Research reports: Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada

Analytical research reports are prepared to support Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada’s research program, which furthers our understanding of the impact of immigration on Canadian society.

• Pathways to Permanent Residency for French-Speaking Skilled Temporary Foreign Workers - Atlantic Provinces (PDF, 1.13 MB) New
• Occupational outcomes of immigrants: Lower versus higher skilled jobs (PDF, 1.13 MB) New
• Criminal Careers of Intimate Partner Abusers: Generalists or Specialists? New
  • The Criminal Career of Intimate partner Violence Offenders: generalists or specialists? – Presentation New
• An examination of in-hospital deliveries in Canada outside Quebec: analytical report (PDF, 1.3 MB) New
  • An examination of in-hospital deliveries in Canada outside Quebec: analytical report – Executive summary 
• Which immigration selection factors best predict the earnings of economic principal applicants? New
• Racism, Discrimination and Migrant Workers in Canada: Evidence from the Literature - Summary report (PDF, 1.45 MB) New
  • Racism, Discrimination and Migrant Workers in Canada: Evidence from the Literature New
• International students as a source of labour supply
  • International students as a source of labour supply: A summary of recent trends New
  • International students as a source of labour supply: Pre-immigration study in Canada and post-immigration earnings
  • International students as a source of labour supply: Engagement in the labour market during the period of study
  • International students as a source of labour supply: Engagement in the labour market after graduation
  • International Students as a Source of Labour Supply - Transition to permanent residence
  • International Students as a source of Labour Supply - The growth of international students and their changing socio-demographic characteristics
  • International students as a source of labour supply - retention in their province of study
• The labour market outcomes of economic immigrants in the skilled trades
• Foreign workers in the Canadian food manufacturing industry
• Foreign workers in the Canadian agriculture industry
• Transition to permanent residency by lower- and higher-skilled temporary foreign workers
• Are the gaps in labour market outcomes between immigrants and the Canadian-born starting to close?
• Occupational Integration in Healthcare by French-speaking Immigrants Living in Minority Communities (PDF, 1.1 MB)
• Francophone Immigrant Business Owners in Minority Communities: Challenges and Incentives (PDF, 961.8 KB)
• French-speaking immigrant teachers living in Francophone minority communities: Understanding and facilitating their professional integration pathways (PDF, 942.6 KB)
• Access to mental health consultations by immigrants and refugees in Canada
• The mental health of immigrants and refugees: Canadian evidence from a nationally linked database
• Estimating immigrants’ presence in Canada within the context of increasingly fluid international migration patterns (STC LOA)
• Regulatory approaches to international labour recruitment in Canada (PDF, 3.7 MB)

  This paper is a resource on the provincial statutory regulation of international labour recruitment and employment of migrant workers in Canada.

• Early earnings trajectories of international students after graduation from postsecondary programs
• Economic Insights series
  • Economic Insights series - Two-step Immigration Selection: A Review of Benefits and Potential Challenges

    In a two-step immigration selection process, temporary foreign workers are first selected by employers for a temporary job, and some qualified temporary foreign workers then become economic immigrants. The details of this selection process vary among countries. For example, in the US, the temporary workers are typically sponsored by the employers in their bid to become permanent residents. In Canada, the temporary residents are selected for permanent residency by the government based on a set of largely human capital criteria, although employers may play a role in some selection pathways. Viewed in a generic manner, the two-step process presents both advantages and risks. This article provides an overview of such potential advantages and risks. It is the first of five articles on the two-step selection process.

  • Economic Insights series - Two-step Immigration Selection: An Analysis of its Expansion in Canada (11-626-X No. 112)

    This Economic Insights article documents the expansion of two-step immigration selection in Canada since the early 2000s. Two-step immigration selection refers to the selection of economic immigrants from among temporary foreign workers. The increased transition of a rapidly rising number of temporary foreign workers to permanent residence was made possible through the shifting composition of admission programs towards provincial programs and the Canadian Experience Class, and the growing reliance on temporary foreign workers within each admission program. Among economic principal applicants, the share with pre-landing Canadian work experience increased from 12% for the 2000 landing cohort to 59% for the 2018 landing cohort. This is the second of five articles on the two-step selection process.

  • Economic Insights series - Two-step Immigration Selection: Recent Trends in Immigrant Labour Market Outcomes

    This article examines whether the increased selection of economic immigrants from among temporary foreign workers accounted for the recent improvement in immigrants’ employment rates and entry earnings. Immigrants who were former temporary foreign workers, particularly those with medium or high levels of pre-immigration Canadian earnings, had higher employment rates and earnings after immigration than other immigrants. The expansion of two-step immigration selection was the driving force for the recent improvement in new immigrants’ labour market outcomes. It is the third of five articles on the two-step selection process.

  • Economic Insights Series - Two-step Immigration Selection: Why Did Immigrant Labour Market Outcomes Vary by Admission Programs?

    Economic immigration in Canada consists of various admission programs, including the Federal Skilled Worker program (FSWP), Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) and Canadian Experience Class (CEC). These programs all select permanent residents based on their potential ability to do well in the labour market, but are administered differently and have different selection criteria and processes. CEC and PNP immigrants have higher employment rates and earnings than FSWP immigrants during the initial years after immigration, although PNP immigrants have lower earnings than CEC or FSWP immigrants five years after immigration. The more positive labour market outcomes of CEC and PNP immigrants are mostly associated with their higher levels of two-step selection—the selection of economic immigrants from among temporary foreign workers. It is the fourth of five articles on the two-step selection process.

