The employment rate of immigrants was higher than that of people born in Quebec, in 2022, indicates Wednesday the Institute of Statistics of Quebec.
The ISQ’s 2022 Labor Market Report reveals that the employment rate for immigrants had reached 65.9% that year, compared to a rate of 60.5% for natives.
In figures, 859,500 immigrants were employed in Quebec at the time.
“We have been compiling data since 2006 on immigrants and it is indeed a record, because it goes with the growth of this population in the population of Quebec. We are talking today about 20 per cent of jobs held by immigrants,” said Luc Cloutier-Villeneuve, labor statistics analyst at the ISQ, in an interview.
And this is particularly explained by the category of immigrants aged 55 and over, he specifies.
These people “have less experience, less preparation for retirement, given that they began their presence in Quebec or Canada later. So they work more, longer,” explains Mr. Cloutier-Villeneuve.
People aged 55 and over too
Another surprising data: that of employment among people aged 55 and over.
In Quebec, during the 2012-2022 period, it is among people aged 55 and over that the number of jobs has increased the most, ie by 39% over a period of 10 years, underlines the ISQ.
Mr. Cloutier-Villeneuve offers explanations for this phenomenon: first, this cohort of citizens is still numerous.
Then, people aged 55 and over participate more than before in the job market. They are also more educated than before, so they stay longer in the labor market. “There has been a greater participation of people aged 55 and over in Quebec for ten years,” he argues.
It is possible that there are also experienced workers among them who return to work after having left it, but the Institute cannot measure this phenomenon precisely.