Canada's Temporary Foreign Worker Program
Policy Analysis and Advice: Canada’s Temporary Foreign Worker Program
Temporary migrant worker, also known as foreign worker (TFW), programs are employed by virtually every country, and there are varying degrees of effectiveness in regards to the enforcement of human rights, economic development and consideration of the domestic workforce. Foreign workers, defined as “workers...employed in a country other than their own” (ILO, 1999, p. 1), face challenges such as lack of worker mobility and worker exploitation. According to Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC), Canada’s program “allows Canadian employers to hire foreign nationals to fill temporary labour and skill shortages when qualified Canadian citizens or permanent residents are not …show more content…
11). The low skilled programs are further broken down into four different streams: the Live-in Caregiver Program, the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP), the Pilot Project for Occupations Requiring Lower Levels of Formal Training (National Occupational Classification C & D) (“NOC C & D Pilot Project”) and the Agricultural Stream of the NOC C & D Pilot Project (p. 11). These four streams all require a Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) (Mertins-Kirkwood, 2014, p. 11). The TFWP operates on a request-based system, which means employers file LMIAs and must gain approval by Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) to ensure there is a legitimate labour shortage (p. 10). If approval is granted, employers can hire foreign workers, who work for them throughout the duration of their stay. Permanent residency is only a possibility through the live-in caregiver program, in which workers can gain permanent residency in Canada after a minimum of 22 months (p. …show more content…
That gap closed to 98 cents within 25 years [...] However, that disparity has become both larger and more difficult to close [...] Those individuals who landed between 2000 and 2004 earned just 61 cents on the dollar relative to a Canadian-born. (p. 5-6)
This growing wage gap between foreign workers and Canadian workers is a worrying sign that the TFWP needs to adapt to the changing socioeconomic state of affairs in Canada as well as more effectively enforce labour rights standards to ensure that TFWs are treated as equals and human beings, not a commodity or item to be bought and
Temporary migrant worker, also known as foreign worker (TFW), programs are employed by virtually every country, and there are varying degrees of effectiveness in regards to the enforcement of human rights, economic development and consideration of the domestic workforce. Foreign workers, defined as “workers...employed in a country other than their own” (ILO, 1999, p. 1), face challenges such as lack of worker mobility and worker exploitation. According to Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC), Canada’s program “allows Canadian employers to hire foreign nationals to fill temporary labour and skill shortages when qualified Canadian citizens or permanent residents are not …show more content…
11). The low skilled programs are further broken down into four different streams: the Live-in Caregiver Program, the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (SAWP), the Pilot Project for Occupations Requiring Lower Levels of Formal Training (National Occupational Classification C & D) (“NOC C & D Pilot Project”) and the Agricultural Stream of the NOC C & D Pilot Project (p. 11). These four streams all require a Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) (Mertins-Kirkwood, 2014, p. 11). The TFWP operates on a request-based system, which means employers file LMIAs and must gain approval by Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) to ensure there is a legitimate labour shortage (p. 10). If approval is granted, employers can hire foreign workers, who work for them throughout the duration of their stay. Permanent residency is only a possibility through the live-in caregiver program, in which workers can gain permanent residency in Canada after a minimum of 22 months (p. …show more content…
That gap closed to 98 cents within 25 years [...] However, that disparity has become both larger and more difficult to close [...] Those individuals who landed between 2000 and 2004 earned just 61 cents on the dollar relative to a Canadian-born. (p. 5-6)
This growing wage gap between foreign workers and Canadian workers is a worrying sign that the TFWP needs to adapt to the changing socioeconomic state of affairs in Canada as well as more effectively enforce labour rights standards to ensure that TFWs are treated as equals and human beings, not a commodity or item to be bought and