Canada-US workplace comparisons

Better worker protection in Canada, but few real raises or new quality jobs in decade since free trade

By: Paul Weinberg

  We have stronger employment standards, greater unionization and better health and safety regulations on the job, despite some erosion under more conservative federal and provincial governments, than Americans.
  But most Canadians haven't had a significant pay increase in the past decade. Our economic boom was fueled mainly by heavy exports to a vibrant U.S. market, not by domestic purchases in goods and services, which were weak, according to Queen's University industrial relations professor Pradeep Kumar. At the same time, better paid American consumers played a major role in the expansion of their economy, he says.
  So, the question - is the grass greener in Canada or the U.S. in terms of the workplace - may be relative.
 

"Significant waves of downsizing and longer working hours on both sides of the border are affecting the morale and health of employees"

  Workplaces across Canada and the U.S. are undergoing similar stresses and strains stemming from a combination of corporate restructuring, the replacement of good-paying manufacturing jobs with less secure lower paying positions and pressures on employees to work longer hours.
  A recent evaluation of seven years under NAFTA by the Washington D.C. based Economic Policy Institute cites "a continent-wide pattern of stagnant incomes, increased insecurity and rising inequality." The whole rationale of NAFTA - that it would create better jobs-has not happened, says economist Jeff Faux at EPI.
  In some cases the impact of free trade upon Canada has been worse because of the greater reliance on foreign made parts in the manufacture of products. Many subsidiaries of U.S. high tech companies, for instance, do much of their research and development in their home country, says Bruce Campbell, an economist with the Ottawa based Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives.
  In the Canadian contribution to the EPI report, Campbell points to a little known Industry Canada study which documents an upsurge in the import content per unit of exports and a decline in Canadian content.
  "Between 1989 and 1997, 870,700 export jobs were created but during the same period 1,147,100 jobs were destroyed by imports. Thus, Canada's trade boom resulted in a net destruction of 276,000 jobs," says Campbell.
  American workers are similarly losing their jobs as U.S. manufacturers shift overseas. But Campbell suggests that the slide towards lost jobs has been greater in Canada.
  Unemployment is higher in Canada than in the U.S. and most of the job growth in this country has been in temporary, part-time or self-employment, states Campbell. "The growth of non-standard work has been faster in Canada."
  Paid full-time employment growth in Canada has been almost non-existent under free trade with the US and Mexico, adds Campbell. Self-employment in this country jumped to 43 per cent of new job creation between 1989 and 1999, while part-time work accounted for another 37 per cent of net employment growth in the same time period.

Canada is a safe place to work, but there aren't many full-time jobs being created

Unions
  Employers demanding concessions during the bargaining process have put unions in both Canada and the U.S. on the defensive.
  Threats by employers to close part or all of an operation and relocate it out of the U.S. have become more credible with the onset of corporate mobility under NAFTA and globalization, says Robert Scott, a U.S. contributor to the EPI NAFTA evaluation.
  Representation by unions has dropped in Canada from 35 to 33 per cent, while membership hovers around 14 per cent in the U.S. where legal barriers to union organizing are substantially greater than they are in Canada.
  Much has been made about the increased union activity south of the border, as well as its innovative aspects. But the 300,00 workers joining unions every year in the U.S. are still not enough to make a significant dent in the overall percentage of unionization in that country, says Kumar.

Workplace health and safety
  Furthermore, Canadian workers can refuse to do unsafe work and are able to participate on workplace health and safety committees, a right that their American counterparts do not have, says Kumar.
  Work related repetitive strain injuries are a growing problem across North America. But U.S. labour is having a harder time getting U.S. politicians to accept its seriousness, says Kumar, pointing to how both houses of Congress in Washington recently turned down proposed ergonomic standards.
  In the U.S. the biggest issue at the bargaining table is negotiating employee participation in one of the myriad of private insurance plans offering basic health benefits - something that Canadians receive through a public system. "Health benefits just dwarf everything else. Our representatives who are bargaining [in the US] have to become experts in health insurance, the different providers, deductibles, and all that. Here in Canada it is a non-issue," says Jonathan Eaton, a researcher with the Canadian section of the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees, which has members across North America.
  Significant waves of downsizing and longer working hours on both sides of the border are affecting the morale and health of employees, says Kumar.
  The difference with Canada is that we have a larger public sector where more than half of the employees are unionized, compared to about 35 per cent in equivalent U.S. positions.
  Canadian government workers bearing the burden of wage freezes and eroded incomes are starting to go on strike to win major concessions from employers, adds Kumar. "Workers are getting frustrated, they are getting edgy and they are getting stressed out."

Posted: May 14, 2001

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