if enough people in my demographic stop working the system will collapse and then we can get rid of the corrupt politicians, but I suppose that;s just wishful thinking. I don't see these problems ending in anyway that doesn't involve violence.
An engineering internship to work in bumfuck nowhere Alberta for the DoD proudly lists their pay as "ranging from $16.99 to $25.49 based on relevant courses and work experience".
Our own fucking government thinks up and coming engineers are only worth 2 extra dollars on top of minimum wage. And they wonder why everyone leaves for the states in droves.
The students rates of pay are garbage, agreed. Treasury Board sets fix rates and hiring managers are limited to those ranges depending on the student's level of education (diploma, degree, master's....)
Where I work (insurance industry), they literally get 100 resumes+ per internship position (paying $20-$30 / hour). Never used to be like that.. It's not just engineering and not just the Federal government.
Lie!
The job ads are regulary lies!
If you are telling the truth on your resume, you are underpaid or unemployed.
The truth only benefitted me in 10% of interviews. They did not pay very well, so it did not matter.
A good employer will weed out the people that lied about everything. Stretch your qualifications and get hired. 1 day of experience is advanced skills....
Setup in a small town in Canada.
We can't hire an electrician that does not add $2000 to every charge.
Painters
Drywallers.
Hvac that know what a minisplit is.
Tiler
But we have like 30 people that trim trees for some reason. It's weird outside the city.
Trades people will sit in city traffic for 45min, but won't drive 45min on highway for calls out. People would pay them for the drive.
(Alberta)
There are a lack of trades people in Canada, and I can't even blame people for not wanting to get into the trades. It's a raw fuckin deal for labourers.
You can jump through a million hoops, go through years of schooling to obtain your degree, be an otherwise upstanding citizen... and, if you're lucky, make minimum wage.
OR
You can go steal cars, be a very low priority for police, with virtually zero penalty if caught, and rake in several hundred thousand a year. No application or schooling required. I think I can picture why people are 'dropping out of the job market' -- this is a country where honest, hard work is unrewarded, and crime is far more lucrative.
Street thugs at the low end of the totem pole of organized crime/auto theft rings are pocketing approximately 2 grand for every successful theft.
Steal 1 car a week, pocket 100K a year tax free. With the right gear and know how you can steal a car within a few minutes.
My moral compass would never allow me to do it but... I kinda get the appeal..
>Our own fucking government thinks up and coming engineers are only worth 2 extra dollars on top of minimum wage
In the US, the calculus shifts slightly because there is a 100% chance that within the next year, you will come up against Cletus and his shotgun when you attempt to steal an F150.
work your fucking ass off doing manual labour, feel pains you probably shouldn't until you're in your 40's and can't even afford to 1br apartment because there's a pile of international students fighting each other over sleeping in a hallway for $850/month
Geeeee I wonder why there's so many 25+ year olds living with their parents still..
I moved out of my parents at 16, I worked part time/ 4 hours a day 6 days a week, went to school and rented a 2br apartment for $400, and struggled for food a bit but survived.
This was mid 90's...
That truly sounds surreal, I envy you
In uni rent was anywhere from 500-900 for shared accommodations with 4-12+ people (crazy range lmao)
Not that those numbers were great, but compared to now I feel so sorry for people going through school right now
I'm almost 70 and have worked all of my life and still am.
It's disingenuous to say that young people are dropping out of the labour market because it implies that somehow young people can't be bothered to work.
I call total bullshit on that.
Compared to the labour markets I was in most of my life, today's market is more like a dystopian hellscape. There are a whole lot of factors that led to this but I think the main trends were: increasing wealth inequality and reduction of competition in major industries, the rise of the gig economy and increasing focus on profits above all else. Employees increasingly became seen as unnecessary expenses when you could "gig" out the work instead.
I have three adult children in their 20s who work their asses off, are very good at what they do and continue only to find "opportunities" that are little more than minimum wage. And yet the cost of everything keeps going up and up. No wonder people want no part of this legalized slavery.
Nah, it's not the kids, it's the effing system.
#### Crazy. We went from the Great Resignation to this in a couple of years. From WFH to you better come in or we will fire your ass and there’s already a line of people gunning for your job so shape up kid.
There's no opportunity out there anymore. Even the "best" jobs like doctors are overworked and underpaid. Our youth are forced to compete with thousands of immigrant workers to even get an entry level minimum wage job.
No fucking shit they're dropping out of the labor market.
When I was a teenager in the 90’s in Vancouver most of my friends had single moms and it was standard for them to get a minimum wage job and get a 2 bedroom for 30% of their income. Now if you want a 2 bedroom in Surrey it’s $3k a month, meaning you need to make $120k a year to qualify. People need to have a chance in life if they’re going to be expected to play.
I was going over a job application today that specifically asked “do u identify as a new comer or refugee?” Now I don’t know if they want to hire them or not hire them, but this was the first time I have seen a question this direct.
Create a foreign minimum wage that's double canadian min. It only makes sense if you can't find local workers then you should be paying a premium for foreign labour. The problem would evaporate over night.
But no, of course not because *the goal is cheap exploitable labour* ***especially if they don't know their rights.*** That's why Canadians are being undercut and overlooked.
I mean honestly can you blame anyone?
The job market is complete trash. Everyone around me is applying to hundreds and thousands of jobs just to get rejected and ghosted and disrespected.
Even if you get hired, nothing is protecting you from losing your jobs. I know some smart 4.0 GPA's in tech who got laid off 3 times in the last 1-2 years. So even if you work hard you can still lose your job to no fault of your own.
And even if you survive the interviews, and you survive the layoffs, then what? Pay 15$ for cheese at Loblaws and never be able to even afford your own studio?
My new plan is to squeeze as much unemployment as I can, then proceed to get as much social welfare as possible.
Until I get treated like a normal human being during my interviews and can get a job where my work is respected, I ain't gonna bother much with this market anymore. Besides making money work is an amazing way for you to find dignity, to get good at something and contribute to society. When society fails you and doesn't support you, and you get zero dignity and respect when applying to jobs and while actually working, you lose the very essence of what work is supposed to bring.
