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Hiring and job separation rates in the era of generative artificial intelligence: Early evidence (Statistics Canada)
Using Labour Force Survey data from January 2006 to August 2026, this Statistics Canada study by Tahsin Mehdi and Marc Frenette compares hiring and job separation rates for employees aged 15 to 64 across occupations with different levels of potential exposure to AI. It finds no broad evidence that the rise of generative AI has sharply reduced hiring or increased separations: hiring rates for workers aged 15 to 29 fell from 2.9% to 2.5% in occupations more amenable to AI augmentation and from 4.0% to 3.3% in less exposed occupations, while separation rates stayed within historical ranges. The authors note that hiring rates began declining before ChatGPT’s release in November 2022, so it is unclear whether lower hiring reflects AI or other economic forces, and they stress the need for continued monitoring.
Meeting the Demand for Talent (Future Skills Centre)
This State of Skills report draws on projects funded by the Future Skills Centre to examine how Canada can build the skilled workforce needed to deliver about $192 billion in major federal projects, warning that worsening mismatches between the skills employers need and those workers have could stall progress. It points to approaches that are working, including demand-driven training co-designed with employers, skills-first hiring, competency frameworks, pay-for-performance incentives that reimbursed up to 70% of employer training costs, and tailored supports for retaining and advancing equity-deserving groups. For small and medium-sized businesses, it recommends incremental AI adoption through external partnerships and upskilling existing staff, and it urges governments to invest in intermediaries that aggregate employer demand for training.
How are young Canadian university graduates faring in the recent labour market? (Statistics Canada)
Using Labour Force Survey data for non-students aged 25 to 34, this study in Statistics Canada’s Insights on Canadian Society finds that 69% of young adults with a bachelor’s degree or higher were employed in permanent, full-time positions in 2025, down from a peak of 71% in 2022 but above the 65% average from 2017 to 2019. University graduates continued to out-earn peers with other levels of education, with an average hourly wage of $39.18, although real wage growth has been modest. Gender gaps persist: 72% of men and 66% of women held permanent, full-time jobs, women earned $0.92 for every dollar earned by men, and female graduates with a child aged six or younger at home were less likely to work in permanent, full-time positions (62%) than women without young children (67%).
A Matter of Degrees: Understanding Immigrant Skills and Labour-Market Outcomes (C.D. Howe Institute)
Using data from the 2023 Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC), this Commentary by Parisa Mahboubi finds that immigrants in Canada score lower than non-immigrants in literacy, numeracy and adaptive problem-solving, with the largest gap in literacy (20 points), and that the gap appears at every education level: university-educated immigrants score about the same in literacy as non-immigrants with a high school diploma. Language background is the characteristic most closely associated with the gap, and immigrants with foreign credentials earn less and are less likely to work in high-skill occupations than comparable non-immigrants, even after accounting for measured skills. The paper recommends considering a higher minimum language threshold in Express Entry, faster and more consistent credential recognition, and rigorous evaluation of employment-focused language training.
Littler 2026 Canadian Employer Survey Report (Littler)
Based on a July 2026 survey of 200 Canadian HR professionals, in-house lawyers and executives, this report from employment law firm Littler finds that 77% of employers took workforce actions over the past year in response to economic pressure, including paused or reduced hiring (46%) and layoffs (35%), with 83% of that group citing US tariff disruptions. AI is already reshaping roles, with 44% of employers having reassessed or reassessing job responsibilities and 36% having reduced or planning to reduce hiring, even though fewer than half have a formal workplace AI policy. The report also finds that 55% of employers have updated job postings to include pay information, that half have increased required on-site days in the past two years and that 59% report more requests for mental health leaves or accommodations.