  • Economic Insights Series - Two-step Immigration Selection: Skilled Work Experience vs. Pre-arranged Jobs

    Canadian work experience and pre-arranged employment are both important criteria in Canada’s Express Entry system of economic immigration selection. While pre-arranged employment may more directly reflect employers’ preference than Canadian work experience, the latter can better capture the “realized market values of skills” when it is measured by levels of pre-immigration Canadian earnings. Among prime-aged principal applicants selected through the Express Entry system, having pre-immigration Canadian earnings was associated with a large advantage in employment incidence in the first two years after immigration, while having a pre-arranged job made no difference in employment when common immigrant characteristics are taken into account. With otherwise similar characteristics, immigrants with a pre-arranged job earned 15% more than those without a pre-arranged job in the first two years after immigration, while immigrants with high pre-landing Canadian earnings earned almost twice as those without pre-landing Canadian earnings. Immigrants with medium and low pre landing Canadian earnings had no earnings advantage relative to those without pre-landing Canadian earnings after immigration. Overall, the level of pre-immigration Canadian earnings was an important predictor of post-immigration earnings, while having a pre-arranged job accounted for little of the variation in post-immigration earnings among economic principal applicant immigrants. This is the fifth of five articles on the two-step selection process.

• A Canada–U.S. Comparison of the Economic Outcomes of STEM Immigrants
• Trends in the Citizenship Rate Among New Immigrants to Canada
• Long-term Labour Market Integration of Refugee Claimants Who Became Permanent Residents in Canada 
• Transitions into and out of Employment by Immigrants during the COVID-19 Lockdown and Recovery
• Immigration and Firm Productivity: Evidence from the Canadian Employer-Employee Dynamics Database
• International Metropolis Conference 2019 – Final Report
• Innovation in Immigrant-owned Firms in Canada

  The main objective of this paper is to determine whether the immigration status of the owner of a small or medium-sized enterprise (SME) affects the likelihood of a company implementing an innovation. A number of recent research papers tackled the issue of immigrants and innovation by concentrating on patent filing (a proxy for innovation) by individual immigrants. The novelty of this paper is the fact that it is one of very few to address this issue from the perspective of the firm, as innovation occurs within a firm context. This study uses measures of innovation and intellectual property that provide a much broader perspective of the innovation process than a focus on patents alone.

• Skill Utilization and Earnings of STEM-educated Immigrants in Canada: Differences by Degree Level and Field of Study
• Economic Immigrants in Gateway Cities: Factors Involved in Their Initial Location and Onward Migration Decisions
• The Impact of Immigrant Business Ownership on International Trade
• Immigrant Entrepreneurs as Job Creators: The Case of Canadian Private Incorporated Companies
• The Wealth of Immigrant Families in Canada
• Labour Market Outcomes Among Refugees to Canada
• Settlement and integration of French-speaking refugees in a Francophone OLMC: The case of Winnipeg and Saint Boniface, 2006 to 2016
• The Financing of Immigrant-owned Firms in Canada
• Language Projections for Canada, 2011 to 2036
• Immigration and Diversity: Population Projections for Canada and its Regions, 2011 to 2036
• An Overview of Methods and Data Sources
• Meeting places: Social and cultural integration experiences for newly arrived French speakers in Francophone minority
• Skills Proficiency of Immigrants in Canada: Findings from the Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) (PDF, 5.78 MB)

  This report uses data from the Survey of Adult Skills conducted under the OECD Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) to look at skills and immigration in Canada. It examines the skill levels of recent and established immigrants in Canada and in an international context, and provides a detailed analysis of foundational skills relative to a variety of sociodemographic factors, such as age, gender, length of residency in Canada, and highest level of education completed, as well as immigration-specific factors, such as immigration category (refugee, family class, points system).

• Labour market outcomes of immigrant women who arrive as dependants of economic principal applicants

  Many immigrants come to Canada with spouses and dependants. Success in the labour market at the family level is not only important to the economic well-being of immigrants, but also critical to the overall contribution of immigration to the Canadian economy. This study looks at characteristics and labour market outcomes of women who arrived as spouses of economic principal applicants and compares them to those of other economic immigrants (male and female principal applicants and male spouses) and to those of married women who arrived in the family class.

• Educational and labour market outcomes of childhood immigrants by admission class

  The children of immigrants who arrived in Canada over the past several decades outperform their peers with Canadian-born parents in educational attainment overall, and the two groups have similar labour market outcomes. However, large variations by ethnicity or source country have been observed among the children of immigrants. This heterogeneity has been interpreted as the result of differences in vulnerability and resources between immigrant groups, in terms of individual and family socioeconomic background—particularly education and host-country language ability—and group cultural and community characteristics.

• Chronic low income among immigrants in Canada and its communities

  This paper examines the rate of chronic low income among immigrants aged 25 or older in Canada during the 2000s. Chronic low income is defined as having a family income under a low-income cut-off for five consecutive years or more. A regionally adjusted low-income measure is used for the analysis. Among immigrants who were in low income in any given year, about one-half were in chronic low income. The highest chronic rates were observed among immigrant seniors, as well as immigrants who were unattached or lone parents. There were large differences in the chronic low-income rate by immigrant place of birth, even after adjusting for differences in other immigrant background characteristics. The chronic low-income rate was lower among economic class immigrants than among family or refugee classes, but the difference was reduced after adjusting for background characteristics. Chronic low-income rates among immigrants varied significantly across the 29 cities/regions in the study, varying by a factor of 5 between the highest and lowest rates. However, the community ranking was not static and changed significantly between the beginning and end of the 2000s.

• Interprovincial mobility: Retention rates and net inflow rates 2008-2013 landings

  This document provides is an update of the 2014 publication The Interprovincial Mobility of Immigrants in Canada 2006-2011. Whereas the earlier document focused on the 2011 tax year, this document focuses on immigrants who landed between 2008 and 2013 and where they resided (which province) in the 2013 tax year.