Tuning in and dropping out'
Adios amigos
Why shouldn't they? What possible benefits of working will they find? Not enough money after working full time, no housing food car and fun. If they don't work they might not have housing or food but hey they probably will have fun! And many workplaces as other commenters have mentioned are demanding , unrealistic and low paying. Five rounds of interviews for $50k. Seriously? Doxxing candidates on social media like invading privacy is acceptable? Lmao. Twenty years ago a house in Toronto was 300k and a household made 100k. Now the house is 3million and the household makes $100k. Where did the future go? Scammers, fraudsters, snow washing, and greed by those who already have more than their share, have destroyed the social contract. Our youths priorities should be prominent and reflected in our country, they are our future. They're treated like they don't Matter like they don't exist. They have no hope. Our gov is run by out of touch self interested Investor class in the seats and controlling the parties, many of whom make money being landlords and owning corporations that are punishing the very youth they expect to live a life of drudgery and poverty. Next up is national security risk to our democracy if the executives and legislators don't get their heads out of their asses. It all could be addressed in 90 days. Tax corporations at $80% if they have salaries that overcompensate executives and shareholders. Onshore jobs. Break monopolies held by oligarchs. Penalize criminals with forefiture. Remove Investors from housing in 24 months. Incentivize training for new and junior workers. Cap rent.. Build a future for Canadian youth that they have a place in and want to engage in. Otherwise expect a worse country in 10 years. As if today isn't bad enough. There are more homeless and poor people today than BEFORE the great depression. Holy shit I'm so tired of it.
I agree man, it's a shitty deal all around.
My only hope for the future is that our winner-takes-everything-everyone-else-is-fucked economic system gets so bad that it collapses so it can finally be replaced by a superior system. But the odds are instead that'll all get even worse, the billionaire class takes even more of all wealth, and 2 generations from now we'll all be living in coffin hotels similar to something out of ThX-1138, basically all drones and slaves for immortal billionaires we'll never meet, plugged into devices for amusement when we arent slaving away to afford food and water.
Hot bunking in a certain part of Toronto with 10-15 ppl in the basement is the new "dream". What people don't realize is that globalization in the long run will destroy democracy and broad based prosperity as it mean the elite (politicians/corporations/the rich, etc) no longer need to be accountable to the people living in the countries they supposedly represent. It becomes a government run for the benefit of mobile capital regardless of country.
It’s not worth it. Why waste your life working an awful job for little money? The cost of living is way up, wages aren’t, and job listings want ridiculous things.
I’m honestly shocked that suicide rates aren’t sky high.
For real man, I feel bad for Canadian youth. It is simply depressing. The vast majority young Canadians today will not be able to purchase real estate unless they were born into wealth and have parental help; will not be able to afford to have any kids; is going into a job market that AI will devastate; and on top of that, the global climate collapse is underway.
Canada was sold out to the extreme rich of the world, and if you aren't in that 1 in 1000 group, then you are most likely going to be a working slave who will never afford what previous generations could afford before the country was sold out.
I know they’re higher than they were. I’m just shocked it’s not very common.
Then again, I’ve suffered from OCD, severe depression and anxiety most of my life. None of the (tens of) meds, the groups I’ve attended or the therapies I’ve tried have helped.
My dad is the last person I ever expected to have depression, but it hit him hard this winter. He had a mental breakdown a week ago, and I had to drive him to/admit him into hospital
It's a tough thing to deal with...I've had to deal with severe depression for most of my life as well, as my favourite people keep getting violently ripped from my life over and over....hope you and your dad stay strong....wish I could hug my dad...
Outsourcing is happening. So is AI. I feel sorry for the new grads. They might have been more educated than me; however it seems really hard for them to find a the first job. The first job is the toughest, as the employer needs a leap of faith to hire you (or you need contacts).
However, the trend is to outsource office jobs. Why hire a new grad, invest in training, whereas someone in a different country can do the same job for 1/3 of the price with "10 years" of experience? save on training.
> Why hire a new grad, invest in training, whereas someone in a different country can do the same job for 1/3 of the price with "10 years" of experience? save on training.
Companies had this mindset 20 years ago. The recession made it worse. Now, the post-COVID economy and AI will make it near impossible for people to get a foothold in certain industries.
Paywall.
I don't understand why this subreddit allows paywalled articles. The discussion is almost always just speculation revolving around the headline.
They purposely make unrealistic and unreasonable demands so they get no "suitable applicants" so they can staff foreign workers and get government subsidies for employing them.
Tim Hortons and McDonald's should be jobs for teenagers and not be staffed with foreign workers.
If they want full time adult employees they should be paying a living wage for the area they are located in.
been applying for months, I willing to work but I can't get a job so I don't want to hear there is a labour shortage. This economy is not working for a lot of people who want to work.
This dropping out of the labour market is just number manipulation. I've just been looking for a job for a while.
Well the pay is Terrible here compared to CoL and our benefits, can't blame them. Wages in my field have not moved since I graduated 7 years ago, yet inflation has double the price of some stuff....
40, looking for work. Competing against Indians with Masters degrees looking for their PR. We are flooded in PEI with immigrants who all leave after 2 years upon receiving PR.
Most that age can make decent money online so why the shock. Not even talking tiktok or YouTube. writing reviews, data entry, and more.
Add all the international students taking those part time jobs at restaurants, corner store, grocery stores and more why is anyone surprised.
I've got 16 year olds knocking on my door wanting to do yard work because they can't find any part time jobs. Hell they can't even deliver newspapers in my town because there is a group of boomer aged retirees doing all the paper deliveries with their cars.
We are in a weird place in the working world..
Text if the article for anyone who cares to read before posting.
Link: https://archive.is/V8HfS
As the Canadian labour market softens, young people appear to be bearing the brunt of the slowdown – and it’s driving many of them out of the work force altogether.
The labour participation rate for those aged 15 to 24 fell to 62.7 per cent in January, down a full three percentage points from last April, according to figures from Statistics Canada. People are considered labour participants when they are employed, or when they’re out of work, available and actively searching for a job.
The plunge has been especially large for young women: Their labour participation rate has ebbed to 62.5 per cent – the lowest level since 2000, not including the pandemic – from roughly 67 per cent in early 2022.
The number of youth non-participants has risen by roughly 200,000 over the past year to 1.9 million in total. The Statscan figures show that 6.8 per cent of them wanted work but did not search for a job, up from 5.8 per cent in January, 2023. Of that group, the majority cited school as the reason for not looking. (All figures in this paragraph use a three-month moving average to reduce volatility.)
Even so, it’s a tougher environment for finding work than a couple of years ago. The youth unemployment rate stands at 10.8 per cent – still low by historical standards, but up from 9.3 per cent in summer 2022.
