“I’m looking for a second job to pay for the electricity and the mortgage,” he says Newspaper Guy Romeus, who clearly realizes that his 40 hours a week work will no longer be enough.
Like him, a growing number of Canadians who work two or more jobs are doing so not by choice, but out of necessity, to meet basic needs like food, rent or a mortgage, according to Statistics Canada’s latest employment data released yesterday.
“I would like to have a second job because inflation is devouring Quebec’s population,” summarizes Guy Romeus, who works at a company on Montreal’s south shore.
According to Statistics Canada, around a million workers — or 5.4% of them — hold multiple jobs at the same time. Although this proportion has changed little over the past year, we nevertheless see that this choice is increasingly being forced by economic difficulties.
No “little luxury”
In fact, last August, as many as 34.9% of workers in the country who held more than one job did so primarily to meet basic needs. This is a 70% increase compared to data collected just prior to the pandemic, i.e. February and March 2020.
Back then, only 20.6% of workers who held multiple jobs did so primarily to meet basic needs such as buying food or shelter. Necessity justifies the decision of more than a third.
“Nowadays we can no longer afford small luxury goods because you have to have a lot of money for them,” explains Guy Romeus, who remains in good spirits. “Two years ago we could eat for $7 or $8. Nowadays it is very expensive to drink even a glass of juice,” he adds.
part time
Marc Desormeaux, senior economist at Desjardins, notes that of the 40,000 jobs created last month, no less than a quarter (24.22% or 7,800) are part-time jobs, most often sought as second jobs. The trend is increasing; the average since January has been just 17.6%.
Historically, women, young people, racialized Canadians and immigrants admitted less than 10 years ago were most likely to hold multiple jobs. In August, new immigrants were more likely to hold multiple jobs out of necessity than those born in Canada. This was the case for half of them (50.8%), compared to 29.8% of their peers born here.
Among racialized Canadians, the proportion who held more than one job out of necessity was particularly high among workers of Arab (76.2%), Latino (63.1%) and Filipino (51.4%) backgrounds.
Highlights:
The Quebec Institute said yesterday that it was difficult to predict which workers would see their employment prospects hit in the coming months. Nevertheless, he notes that employment has declined, particularly in retail. The number of unemployed people also rose more sharply among “high school graduates” than among university graduates.