• Syntheses on the French-speaking immigrants outside Quebec

  The six syntheses on the French-speaking immigrants outside Quebec are based on the findings presented in the following report: Houle, R. et al. (2014) Statistical Portrait of the French-speaking Immigrant Population Outside Quebec (1991-2011), IRCC: Ottawa. In these syntheses, the French-speaking immigrant population outside Quebec comprises two groups: those with only French as their first official language spoken (French FOLS) and those whose first official language spoken is both French and English (French-English FOLS).

• International Students, Immigration and Earnings Growth: The Effect of Pre-immigration Canadian University Education

  While destination-country education provides many potential advantages for immigrants, empirical studies in Australia, Canada and the U.S. have produced mixed results on the labour outcomes of immigrants who were former international students. This study uses large national longitudinal data sets to examine cross-cohort trends and within-cohort changes in the earnings among three groups of young university graduates: immigrants who are former international students in Canada (Canadian-educated immigrants), foreign-educated immigrants, and the Canadian-born. The results show that Canadian-educated immigrants on average had much lower earnings than the Canadian-born but higher earnings than foreign-educated immigrants both in the short and long run. However, Canadian-educated immigrants are a highly heterogeneous group, and whether they held a well-paid job in Canada before becoming permanent residents is the key factor differentiating their post-immigration earnings relative to both the Canadian-born and foreign-educated immigrants. Furthermore, Canadian education minimizes the earnings variation by source-country quality of tertiary education, but mitigates little of the disadvantage of international students from countries where English is not the official language.

• Transition from Temporary Foreign Workers to Permanent Residents over the 1990s and 2000s

  The number of temporary foreign workers in Canada has increased considerably since late 1990s. Temporary foreign workers have also become an increasingly important source from which permanent residents are admitted to Canada. Using the Temporary Residents file and the Immigrant Landing File, this article documents the changes in the level and type of new temporary foreign workers arrived in Canada in 1990s and 2000s. It further examines the patterns of transition from temporary foreign workers to permanent residents, and the immigration classes through which temporary foreign workers obtained permanent residency.

• Push-Pull Factors Related to Student Retention and Integration in Québec

  This study aimed to identify the principal factors that drive English-speaking youth including English-speaking international students and immigrants to remain in or leave the province upon the completion of their university education. We were concerned with the socioeconomic and linguistic factors that attract students to the province and contribute to the retention of these youth in the English-speaking community (ESC) of Quebec. Specifically, we examined English-speaking students’ initial motivations for studying and living in Quebec, what kind of support they obtained upon arrival and across their period of study, and the conditions that might motivate them to remain in the province upon the completion of their studies.

• Spousal Characteristics and the Selection of Economic Immigrants

  A growing number of OECD countries have skilled immigration programs with a fundamental goal of selecting immigrants who will integrate quickly into the receiving country labour market and have labour market earnings that are commensurate with their human capital. While this policy goal has received considerable interest in the economics literature, far less attention has been devoted to the more specific question of whether to incorporate a married applicant’s spouse’s characteristics into the decision to admit a Principal Applicant (PA). This is surprising given that a number of immigrant point systems allocate points based on the characteristics of the applicant’s spouse. Incorporating spousal characteristics into immigrant selection rules raises a number of methodological issues that need to be considered when devising an optimal point system. To date, we are not aware of any attempts in the economic literature to analyze this topic.

• Parallel lives’ or ‘super-diversity’? An exploration of ethno-cultural enclaves in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver, in 2011

  Two patterns of enclave development are introduced at the outset of the report: enclaves as relatively monolithic social spaces where minority groups live in isolation from mainstream culture and each other (‘parallel lives’), versus enclaves as ‘super-diverse’ spaces that contain highly variegated populations. One of the important themes of this study is to determine which of these patterns better describes the social geography of Canada’s three largest immigrant reception cities, Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver.

• Which Human Capital Characteristics Best Predict the Earnings of Economic Immigrants?

  While an extensive literature examines the association between immigrants' characteristics and their earnings in Canada, there is a lack of knowledge regarding the relative importance of various human capital factors, such as language, work experience and education when predicting the earnings of economic immigrants. The decline in immigrant earnings since the 1980s, which was concentrated among economic immigrants, prompted changes to the points system in the early 1990s and in 2002, in large part, to improve immigrant earnings. Knowledge of the relative role of various characteristics in determining immigrant earnings is important when making such changes. This paper addresses two questions. First, what is the relative importance of observable human capital factors when predicting earnings of economic immigrants (principal applicants), who are selected by the points system? Second, does the relative importance of these factors vary between the short, intermediate, and long terms?

• Changing Immigrant Characteristics and Entry Earnings

  Immigration selection policies changed significantly during the 1990s and 2000s, at least in part to improve immigrant entry earnings. After the decline in both relative (to the Canadian-born) and absolute entry earnings during the 1980s and early 1990s, there was a strong desire to improve the economic outcomes of immigrants shortly after their landing. Changes in selection policies and other factors altered immigrants’ characteristics across a number of dimensions, including demographics, source region, work experience and geographic distributions. This paper examines whether immigrants’ earnings immediately after their landing improved as a result of these changes and, if so, which characteristics contributed the most to this improvement.

• Immigration, Business Ownership and Employment in Canada

  Abstract: This paper provides, for the first time, an overview of immigrant business ownership and the associated employment in Canada. This research is possible because a new dataset has been created in which the immigration status of business owners can be determined. The analysis focuses on two types of businesses: private incorporated businesses and the unincorporated self-employed. Results are presented for immigrants who have entered Canada since 1980 and who were in the country in 2010, hereafter simply referred to as immigrants in Canada. In addition, two entering cohorts of immigrants are tracked to determine the business ownership trajectory during the first 5 to 10 years in Canada.

• Best practices and strategies implemented by Anglophone organizations for receiving and integrating immigrants in Quebec City

  The research focuses on best practices and strategies implemented by organizations receiving and helping settle Anglophone or allophone immigrants in Quebec City whose first official language spoken is English.