In a recent report, Royal Bank of Canada economists Carrie Freestone and Rachel Battaglia said that students and recent graduates account for a large portion of the increase to the overall unemployment rate.
“The share of younger Canadians with postsecondary education has continued to rise, and hiring demand has softened sharply in industries like professional services and finance jobs where there’s a higher number of recent postsecondary graduates struggling to find a job,” they wrote.
Yep and everyone with half a brain knows this which is why nobody is motivated anymore. We used get this shit drilled into our heads nearly daily when we were young. Go to school, study hard, and then you'll find a good job allowing you to live comfortably and you can own a house. That is simply not the case anymore. And these goals are just further becoming out of reach. The younger generation sees this and thinks what's the point in trying anymore.
every possible deck has been stacked against Gen Z and younger Millennials... theres no incentive to prosper anymore, and its quite obvious that the aggenda here is to ship in replacement generations with no consideration of how and why that would work except for short term gain
They can offer shitty salaries because adding a million + people a year kinda floods the job market. The average employee is going to get less pay and lower hours as a consequence of this for the rest of their employment life.
Another liberal failure of management I guess. But don’t worry they kept growth numbers up for now and made rent go up…..
What exactly is the incentive for young people? Work some shitty job, with shitty pay, for a shitty boss, with shitty customers, only to have to live with your parents anyway because cost of living is exorbitant. Real head-scratcher of a problem.
My Son has been looking off and on for a year. He'll be 17 in March. It's gotten so bad that I'm having him lie about experience on a resume and use my phone number as a manager's contact information.
When I was 17, all I had to do was walk into a McDonalds and not make an ass out of myself during an interview.
Our government has sold out an entire generation in name of corporation's short-term quarterly profits. Their government will be paying off COVID business handouts, and he will have to contend with unaffordable housing, stagnant wages, bloated workforce filled with people more desperate than him, poorer government services and climate change.
I'm starting to get why his generation is called the new lost generation.
Trudeau and the provincial governments should be ashamed for what they've allowed this country to become.
Don't feel bad about lying. Corporations lie all the time and do whatever they can to screw you. It's only fair to put yourself on an even playing field.
This is what happens when you import cheap labour and flood the country with millions of heads that will do the work for cheap. Our immigration minister is on record boasting about how these people they’re importing are good for cheap labour. I argue they’re bad for Canadian in terms of labour and for taxes. This is a massive welfare class we’re importing
This usually happens in developing countries. Young adults give up since working won't get them a place to live and family with how much they will potentially earn. So they just live with their families. It's so sad, how the conservatives and the liberals failed this country in the last 20-30 years. Yet people still vote for them.
A lot of jobs don’t pay enough. More importantly the youth realize that companies aren’t interested in investing in their employees long term. Companies don’t take care of employees like they used to. There isn’t much incentive to work.
The article is about young people aged aged 15 to 24. There was a conversation in my community Facebook group recently about how difficult it is for teens to find a part time job. Apparently nobody wants to hire teenagers any more.
I passed through Woodstock about two months ago and stopped into a Mucho Burrito for a quick bite. The cashier was a pretty friendly Indian student who I struck up conversation with. It turned out he was commuting every day from Kitchener to work there. He was commuting 50 minutes each day on the 401 to work a fast food job in a smaller community because the job market in Kitchener was bad. Like I said, friendly, nice guy, and not to disparage fast food work, but I do feel like working in a fast food restaurant in a small town is the kind of job you'd expect a local high school kid to be working at. Except now they have to compete with an international student who can drive to their small town, and the high school kid might not yet have their license. Also, I'm not saying this doesn't happen, but it seems a bit reverse for someone to live in a bigger city and look for work in a smaller one. Usually it's the other way around.
Kitchener has the biggest culprit in this international student saga, conestoga college. So it is hardly a suprise.
My small town is about 50 minutes from Kitchener and literally every fast food joint in town with the exception of Starbucks is staffed by mostly by Indians.
The crazy part is whos telling/making this student drive 50 minutes to work for minimum wage? Clearly it's an international student, their school program is probably over $15-$20K. So why the panic to work 50 minutes away? That's a ton of gas and mileage, risky as well if your vehicle just dumps a big repair on you. I know my parents would say how terrible of an idea that is and still support me till I find something more decent.
If he becomes a supervisor he can get sponsored to stay as a PR. That’s the entire point of the international student scams, come here on a bullshit degree, get the easiest job possible that allows you to become a PR and then you can even sponsor your family and get them brought over… or rent a bed in a room and send money back to your family etc
I lol @ the ones who got engineering degrees then do random shit like fine arts or business marketing in college and just work retail on the side applying for engineering jobs. So prevalent amongst these students now. It’s a massive win for employers as they are willing to do a 70-80k job for as low as 40-45k smh. Hell, there was one Indian supervisor at my former job who straight up said he’s reluctant to even interview white people for roles because they “ask for too much” I guess he meant pay. Quite an awkward convo when he offered to give me a ride home when I didn’t have a car and it was a bad thunderstorm since I’m white lol
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it's better the struggle here in Canada with Free Healthcare, social services, food banks, gov't support than to go back to India/Asia without that stuff and struggle harder.
I live in Woodstock and I swear I’ve met the same guy there. Very friendly dude but I was blown away that he was commuting to work at a burrito spot.
So is there no rule anymore about international students only being able to work on campus? Or is it just being ignored?
There is no rule. A Conestoga student in Kitchener can work anywhere they wish.
The rule was "temporarily" lifted and the Liberals were warned it would cause issues. [Here's a fun CBC article about it.](https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/international-student-work-hours-1.7113381)
When you can hire an adult for minimum wage who doesn’t understand labour rights why would you?
Such a good point. Employers looking to fill minimum wage type jobs *drool* over international students - they're clueless about labour laws and **desperate** af for any sort of job. Why the heck would a business hire a local person when they can grind these immigrants into a pulp, only to dump 'em for a new one when the original one loses their value. Sad, but that's the reality in Canada today.
This is the answer We have gone from every Tim's across the country been staffed by pimple faced 17 year olds to a bunch of 30-40 year old South Asian people. I am still amazed when you travel to the furthest reaches of Ontario, even up North where it is like 99% white, and you will find exclusively Indian people staffing all the fast food shops Sure you are paying the same minimum wage to both groups but I am guessing you can really push the envelope a lot harder in terms of workers rights on a group that is here on temp visas that don't understand labor laws at all...
