Upgrading or Polarization? The Evolution of Employment Structure and Quality in Quebec and Canada, 1997-2013
The Labour Force Survey Microdata of Statistics Canada have been used as part of an approach centered on professions, which itself rests upon an employment regime approach. The authors have constructed a typology of occupations into eight classes. Based on the relative share of occupational classes in wage employment, it appears that professionals and technicians, both in the natural sciences and the new technologies of information and communication and in the social and health sciences have recorded the largest growth; low-skilled workers in interpersonal services have also grown, while blue-collar and white-collar workers have declined and senior managers and the finance professionals are mired in stagnation. The latter, however, have proved to be the real winners of income distribution during the period. In terms of job quality, as measured by the relative growth of occupations grouped into income quintiles, an asymmetric polarization can be observed: the highest quintiles, bringing together the good jobs, have experienced higher growth than the lowest quintile, associated with bad jobs, while intermediate quintiles declined. We can also observe growth in wage inequality in the sense that wages in the highest quintile increased more quickly than in other income quintiles. Finally, Quebec and Canada belong to the neoliberal regime. Quebec is certainly a more egalitarian society but, unlike the country’s social democratic model, this “distinct” character is not the result of more progressive social policy and a more inclusive trade unionism, which would have raised the lowest quintile wages; it rather reflects the employment stagnation, or even decline, in the highest quintile and wage stagnation, or even decline, in the fourth quintile.