• Proficiency in literacy, numeracy and problem solving in technology-rich environments: comparing generations and age at arrival groups

  Using information from the 2012 Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), this report presents an overview of the proficiency in literacy, numeracy and problem-solving in technology-rich environments (PS-TRE) of the Canadian population by generation since immigration and by age at landing category for immigrants.

• English-speaking female immigrants lacking functional knowledge of French who have recently arrived in Quebec: access to reception, settlement and integration services

  We set out to determine whether newly arrived English-speaking female immigrants lacking functional knowledge of French were benefitting adequately from the programs and services offered by TCRI member agencies, which fall under Quebec’s jurisdiction, but also services offered by other agencies in other sectors that are directly relevant to these women.

• Research Symposium on English-Speaking Immigration in Quebec Organized by Research and Evaluation

  The research symposium started with Yvan Déry, from Canadian Heritage, delivering opening remarks that emphasized the importance of developing research projects to better understand how immigration can contribute to the vitality of English-speaking communities in Quebec given their specific challenges and barriers.

• The path of international students in Francophone minority communities (FMCs)

  The purpose of the research project on international students in Francophone minority communities (FMCs) is to further the knowledge of the Department of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) on ways to attract, retain and integrate this population—socially, culturally, and economically—where French is the minority language.

• Annual Income of Immigrants Relative to the Canadian National Average, 1981-2011

  For the purpose of this analysis “Annual Income” for immigrants is taken from the Longitudinal Immigrant Database (IMDB) and is defined as the summation of income from Employment Earnings, Self-Employment Income, Employment Insurance benefits, and Investment Income (Capital Gains/Losses, Dividends, Interest and Investment Income). Note that income from Social Assistance is not included in this calculation of total income.

  The Canadian average annual income is not available in the IMDB; however, for 2005–2011, a comparable Canadian average income measure for 2005–2011 has been produced using data from the Canada Revenue Agency. Prior to 2005 for the Canadian series (1981–2004), average annual income has been extrapolated using average growth in employment earnings for all individuals who filed an income tax return in a specific year.

• The role of spouses and children in the decision to settle or not to settle into a certain community: A focus on cities outside of Montréal, Toronto, and Vancouver

  In regard to families’ collective settlement decision making, very little data exists. Most researchers would agree that few families migrate based on the expected outcomes for one individual alone. However, the literature is silent on how these collective migration strategies are negotiated and determined. In particular little is known about how the experiences of spouses and children contribute to the settlement and integration process once migrant families arrive and attempt to settle in Canada; coping mechanisms, family strategies, and the attainment of family well-being are seriously under researched. The information that does exist tends to be anecdotal.

• Building knowledge about immigrants and community reception within an official language minority context

  This project was funded by the Research and Evaluation Branch at Citizenship and Immigration Canada that receives funding from the Roadmap for Canada's Official Languages 2013-2018: Education, Immigration, Communities to support research on immigration in official language minority communities.

• Interprovincial Mobility of Immigrants in Canada 2006-2011

  This document focuses on the interprovincial mobility (or retention) of immigrants who landed in Canada between 2006 and 2011 and in which province they resided in the 2011 tax year. The data are drawn from the 2011 Longitudinal Immigration Database.

• Economic and social objectives of immigration: The evidence that informs immigration levels and education mix

  Any discussion of the number and type of immigrants entering Canada typically focuses on a number of economic, demographic, humanitarian and social objectives. These objectives often generate conflicting conclusions regarding immigration policy direction. To complicate matters, concerns regarding short run objectives may or may not line up with longer run goals. And finally, conclusions regarding immigration policy depend upon whose perspective the goals reflect, those of the immigrant themselves, Canadian workers, Canadian employers, or Canadian society as a whole

• Sense of belonging: literature review

  Sense of belonging and its indicators can contribute to monitoring how CIC’s mandate is fulfilled. More specifically, sense of belonging is of interest under CIC’s Strategic Objective 3 (SO 3) — newcomers and citizens participate to their full potential fostering an integrating society – comprising the policy and program areas of integration, citizenship and multiculturalism.

• Promising Integration Practices in Francophone Official Language Minority Communities

  The project focuses on reception and integration strategies associated with Francophone Official Language Minority Communities (OLMCs) in three practice areas: newcomer integration into the workforce, integration into Francophone institutions, and settlement service provision in French. The goal was to first identify and then analyze promising practices to determine whether and how they might be transferred.

• Economic Integration of French-speaking Immigrants Outside Quebec: A Longitudinal Approach

  The main research question is to determine the number of years that francophone immigrants need to reach an income level that would, or would not, indicate successful economic integration and to determine what proportion of them reach that level. The innovative approach proposed is a survival analysis, allowing the development of attrition tables for various modalities that can decline as a function of the different variables available (such as province of settlement and immigrant class). Multivariate analyses are also conducted using proportional-hazards regression in discrete time.

• Statistical Portrait of the French-speaking Immigrant Population outside Quebec (1991-2011)

  The project objective is to update the statistical information in the Statistics Canada report entitled "Statistical Portrait of the French-Speaking Immigrant Population Outside Quebec (1991 to 2006)" using the 2011 National Household Survey. The update includes text highlighting the major features in each table and graph for 2011, and providing a comparison with the situation in 2006.

• FMC Reception Capacity Typology: Comparative Analysis of British Columbia and Manitoba

  Canada has a long history of immigration and immigrant integration. The recent diversification of migratory flows has, however, had profound impacts on the forms of political regulation. This is notably the case for official language minority communities (OLMC). For several years, the declining number of Canadians whose maternal language is French has prompted immigration to be seen as a way to compensate for the decline of Francophones outside of Quebec and to contribute to the vitality and survival of these communities. Specific plans to attract and retain Francophone immigrants were implemented during the 2000s, and as a result, a large portion of Francophone minority communities are immigrants, creating new plurilingual and multicultural Francophone spaces.