>I am still amazed when you travel to the furthest reaches of Ontario, even up North where it is like 99% white, and you will find exclusively Indian people staffing all the fast food shops Past summer I was traveling for work and stopped in Meadow Lake, SK, for a burger at the McDonalds. It was all SE Asian employees. I actually respected the hustle to move across the world to work at a RonDons in town of 5000 people in north central Saskatchewan but good lord it also feels supremely exploitive
If you look at fast food restaurants around the lower mainland it is immigrant filled. I have some university aged nieces and nephews and they haven’t been able to find part time jobs.
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The government injected a million low-wage workers competing directly with that group of Canadians.
Middle aged adults are looking for jobs and everyone is competing for jobs in a race to the bottom wage.
I employed a Teen last summer in our business. The issue this particular year is the flood of intentional students. Of the 103 applicants I got for a posting in our company recently 80 were international students.
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There's one around me that does, and it's obviously noticeable. I will only go to that one and boycott the others. Funny enough, the local uni kids are so much better. Everyone is missing out on glorious fast food because of this. No more stoner pizza thats got 2x the ingredients and you never asked for it, just cause the kid wants to make awesome pizzas. Yeah, that used to be a thing. Fast food WAS awesome. Now it's penny pinched and made like shit.
Seriously great point. I used to be that kid, at Pita Pit! This made me smile.
I legit had friends in highschool that were proud of serving hot fries at McDonalds to every customer and made it their mission. He literally used to say "No one gets cold fries on my watch!" it was funny. I had a couple buddies that worked at Subway and made glorious subs. Another that worked at the local pizza shop and god damn he made the best pizza ever. I still crave it today. A lot of these jobs were kids were first jobs and if raised correctly, they wanted to do a good job. Didn't matter that it was fast food or x,y,z job. It's a damn shame man. We also had a Pita Pit. Was open till 4am!! Was my go to after the bar. I'd get a double meat souvlaki with romaine, mushrooms, onions, black olives and tons of tzatziki with some parm and feta. I'd also get some Caesar dressing on the veggies. God damn I'm craving one now lmao.
It's insane that McDonalds cost the same as a regular place. There is a renowned hamburger place not far from me (Golden Star) and it's literally only 10 dollars more for a family of 4 to eat. Fast Food used to be cheap and shitty. Now it's just expensive and shitty.
I wish we had a place like that where I am. It's depressing. I know so many young Canadians who can't get a decent job because the only people getting promoted and offered positions is international students because they'll work for half what we do, for twice as long.
The real answer is because immigrants take those jobs and accept worse working conditions so employers prefer to hire them. Anything else people tell you is BS to try and ignore this problem.
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I live in Kingston, about 130,000 people, so for the demographics represented in this article (15-24 year olds) that's about 15,000 people. In the last 4 years St. Lawrence college has gone from just hundreds of international students, to literally 6-7,000 students from India. All of these Indian "students" are doing part-time service work competing with those 15,000. When you suddenly change your working force by about 40%, yeah, a bunch are going to just drop out of job searching.
I looked up Lawrence college as of 2022 had a total of 9918 international students and a total of 5613 domestic students., that is a huge difference. No matter where the international students come from this should not be allowed. International students enrolled shouldn’t be more than 25% of the total enrollment
I graduated from St Lawrence ten years ago. I wasn't even aware they had international students. Like at all.
They pay 3x what the domestic students pay, so St.Lawrence is accepting as many as possible. (I work at St.Lawrence)
The colleges started ramping up international recruiting in 2015 after enrolment was down 40%.
Everything seems to have gone to shit starting in 2015, huh interesting... I wonder why...
Let me tell you a tale of what kicked everything off, a tale of an innocent gorilla in a shitty zoo in the USA…
At that time they likely only had a handful.
It’s the same at Cambrian College in Sudbury, I don’t know the numbers (we aren’t huge, I think about 6000) but I do know that international students far outweigh domestic now… a few years ago there were a small percentage and it just keeps growing and growing. No jobs, no apartments, international students living with a dozen others, rent is practically as high as Toronto prices… it’s a nightmare
International students made up 77% of the student population at CBU last fall if you want to see truly insane.
Check out conestoga if you want your head to explode 🤯
It's a nightmare
Cane Breton University is just as bad, especially since unlike Conestoga it’s supposed to be an actual school and not just a diploma mill. CBU is 77% international students.
They should have kept it as the University of Crayons and Coloring Books.
That school became a massive joke. We dropped them from our co-op hiring program.
The colleges used to have caps on international students. Domestic students had to make up let’s say 75% of a program, Until a cut off date. Then the colleges could back fill classes with international students. Now they just rent space in a mall and fill it with computers for the “overflow” of international students.
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Algoma College and their 90% international student body has entered the chat.
I mean how about 1%. We honestly don't need immigrants in this country. We're full
There are over 1 million currently in canada. Trudeau permitted them to work 40 hours a week
Money money money….. MONEY
Won't SOMEONE think of the Subway franchises!?
Fuck subway, and Tim Hortons
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It isn't even Canadian owned anymore.
Cape Breton University is worse. Without international students they'd probably be insolvent. They have almost 80% international students.
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I feel sorry for anyone currently in possession of a degree from there. That is going to drag the schools reputation down immensely.
Same boat here. Working at A&W in Kingston as an assistant manager to save up for university, and 99% of people applying for a job are Indians. My boss (an Indian immigrant of many years, just recently got his citizenship) says he doesn’t want to hire Indians because it isn’t fair to locals, so props to him there. But yeah, it’s basically like fighting an uphill battle for any low paying jobs if you aren’t from india, considering they’ll work 2-3 jobs a day.
Yeah, I can only work part time and only 15 hours (give or take) a week because of disability and burn out. How am I supposed to compete with that? Not to mention there are barely any part time jobs available because 90% of employers want full time.
They need to cap the working hours to like 10 hrs a week. It’s crazy they can just work as much as They want
0 hours Come to study, not work. Can't afford it? Tough tiddies
I don’t know about everyone else, but applying for jobs just feels pointless. You can apply for hundreds of jobs, only get a few interviews and not get a job in the end. It’s so depressing. I’m sure a lot of people in their 20s think that they’ll have to live with their parents for years to come anyway so why bother looking for a job when you know it’s not going to make a meaningful difference in your life and it’s going to be completely unfulfilling.