• Low-income and Immigration: An Overview and Future Directions for Research

  Recent trends indicate that the gap between the low-income rates for immigrants and those born in Canada has increased substantially since 1980. Rising low-income rates among more recent immigrants relative to both the Canadian-born and immigrants who have been in Canada longer are cause for concern because low-income potentially impacts the ability of immigrant individuals and families to participate economically, socially, culturally, and with dignity in their communities. While the latest research results point to improvements in immigrant economic outcomes relative to the Canadian-born, there remain immigrants who have not seen an increase in relative economic performance, and who live in chronic low-income. This is potentially one of the most serious social and labour market challenges that Canada is facing. The objective of this report is to provide an overview of the low-income situation of immigrants in Canada with the goal of highlighting aspects of this issue in need of additional research. This report is organized into four parts. Part one considers the policy importance of the issue of low-income and immigration. Part two provides a description of low-income measures and touches upon differences to reflect on when using these indicators to evaluate immigrant economic outcomes. This is followed in part three by an examination, based on a review of the research literature, of the factors that contribute to the low-income situations of immigrants in Canada. Finally, part four provides a brief summary, along with research and data considerations for the investigation of low-income and immigration going forward.

• The Integration of Immigrants of Differing Official Language Ability and Use in Canada: Analysis of the 2006 Census and the 2007–2008 Canadian Community Health Survey

  This report presents a detailed analysis of the economic and social integration of immigrants of differing official language ability and use in Canada, with a particular focus on official language minority immigrants, both established and recent. It also presents a demographic portrait of these immigrants in different regions of the country. In addition, the report presents the results of analyses used to develop a welcome-ability index for a variety of communities across the country. The welcome-ability index is a new measure of the capacity of communities to welcome and integrate newcomers.

• Design and Validation of a Survey Instrument to Assess the Attraction, Retention, and Integration of Official Language Minority Immigrants in Canada

  The goal of this project was to design, implement and analyze a pilot survey of recent Official Language Minority Immigrants in Canada, with the ultimate aim of providing a valid and reliable survey instrument that can be used to enhance understanding of the settlement and integration experiences of Official Language Minority Immigrants (OLMIs) in Canada, and the factors that drive their attraction, retention, and integration. To this end, a pilot survey was designed and administered to 150 recent Official Language Minority Immigrants across the country using computer-assisted telephone interviewing (CATI).

• Analysis and Application of a Typology of Francophone Minority Communities (FMCs)

  The purpose of this research is to identify the criteria most relevant to CIC's mandate and objectives in relation to Francophone immigration and the vitality of Francophone minority communities (FMCs). To that end, we conducted an in-depth examination of six communities, their perception of immigration issues, their ability to integrate newcomers, and to include ethnic and cultural diversity in their thinking about identity.

• Profile of Quebec's Anglophone Immigrants with English Mother Tongue

  The objective of this report is to compile an up-to-date profile of the demographic, geographic and socio-economic characteristics of Anglophone immigrants in Quebec. There is no established definition of Anglophone. For historical reasons, Statistics Canada has generally used the criterion of mother tongue, that is, the first language learned at home in childhood and still understood at the time of the census. Statistics based on mother tongue also have the advantage of being roughly comparable going back more than half a century. However, a recent study by Statistics Canada used a broader definition of all persons with English as their first official language spoken.

• Modeling the strategies and practices of NGOs and associations fostering intake and retention in the OLMCs in Edmonton and Sherbrooke

  As part of the Roadmap for Canada’s Official Languages (2013–2018), this research project was designed to contribute to the integration of immigrants in official-language minority communities (OLMCs). To do this, the research aims to model immigrant reception and integration strategies and practices implemented by NGOs and associations working in Anglophone and Francophone OLMCs in two cities: Edmonton, for Francophone communities, and Sherbrooke, for Anglophone communities.

• Francophone immigration research – issues and priorities

  This research meeting was organized by the Association des collèges et universités de la francophonie canadienne (ACUFC) in partnership with Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC). The objective was to review the status and priorities of research on immigration in Francophone minority communities (FMCs).

• Citizenship Acquisition in Canada: An Overview based on Census 1986 to 2006

  Canada’s immigration, integration/settlement, citizenship and multiculturalism policies aim to provide an inclusive environment for Canada’s culturally diverse population. The Canadian citizenship model is generally regarded as facilitative, in comparison to many other countries. For many who are foreign born, the acquisition of citizenship may mark the final stage of the migration process, and also indicate their commitment to Canada.

• Explaining self-reported language proficiency gains of immigrant women

  This report uses longitudinal data from the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC) to 1) explore self-reported language competencies of immigrant women (with baseline comparisons to immigrant men) at the time of arrival and how these develop with time spent in Canada, and 2) examine the relationship between self-reported language competencies of immigrant women, individual characteristics, and the initial integration experience.

• How global demographic and economic trends might affect Canada’s immigration program

  This report is an analytical summary of the points raised during a Metropolis Conversation that took place at Citizenship and Immigration Canada on December 17, 2012. During this roundtable discussion, the participants, who were from the international academy and the senior ranks of government, explored contemporary global demographic and economic trends and considered their implications for Canada’s immigration program, most importantly their effects on Canada’s competitiveness in the international market for talent.

• Mental health and well-being of recent immigrants in Canada: Evidence from the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC)

  Research on the mental health and well-being of recent immigrants, and on the mental health disparities among immigrant sub-groups (e.g., refugees, family class and economic class immigrants), is limited. Existing studies suggest that recent immigrants experience better mental health than other groups, but it is unclear whether this health advantage persists over time; using data from the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC), this paper addresses these gaps.

• World Values Survey (Canada) Immigrant and native born respondent comparisons

  How do immigrants differ from those born in Canada? And are these differences attributable to such social factors as culture, or are structural explanations more plausible? Since 2000, two waves of the World Values Survey in Canada have included a boosted immigrant sample which allows researchers to compare more reliably the similarities and differences in the values of immigrants and non-immigrants. This report summarizes these differences which are organized around five dimensions: the socio-economic profile; religious outlooks; views about immigration and citizenship; trust; and voluntary association membership.

• People of Iraqi ethnic origin in Canada

  This ethnic origin information paper was prepared by Citizenship and Immigration Canada’s Research and Evaluation Branch. It provides demographic, socio-cultural and socio-economic information for the population reporting specific ethnic origins; as well as a history of their migration to Canada. The data comes from the 2011 National Household Survey and Citizenship and Immigration Canada’s publication Facts and Figures.

• People of Syrian ethnic origin in Canada

  This ethnic origin information paper was prepared by Citizenship and Immigration Canada’s Research and Evaluation Branch. It provides demographic, socio-cultural and socio-economic information for the population reporting specific ethnic origins; as well as a history of their migration to Canada. The data comes from the 2011 National Household Survey and Citizenship and Immigration Canada’s publication Facts and Figures.

• Typology of Canada’s Francophone minority communities

  The objective of this research is to learn more about the diversity of Francophone minority communities (FMCs) in Canada and the factors that determine their vitality by establishing a typology for FMCs and a classification system based on the identified criteria. To do this, we sought to further understand the criteria used by CIC and the other federal institutions involved in delivering services aimed at revitalizing and enhancing the growth potential of official language minority communities (OLMCs) for Anglophones in Quebec and for FMCs outside of Quebec. The objective was also to gain insight from the communities themselves with respect to the factors that contribute to their vitality and the differences between them.

• Statistical portrait of English-speaking immigrants in Québec

  This report provides a statistical portrait of immigrants in Quebec whose First Official Language Spoken (FOLS) is English. The portrait applies 2006 Census data results to a comparison of the demographic and socio-economic outcomes of immigrants in the two English-speaking FOLS categories (English FOLS and English-French FOLS) with the French-speaking category (French FOLS) within the Province of Quebec and in Quebec Economic Regions (ERs).

• A new residential order?: The Social Geography of Visible Minority and Religious Groups in Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver in 2031

  This report presents the third phase of a study of the changing ethnocultural landscapes of Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver. It adapts the ethno-demographic projections made by Statistics Canada for 2031 at the metropolitan scale to the intra-urban scale. According to the projections, while Montreal is likely to undergo changes that mirror the general Canadian situation, Toronto and Vancouver are likely to have a social geography that is entirely new to Canada.

• IMDB 2008 Core Report – Provincial portrait of immigrant outcomes: 2001-2008 employment earnings

  This report complements the National Portrait and taken together, the Provincial Portrait and the National Portrait form the IMDB 2008 Core Report which is the central report of Research and Evaluation’s Longitudinal Immigrant Database (IMDB) Research Series describing immigrant outcomes for 2008.

• The role of migrant labour supply in the Canadian labour market

  One of the major objectives of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) is to support Canada’s economy and competitiveness. Canada’s immigration program does this by attracting new immigrants, helping them integrate into the labour market and ensuring that success is attainable for all newcomers. Current demographic trends indicate that these newcomers will play an increasingly important part in the labour market. This is underscored by the twin demographic challenges on the horizon: the first being the retirement of a large number of baby boomers and second, a limited number of new workers who are coming from domestic sources. The central questions addressed in this paper, then, are how will the Canadian labour market evolve over the coming decade and what will be the role of the immigration program in this challenging environment?

• Employment outcomes of postsecondary educated immigrants, 2006 Census – archived

  Drawing upon the newly available information captured in the 2006 Census, this study explores how differences in immigrant employment and occupational outcomes relate to the country of highest educational attainment and different fields of study. The paper examines the following research questions: Do country of education and field of study matter in the Canadian labour market?

• An educational portrait of postsecondary educated immigrants, 2006 Census – archived

  Drawing upon the newly available information captured in the 2006 Census, this study looks at statistical variations in country of highest educational attainment and field of study among PSE immigrants. This paper examines the following research question: What is the picture of postsecondary degree holders in terms of field of study and place of the highest degree among various immigrant groups?

• The housing experiences of new Canadians: Insights from the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC)

  This report outlines several aspects of the residential experiences of recent immigrants to Canada. It uses the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC) to document the experiences of newcomers as they learn how to navigate Canada’s housing market.

• IMDB 2008 Core Report – National Portrait of Immigrant Outcomes: 2001-2008 Employment Earnings

  The IMDB 2008 Core Report is an annual update of previous research that focuses on incidence of employment earnings, average entry employment earnings, and growth in average employment earnings during immigrants’ first five years in Canada. The IMDB 2008 Core Report provides outcomes for those landed in the period 2001 to 2008.

• Who Drives a Taxi in Canada?

  This document uses 2006 Census data to examine the participation of immigrants and the Canadian born in the taxi driving occupation. Specifically, it asks to what extent highly educated immigrants are employed in this occupation and how this compares to their Canadian-born counterparts. The document also draws a general portrait of taxi drivers in Canada and for eight major CMAs in terms of their immigration status, landing period, country of birth, educational attainment, field of study, and location of study.

• Recent Immigrants, Earlier Immigrants and the Canadian-Born: Association with Collective Identities – archived

  Collective identities are statements about categorical membership, which can be understood to be, on the one hand, socially constructed, yet, on the other, real and meaningful. Levels of identification provide insight into feelings of belonging, perceptions of settlement, and overall life satisfaction and therefore can be used as an important indicator of social integration. High levels of identification have “widespread instrumental value in virtue of satisfying desire or needs to belong (or to identify with others, or be recognized by others) and thereby secure goods such as psychological security, self-esteem and feelings of being at home in the world” (Mason 2000, 54).