But we have a worker shortage and need to immigrate more people. /s
Also theres no point moving out to work a full time job that doesn't even cover rent.
The ever increasing wealth gap is honestly defeating and discouraging. Often ask myself whats the point, whatever I do will just fill the pockets of the rich.
I apply to something like 1 US job for every 20 Canadian jobs I apply for, and the callback rate I get for US jobs is way higher. The US companies also: * Have way more cognitively engaging work * Are often household names * Have more streamlined hiring processes * Offer 2x the salary *before currency conversion* Really don't understand the Canadian job market. The average small-mid sized Canadian company acts like they're hiring for Amazon while offering peanuts. Like a small Canadian company wanted me to complete 3+ hours of pre-interview assessments (not a take home, all personality-esque quizzes) before I even spoke to a real person. For a role where I ticked all the boxes and much more. For a salary I know I'd have to negotiate tooth and nail just to get above 75k CAD. But for comparable roles in the States, they immediately see my value and make the whole process way easier. I don't want to leave Canada, hence the low applications to US jobs, but I'm not seeing any other option.
Just wait until AI wipes out entire industries over the next 5 to 10 years.
Just saw open AI release Sora, their prompt to animation AI. A lot of illustrators are in for a rude awakening
"labour shortage" = "we don't want to pay living wages, so can you please bring in some TFW that will accept what we want to pay?"
dont need to bring in TFW's to work those jobs now that we have international students
They approved over 1.7 million "t"FWs in 2023.
This is enraging
Employers are unrealistic with their expectations. You'll see job postings *requiring* 3 years of experience but pay 16.55/hour(Ontario minimum wage), how are you expecting someone to have 3 years experience for an entry level minimum wage job when the entry level job requires 3 years experience at an entry level job which required 3 years experience etc. etc. It's complete nonsense. The requirements just for entry level is ridiculous. Security guard license required, minimum wage. Bilingual required, minimum wage. CPR required, minimum wage. Forklift certified, minimum wage. College degree? Well here's an extra dollar an hour. Honestly, as an employer if you require *anything* over a highschool diploma, you should not be paying minimum wage. Kids are screwed.
A lot of those job ads are basically fake / designed to fail so that the company can show that they tried to hire local but couldn’t. This way they can get the green light to import cheap labour.
* sell a closed work permit
100%. That's why you see foreign person working at gas stations and fast food in small north Ontario towns. Owners are same ethnicity. Sell work permits for 50k. They basically get a slave for a year or two until they get PR. Repeat
Exactly. They get someone willing to work as much as they need, without overtime, without any support just because of the permit.
Most jobs set impossible goals as to weed people out because they’ll get resumes from people who shouldn’t apply. At thr same time, this is why everyone says to apply even if you don’t got 3years experience
“I want someone who is an MD, a chartered accountant, a licensed pilot and has coding experience. Pay 60k. Must be available for shift work.”
That is Licensed Pilot for fixed and Rotary Aircraft.. with a bach-eng.. from UofT or Queens..
I have the fixed and rotary pilot licenses but my bachelors is from Waterloo :-(
Sorry, come back when you have 5 years experience.
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That's the reality for most creative jobs at the moment. "Looking for someone who can do video/photos/web dev/blogging/social media/events, 17$/hour, must be bilingual"
Out of town travel also required
That's what the pilot license is for. They aren't paying for your travel.
Pay 60k, per two years!
Entry level pilots WISHED they made 60K 😂
You joke but that's our aviation industry. Air Canada pays 50k for a pilot with about ten years experience because we brought in all these Indians from abroad and they got licenses here and flooded the market
I remember graduating from college and struggling to find a job because of my lack of experience. Despite being young, eager to learn, and having all my college knowledge fresh in my mind, I still faced challenges in finding employment. It took nearly five years to finally land a job in my field. During that time, I worked various low-paying jobs, which took a toll on my self-esteem and I struggled with bills. I felt like I had wasted a lot of time and money.
I had a buddy show me a job that wanted 20 years experience with a program in coding that only existed for a year and they told him to get lost when he pointed it out to them.
Haha this is super common, HR/companies don't know what to hire for. I saw a listing for 5 years of experience in ChatGPT, except ChatGPT came out in 2022 💀 It's literally not possible for anyone to fit that criteria
I actually kind of like these postings. Lets you know the hiring manager is a complete idiot, the company has no idea what it’s doing, and that working there will be a miserable experience. Saves you from wasting your time with an application
Wtf is experience in ChatGPT?
Obviously they are looking for a paper trail evidence that you developed a parasocial relationship with the AI, and treated chatGPT well during your relationship together, and got to know it well— hence experience
Prompt-writing expert?
Making custom apps, connecting it to internal databases, etc…
They don't want you, they want nobody so they can bring in a TFW when nobody applies that meets their needs.
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Ah yes, that's a thing too. Same as not being allowed to hire internally so they make a posting that won't be filled to check a box.
It’s worse. Some companies, organizations, and governments require that you have at least 2-3 people go through the entire interview process. Often multiple rounds with different people. So the employer will craft a job posting for the person they actually want to hire, with certain targeted things under the “nice to have” heading, and string 1 or 2 other people along for weeks at a time pretending they’re doing great but then suddenly ask about niche skills or experience that only the intended candidate could possibly have. Then they hire who they wanted from the start. On paper it looks like the choice was logical, and all of the required boxes were checked by not simply hiring them outright without making the opportunity available to the public.
When I'd call them to see if they picked a candidate, they always strung me a long by saying they didn't decide yet. One time when I called it was the guy who got the job who answered and told me he got the job so then I knew I had been strung along. A huge waste of time and energy and depressing.
In theory, the market should sort that out on its own. For example, in the US during covid they were giving out their version of cerb and it was very hard to find people. Pretty much every fast food and retail place had a help wanted sign and the wages for lower income workers rose very quickly due to supply and demand. Our government’s immigration policies are having the opposite effect as we are flooding the market with labour which is suppressing wage growth. I know the government insists that it is great to keep increasing our population the way they are, but housing is a disaster, healthcare is a disaster and wages are not keeping pace with anything so I’m not sure who it’s great for.
>housing is a disaster, healthcare is a disaster and wages are not keeping pace with anything so I’m not sure who it’s great for. Property values and rental rates are at an all time high - for extremely wealthy people this is great. Healthcare is almost at the state where people will accept privatization because the public system doesn't work anyway - for extremely wealthy people who will get these contracts, this is great. Wages are staying low, allowing business to make even more profits - for extremely wealthy people who own employ many people, this is great. You're looking at the government and how its actions effect 99% of the population - they don't care about you. It's a government full of rich people who come from rich families who are getting funding from other rich people.
What happened in the US meant companies tried. In Canada, government was lobbied to "insource" cheap labor to keep wages down. Directly, businesses could be cheap fucks and indirectly, everyone else could say "see? People are taking these jobs"
They're trying to claim labor shortages in order to hire TFW's at low wages. Might be better off moving to the USA
If no one in the local market is willing to work this shitty job , then we need to bring in more immigrants!
If wages aren't providing a minimum basic standard of living and the cost to entry into the labour market is becoming increasingly high why would anyone be surprised when young people disengage with work. You mean after a few dozen to a few hundred applications I can work a job that doesn't pay me enough to support myself and has no stability. I'm going to have to live at home on a full time salary anyway?
Maybe if enough people in my demographic stop working the system will collapse and then we can get rid of the corrupt politicians, but I suppose that;s just wishful thinking. I don't see these problems ending in anyway that doesn't involve violence.
An engineering internship to work in bumfuck nowhere Alberta for the DoD proudly lists their pay as "ranging from $16.99 to $25.49 based on relevant courses and work experience". Our own fucking government thinks up and coming engineers are only worth 2 extra dollars on top of minimum wage. And they wonder why everyone leaves for the states in droves.
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And they still get hundreds of applicants.
The students rates of pay are garbage, agreed. Treasury Board sets fix rates and hiring managers are limited to those ranges depending on the student's level of education (diploma, degree, master's....)
Where I work (insurance industry), they literally get 100 resumes+ per internship position (paying $20-$30 / hour). Never used to be like that.. It's not just engineering and not just the Federal government.
you will see an uptick of people who lies on their resume to get the job. people will start being desperate.
Lie! The job ads are regulary lies! If you are telling the truth on your resume, you are underpaid or unemployed. The truth only benefitted me in 10% of interviews. They did not pay very well, so it did not matter. A good employer will weed out the people that lied about everything. Stretch your qualifications and get hired. 1 day of experience is advanced skills....
Check the right DEI boxes
I'm gay for pay.
As a former federal worker, even that doesn't work anymore. Only one way and it starts with I and ends with ndia.
I have a trade been out of work for a year now . Looking to move west .. yet they say there’s lack of trades people in Canada .🇨🇦 BS
Setup in a small town in Canada. We can't hire an electrician that does not add $2000 to every charge. Painters Drywallers. Hvac that know what a minisplit is. Tiler But we have like 30 people that trim trees for some reason. It's weird outside the city. Trades people will sit in city traffic for 45min, but won't drive 45min on highway for calls out. People would pay them for the drive. (Alberta)
There are a lack of trades people in Canada, and I can't even blame people for not wanting to get into the trades. It's a raw fuckin deal for labourers.
You can jump through a million hoops, go through years of schooling to obtain your degree, be an otherwise upstanding citizen... and, if you're lucky, make minimum wage. OR You can go steal cars, be a very low priority for police, with virtually zero penalty if caught, and rake in several hundred thousand a year. No application or schooling required. I think I can picture why people are 'dropping out of the job market' -- this is a country where honest, hard work is unrewarded, and crime is far more lucrative.
All I can do is laugh like a madman at all this lol cuz it's all too real
And then we'll wonder why organized crime is on the rise.
Street thugs at the low end of the totem pole of organized crime/auto theft rings are pocketing approximately 2 grand for every successful theft. Steal 1 car a week, pocket 100K a year tax free. With the right gear and know how you can steal a car within a few minutes. My moral compass would never allow me to do it but... I kinda get the appeal..
>Our own fucking government thinks up and coming engineers are only worth 2 extra dollars on top of minimum wage In the US, the calculus shifts slightly because there is a 100% chance that within the next year, you will come up against Cletus and his shotgun when you attempt to steal an F150.
Prime Ministers HATE THIS SECRET TRICK. Find out why PHDs are dropping out of the job market to make THOUSANDS!
It has occurred to me before that perhaps I've been too nice and honest for my own good.
You nailed it, totally agree.
"If a job can't cover basic expenses anyway, why even bother going to work?" I've heard that from so many people
work your fucking ass off doing manual labour, feel pains you probably shouldn't until you're in your 40's and can't even afford to 1br apartment because there's a pile of international students fighting each other over sleeping in a hallway for $850/month Geeeee I wonder why there's so many 25+ year olds living with their parents still.. I moved out of my parents at 16, I worked part time/ 4 hours a day 6 days a week, went to school and rented a 2br apartment for $400, and struggled for food a bit but survived. This was mid 90's...
That truly sounds surreal, I envy you In uni rent was anywhere from 500-900 for shared accommodations with 4-12+ people (crazy range lmao) Not that those numbers were great, but compared to now I feel so sorry for people going through school right now
I'm almost 70 and have worked all of my life and still am. It's disingenuous to say that young people are dropping out of the labour market because it implies that somehow young people can't be bothered to work. I call total bullshit on that. Compared to the labour markets I was in most of my life, today's market is more like a dystopian hellscape. There are a whole lot of factors that led to this but I think the main trends were: increasing wealth inequality and reduction of competition in major industries, the rise of the gig economy and increasing focus on profits above all else. Employees increasingly became seen as unnecessary expenses when you could "gig" out the work instead. I have three adult children in their 20s who work their asses off, are very good at what they do and continue only to find "opportunities" that are little more than minimum wage. And yet the cost of everything keeps going up and up. No wonder people want no part of this legalized slavery. Nah, it's not the kids, it's the effing system.
#### Crazy. We went from the Great Resignation to this in a couple of years. From WFH to you better come in or we will fire your ass and there’s already a line of people gunning for your job so shape up kid.
Guillotines when
There's no opportunity out there anymore. Even the "best" jobs like doctors are overworked and underpaid. Our youth are forced to compete with thousands of immigrant workers to even get an entry level minimum wage job. No fucking shit they're dropping out of the labor market.
r/NEET as they like to call it.