• A literature review of Public Opinion Research on Canadian attitudes towards multiculturalism and immigration, 2006-2009 – archived

  The report is a review of publicly-available data on public attitudes relating to multiculturalism and immigration, from 2006 to 2009. We believe that a review of attitudes can play a critical role in policy and program development in these domains. That said, relatively little data on the state of Canadian public opinion on issues of multiculturalism and immigration exists since 2006, and the current state of Canadian opinion on these critical issues has been scarcely explored. There has been some intermittent and partial exploration of these attitudes in various individual commercial and in some academic work, but no systematic review of the public literature on the state of opinion on these issues. The primary purpose of this project is to identify and analyze existing public opinion data on the Canadian public’s attitudes towards multiculturalism and immigration, and review literature that analyzes such data.

• A profile of foreign students who transition to permanent resident status in Atlantic Canada

  This paper has been prepared at the request of the Atlantic Population Table. The Atlantic Population Table (APT) is a multistakeholder initiative of key federal and provincial partners, namely the Atlantic Opportunities Agency (ACOA), the four Atlantic Provinces, HRSDC and CIC, working together in support of regional development, including increased immigration to meet local needs.

  There are five streams of the APT initiative: Attraction and Promotion, Awareness, Retention, Research and Labour Market Integration. Under the research stream a comprehensive three year research plan (2007-2010) was developed, based on priorities identified by the APT Research Sub-Committee.

• Social Capital and Employment Entry of Recent Immigrants to Canada – archived

  There is growing evidence that the economic outcomes of recent immigrants declined in comparison with earlier cohorts (e.g. Bloom, Grenier and Gunderson 1995; Picot, Hou and Coulombe 2007). Examining the determinants of labour market outcomes for recent immigrants, including social capital components, is an essential step in understanding this phenomenon. In light of the difficulties of recent immigrants to assimilate into the Canadian labour market, the role of social capital as a mechanism for understanding the socio-economic progress of immigrants is increasingly prompting public interest (Kunz 2005). Different definitions of social capital have been used to examine broad contexts such as educational attainment (Sun 1999; Israel and Beaulieu 2004), job search (Montgomery 1991), and health services utilization (Deri 2005).

• Portrait of an Integration Process – archived

  This study examines the progressive process of the LSIC immigrants during the initial settlement and integrating period, with a focus on the barriers new immigrants experienced and resources they relied on in the first 4 years in Canada. Four key areas of settlement and integration are explored including: finding employment, getting education, accessing health care and finding housing. The paper tries to identify core integration barriers and possible sources of assistance for these hurdles. Challenges to assimilation process are also examined in terms of unmet needs in the key integration tasks over time. The paper draws on the advantages of the LSIC, by examining the dynamics of the integration process. Special attention is given to the progressive nature of the initial 4 years for immigrants.

• Social Capital and Wages – archived

  It is now well established that social capital is a resource that resides in interpersonal networks and that workers draw upon it to access employment and better job opportunities (e.g. Granovetter 1995; Lin 2001). Returns to social capital in the labour market have been explored increasingly over the last decade (e.g. Lin 1999; Staiger 1990; Calvó-Armengol and Jackson 2003). Despite an important theoretical literature arguing that using contacts or networks increases wages and occupational status (e.g. Granovetter 1995; Lin 2001), the empirical results on the effects of social capital on labour market outcomes vary with the contexts of the studies. The disparity of measurements of social capital and the unavailability of relevant data leave the empirical question open.

• Initial Labour Market Outcomes – archived

  The completion of the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC) provides a unique opportunity to capture initial settlement and integration experiences of recent immigrants who landed in Canada from October 2000 to September 2001. The longitudinal nature of the LSIC enables researchers to examine the dynamics of the whole adaptation process in the first 4 years in Canada.The results from the first two waves of the LSIC showed that as time went on, the LSIC immigrants had made considerable progress in the Canadian labour market. The current report takes a comprehensive look at the employment outcomes of these immigrants during their first four years in Canada, with the focus on transitions in the labour market over time.

• The Labour Market Progression of the LSIC Immigrants – archived

  Labour market participation is a key aspect of the settlement and integration process for newcomers in Canada. Results from the first wave of the LSIC showed that during the first six months most of the LSIC immigrants had tried to enter the labour market, and 4 out of 10 had found work. As time goes by, have these newcomers progressed in the labour market? The second wave of LSIC can offer insights on the labour market experience of the new immigrants two years after arrival.

• The Interprovincial Mobility of Immigrants in Canada – archived

  This document highlights some of the key findings of analysis carried out on the interprovincial mobility of immigrants and the retention of immigrants, based on data extracted from the Longitudinal Immigration Database (IMDB). The information presented focuses on the 2006 tax year.

• An examination of the Canadian Language Benchmark data from the Citizenship Language Survey – archived

  In the summer of 2006, Citizenship and Immigration Canada requested a comprehensive analysis of an existing data set. Data for the pilot test were collected in six cities from immigrants who were waiting to take their citizenship test. Assessors administered the combined listening and speaking component of the Canadian Language Benchmark Assessment tool (CLBA). In addition, the participants provided demographic information on a wide array of variables. The chief purpose of this research was to examine the relationships between these variables and the language proficiency of the immigrants, as determined by the CLBA scores.

• Health Status and Social Capital of Recent Immigrants in Canada: Evidence from the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada – archived

  Using data from the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC), the author look at the dynamic changes in the health status of recent immigrants in their initial four years in Canada, focusing particularly on the effect of social capital on immigrant health. Our descriptive and regression results provide support for the “healthy immigrant effect”; however, the results show that this effect diminishes over time.

• Recent immigrant outcomes – 2005 employment earnings – archived

  This research report provides a longitudinal study on immigrant labour market outcomes with the use of data from the Longitudinal Immigrant Database (IMDB) and the Labour Force Survey (LFS). The report discusses major factors affecting the labour market outcomes of recent immigrants to Canada. This is an annual follow-up to 2004 report.

• Socioeconomic Profiles of Immigrants in the Four Atlantic Provinces – Phase II: Focus on Vibrant Communities – archived

  This research project, conducted for Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC), is one of the research activities scheduled under the Atlantic Population Table Research Workplan for the year 2007-2008. The question of attraction to, and promotion and retention of, immigrants in Atlantic Canada has been identified as a key priority for this research. Building on the project sponsored by the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency (ACOA), the Rural Secretariat, the four provincial governments of Atlantic Canada and Saint Mary’s University on demographic and socioeconomic profiles of immigrants in all four provinces, this project makes use of data on annual inflows of immigrants and data on resident immigrants based on the 2001 and 2006 censuses to provide a profile of immigrants in vibrant communities of Atlantic Canada.

• An annotated bibliography of francophone immigration to Atlantic Canada – archived

  What follows is a series of bibliographical annotations for publications dealing with the subject of Francophone immigration to Atlantic Canada. They fall into three major groups, namely works products by academic researchers, works published by community organizations, and works distributed by government institutions.

• Exploring minority enclave areas in Montréal, Toronto, and Vancouver – archived

  The population of immigrants and members of Visible minority groups in Canada is concentrated in the three largest metropolitan areas of Montréal, Toronto, and Vancouver. Further, there are pronounced variations within these cities, and researchers and policy analysts have become increasingly interested in the tendency of some groups to form ethno-specific enclaves in certain neighbourhoods.

• Language Instruction for Newcomers to Canada: Client Profile and Performance Indicators – archived

  The Language Instruction for Newcomers to Canada (LINC) program provides basic language training to adult permanent residents in one of Canada’s official languages to facilitate their social, cultural and economic integration into Canada. By developing linguistic communication skills through LINC, immigrants and refugees are better able to function in Canadian society and contribute to the economy. For this report, special tabulations from two administrative data sources were combined in order to get consistent time series data that is used to develop a demographic profile and performance indications for LINC. The two administrative data sources are:

  1. the Immigration Contribution Accountability Measurement System (iCAMS); and
  2. the History of Assessment, Referrals and Training system (HARTs).
• Language Instruction for Newcomers to Canada: Performance results by LINC level – archived

  The following analysis looks at the LINC program by specific LINC level. For each of the levels, the following three broad characteristics are examined:

  • Number of clients in training at a specified LINC level.
  • Number of clients who have completed courses at a specified LINC level.
  • Average number of hours taken to complete a course at the specified LINC level.
• Impact of Canadian postsecondary education on recent immigrants’ labour market outcomes – archived

  This paper uses data from three waves of the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada (LSIC) that cover the period 2000-2004 to assess short-term employment outcomes for recent immigrants who had prior university education and chose either to enrol in a Canadian university, college, or other postsecondary educational institution. The key research question we sought to answer is: Do different PSE pathways lead to successful employment outcomes among recent immigrants with prior university education?

  Copies of the full report are available upon request to Research-Recherche@cic.gc.ca.

• Recent immigrants: A comparison of participants and non-participants in Canadian post-secondary education – archived

  In this study, the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants in Canada (LSIC) is employed to examine the extent to which immigrants utilized the Canadian post-secondary education (PSE) system soon after arrival, the focus being on adult immigrants who had obtained a post-secondary credential in their country of origin, thus allowing for an analysis focused on the experiences in Canada of immigrants who have post-secondary education at time of immigration.

  Copies of the full report are available upon request to Research-Recherche@cic.gc.ca.

• A description of the ethnic segregation/mixing within major Canadian metropolitan areas project – archived

  This report investigates and analyzes residential and workplace geographic distributions of immigrants and visible minority groups living in Canada’s largest cities and depicts the findings through a series of colour coded maps.

• Elderly immigrants in Canada: Income sources and self-sufficiency – archived

  Using data from the Longitudinal Immigrant Database (IMDB) this report builds on two aspects of previous research in this area. First, this paper investigates the demographic characteristics elderly immigrants in an attempt to highlight differences that may affect income. The second part of this analysis takes a more in-depth look at the income sources of elderly immigrants in Canada.

  • Summary
• Immigrant income and the family – archived

  Throughout the entire report the immigrant and non-immigrant populations are compared with respect to socio-economic characteristics and family income situations.

• Recent immigrant outcomes – 2004 – archived

  This research report provides a longitudinal study on immigrant labour market outcomes with the use of data from the Longitudinal Immigrant Database (IMDB) and the Labour Force Survey (LFS). The report discusses major factors affecting the labour market outcomes of recent immigrants to Canada. This is an annual follow-up to 2003 report.

• Recent immigrant outcomes – 2003 – archived

  This research report provides a longitudinal study on immigrant labour market outcomes with the use of data from the Longitudinal Immigrant Database (IMDB) and the Labour Force Survey (LFS). The report discusses major factors affecting the labour market outcomes of recent immigrants to Canada.

• Recent Immigrants in Metropolitan Areas – archived

  Read about recent immigrants living in Canada and in selected metropolitan areas at the time of the 2001 Census of Population. A set of comparative profiles is available with information on the origin and background of immigrants, their family and household structures, economic participation, income and housing.

• Labour Market Outcomes for Migrant Professionals: Canada and Australia Compared – Executive Summary – archived

  This report was co-funded by Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Human Resources and Skills Development Canada, and Statistics Canada.

  Copies of the full report are available upon request to Research-Recherche@cic.gc.ca.

Older research reports can be found on the Library and Archives Canada website

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