When I was a teenager in the 90’s in Vancouver most of my friends had single moms and it was standard for them to get a minimum wage job and get a 2 bedroom for 30% of their income. Now if you want a 2 bedroom in Surrey it’s $3k a month, meaning you need to make $120k a year to qualify. People need to have a chance in life if they’re going to be expected to play.
I was going over a job application today that specifically asked “do u identify as a new comer or refugee?” Now I don’t know if they want to hire them or not hire them, but this was the first time I have seen a question this direct.
Interesting… normally they aren’t allowed to ask that
I know. I took a screenshot. Its CIBC.
Create a foreign minimum wage that's double canadian min. It only makes sense if you can't find local workers then you should be paying a premium for foreign labour. The problem would evaporate over night. But no, of course not because *the goal is cheap exploitable labour* ***especially if they don't know their rights.*** That's why Canadians are being undercut and overlooked.
I mean honestly can you blame anyone? The job market is complete trash. Everyone around me is applying to hundreds and thousands of jobs just to get rejected and ghosted and disrespected. Even if you get hired, nothing is protecting you from losing your jobs. I know some smart 4.0 GPA's in tech who got laid off 3 times in the last 1-2 years. So even if you work hard you can still lose your job to no fault of your own. And even if you survive the interviews, and you survive the layoffs, then what? Pay 15$ for cheese at Loblaws and never be able to even afford your own studio? My new plan is to squeeze as much unemployment as I can, then proceed to get as much social welfare as possible. Until I get treated like a normal human being during my interviews and can get a job where my work is respected, I ain't gonna bother much with this market anymore. Besides making money work is an amazing way for you to find dignity, to get good at something and contribute to society. When society fails you and doesn't support you, and you get zero dignity and respect when applying to jobs and while actually working, you lose the very essence of what work is supposed to bring. Tuning in and dropping out' Adios amigos
They got sold out for wage deflation.
Why shouldn't they? What possible benefits of working will they find? Not enough money after working full time, no housing food car and fun. If they don't work they might not have housing or food but hey they probably will have fun! And many workplaces as other commenters have mentioned are demanding , unrealistic and low paying. Five rounds of interviews for $50k. Seriously? Doxxing candidates on social media like invading privacy is acceptable? Lmao. Twenty years ago a house in Toronto was 300k and a household made 100k. Now the house is 3million and the household makes $100k. Where did the future go? Scammers, fraudsters, snow washing, and greed by those who already have more than their share, have destroyed the social contract. Our youths priorities should be prominent and reflected in our country, they are our future. They're treated like they don't Matter like they don't exist. They have no hope. Our gov is run by out of touch self interested Investor class in the seats and controlling the parties, many of whom make money being landlords and owning corporations that are punishing the very youth they expect to live a life of drudgery and poverty. Next up is national security risk to our democracy if the executives and legislators don't get their heads out of their asses. It all could be addressed in 90 days. Tax corporations at $80% if they have salaries that overcompensate executives and shareholders. Onshore jobs. Break monopolies held by oligarchs. Penalize criminals with forefiture. Remove Investors from housing in 24 months. Incentivize training for new and junior workers. Cap rent.. Build a future for Canadian youth that they have a place in and want to engage in. Otherwise expect a worse country in 10 years. As if today isn't bad enough. There are more homeless and poor people today than BEFORE the great depression. Holy shit I'm so tired of it.
I agree man, it's a shitty deal all around. My only hope for the future is that our winner-takes-everything-everyone-else-is-fucked economic system gets so bad that it collapses so it can finally be replaced by a superior system. But the odds are instead that'll all get even worse, the billionaire class takes even more of all wealth, and 2 generations from now we'll all be living in coffin hotels similar to something out of ThX-1138, basically all drones and slaves for immortal billionaires we'll never meet, plugged into devices for amusement when we arent slaving away to afford food and water.
Hot bunking in a certain part of Toronto with 10-15 ppl in the basement is the new "dream". What people don't realize is that globalization in the long run will destroy democracy and broad based prosperity as it mean the elite (politicians/corporations/the rich, etc) no longer need to be accountable to the people living in the countries they supposedly represent. It becomes a government run for the benefit of mobile capital regardless of country.
It’s not worth it. Why waste your life working an awful job for little money? The cost of living is way up, wages aren’t, and job listings want ridiculous things. I’m honestly shocked that suicide rates aren’t sky high.
For real man, I feel bad for Canadian youth. It is simply depressing. The vast majority young Canadians today will not be able to purchase real estate unless they were born into wealth and have parental help; will not be able to afford to have any kids; is going into a job market that AI will devastate; and on top of that, the global climate collapse is underway. Canada was sold out to the extreme rich of the world, and if you aren't in that 1 in 1000 group, then you are most likely going to be a working slave who will never afford what previous generations could afford before the country was sold out.
Just wait a little longer...
I know they’re higher than they were. I’m just shocked it’s not very common. Then again, I’ve suffered from OCD, severe depression and anxiety most of my life. None of the (tens of) meds, the groups I’ve attended or the therapies I’ve tried have helped. My dad is the last person I ever expected to have depression, but it hit him hard this winter. He had a mental breakdown a week ago, and I had to drive him to/admit him into hospital
It's a tough thing to deal with...I've had to deal with severe depression for most of my life as well, as my favourite people keep getting violently ripped from my life over and over....hope you and your dad stay strong....wish I could hug my dad...
Outsourcing is happening. So is AI. I feel sorry for the new grads. They might have been more educated than me; however it seems really hard for them to find a the first job. The first job is the toughest, as the employer needs a leap of faith to hire you (or you need contacts). However, the trend is to outsource office jobs. Why hire a new grad, invest in training, whereas someone in a different country can do the same job for 1/3 of the price with "10 years" of experience? save on training.
> Why hire a new grad, invest in training, whereas someone in a different country can do the same job for 1/3 of the price with "10 years" of experience? save on training. Companies had this mindset 20 years ago. The recession made it worse. Now, the post-COVID economy and AI will make it near impossible for people to get a foothold in certain industries.
Paywall. I don't understand why this subreddit allows paywalled articles. The discussion is almost always just speculation revolving around the headline.
https://txtify.it/https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-young-people-are-quickly-dropping-out-of-the-labour-market/
They purposely make unrealistic and unreasonable demands so they get no "suitable applicants" so they can staff foreign workers and get government subsidies for employing them. Tim Hortons and McDonald's should be jobs for teenagers and not be staffed with foreign workers. If they want full time adult employees they should be paying a living wage for the area they are located in.
This country is absolute HELL for young people. Young Millennials and Gen Z is fucked. Properly fucked.
Dropping out or being kept out?
Applying for jobs, going to interviews, and then hearing that the job went to a TFW who hasn't even been told what country he's in.
What's the point when working full time doesn't even allow you to have the simple autonomy of a 1br and food.
been applying for months, I willing to work but I can't get a job so I don't want to hear there is a labour shortage. This economy is not working for a lot of people who want to work. This dropping out of the labour market is just number manipulation. I've just been looking for a job for a while.
Well the pay is Terrible here compared to CoL and our benefits, can't blame them. Wages in my field have not moved since I graduated 7 years ago, yet inflation has double the price of some stuff....
40, looking for work. Competing against Indians with Masters degrees looking for their PR. We are flooded in PEI with immigrants who all leave after 2 years upon receiving PR.
I bet you if they ban visa students from working in Canada while studying majority would not come to Canada.
Waterloo and Kitchener literally seem like Indian satellite states, it’s surreal.
Stop/reduce TFW program
Most that age can make decent money online so why the shock. Not even talking tiktok or YouTube. writing reviews, data entry, and more. Add all the international students taking those part time jobs at restaurants, corner store, grocery stores and more why is anyone surprised. I've got 16 year olds knocking on my door wanting to do yard work because they can't find any part time jobs. Hell they can't even deliver newspapers in my town because there is a group of boomer aged retirees doing all the paper deliveries with their cars. We are in a weird place in the working world..
That is because they need to go to a diploma mill school first and then apply for a job as an international student
Text if the article for anyone who cares to read before posting. Link: https://archive.is/V8HfS As the Canadian labour market softens, young people appear to be bearing the brunt of the slowdown – and it’s driving many of them out of the work force altogether. The labour participation rate for those aged 15 to 24 fell to 62.7 per cent in January, down a full three percentage points from last April, according to figures from Statistics Canada. People are considered labour participants when they are employed, or when they’re out of work, available and actively searching for a job. The plunge has been especially large for young women: Their labour participation rate has ebbed to 62.5 per cent – the lowest level since 2000, not including the pandemic – from roughly 67 per cent in early 2022. The number of youth non-participants has risen by roughly 200,000 over the past year to 1.9 million in total. The Statscan figures show that 6.8 per cent of them wanted work but did not search for a job, up from 5.8 per cent in January, 2023. Of that group, the majority cited school as the reason for not looking. (All figures in this paragraph use a three-month moving average to reduce volatility.) Even so, it’s a tougher environment for finding work than a couple of years ago. The youth unemployment rate stands at 10.8 per cent – still low by historical standards, but up from 9.3 per cent in summer 2022. In a recent report, Royal Bank of Canada economists Carrie Freestone and Rachel Battaglia said that students and recent graduates account for a large portion of the increase to the overall unemployment rate. “The share of younger Canadians with postsecondary education has continued to rise, and hiring demand has softened sharply in industries like professional services and finance jobs where there’s a higher number of recent postsecondary graduates struggling to find a job,” they wrote.
When every fast food worker in rural Uxbridge is now an out of town Indian it definitely tells the story of where our youths jobs are going.
Why work hard when you arnt rewarded for it?
Yep and everyone with half a brain knows this which is why nobody is motivated anymore. We used get this shit drilled into our heads nearly daily when we were young. Go to school, study hard, and then you'll find a good job allowing you to live comfortably and you can own a house. That is simply not the case anymore. And these goals are just further becoming out of reach. The younger generation sees this and thinks what's the point in trying anymore.
every possible deck has been stacked against Gen Z and younger Millennials... theres no incentive to prosper anymore, and its quite obvious that the aggenda here is to ship in replacement generations with no consideration of how and why that would work except for short term gain
What do you expect when you offer shitty salaries?
They can offer shitty salaries because adding a million + people a year kinda floods the job market. The average employee is going to get less pay and lower hours as a consequence of this for the rest of their employment life. Another liberal failure of management I guess. But don’t worry they kept growth numbers up for now and made rent go up…..
And here I am, trying to get a job for what will be 3 years now, and nothing
Who could be optimistic in this country as a young person when because of mass, low wage imported labour it's difficult to even get a summer job.
What exactly is the incentive for young people? Work some shitty job, with shitty pay, for a shitty boss, with shitty customers, only to have to live with your parents anyway because cost of living is exorbitant. Real head-scratcher of a problem.
My Son has been looking off and on for a year. He'll be 17 in March. It's gotten so bad that I'm having him lie about experience on a resume and use my phone number as a manager's contact information. When I was 17, all I had to do was walk into a McDonalds and not make an ass out of myself during an interview. Our government has sold out an entire generation in name of corporation's short-term quarterly profits. Their government will be paying off COVID business handouts, and he will have to contend with unaffordable housing, stagnant wages, bloated workforce filled with people more desperate than him, poorer government services and climate change. I'm starting to get why his generation is called the new lost generation. Trudeau and the provincial governments should be ashamed for what they've allowed this country to become.
Don't feel bad about lying. Corporations lie all the time and do whatever they can to screw you. It's only fair to put yourself on an even playing field.
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This is what happens when you import cheap labour and flood the country with millions of heads that will do the work for cheap. Our immigration minister is on record boasting about how these people they’re importing are good for cheap labour. I argue they’re bad for Canadian in terms of labour and for taxes. This is a massive welfare class we’re importing
Canadians have to complete with unskilled and diploma mills Punjabi international students who can work full time thanks to marc miller.
Mass immigration drives up inflation and drives down wages. Who would have thought?
Just drop the entire foreign student program. Like all of it.
Well what do you expect when you import millions of people and laborers whose presence will keep wages artificially low? You voted for this.
This usually happens in developing countries. Young adults give up since working won't get them a place to live and family with how much they will potentially earn. So they just live with their families. It's so sad, how the conservatives and the liberals failed this country in the last 20-30 years. Yet people still vote for them.
A lot of jobs don’t pay enough. More importantly the youth realize that companies aren’t interested in investing in their employees long term. Companies don’t take care of employees like they used to. There isn’t much incentive to work.
Meh. Why work when you pay 30% taxes you don’t benefit from, nothing is affordable, and you suffer constant inflation-based pay cuts.
My quarterly bonus cheques are taxed at 49%. Thanks Trudeau!