Nomen est omen at the Canadian jobs marketplace

Last year, Ottawa public transport facilities sported ads urging employers to employ immigrants. They featured a photo of a member of visible minorities* and their job application, foreign sounding name, various levels of academic degrees and foreign experience. Jobs poster immigrants applied for were low paid and low skill.

High educated and skilled immigrants often face incredible difficulties finding a job that would properly reflect their education and professional and language skills. For one thing, they are admitted to Canada on the basis of the government’s point system but employment is often governed by private organizations such as chambers, unions etc. which specifically require either Canadian education or experience or both. That practice would be in itself an interesting topic for research since foreign educational standards and professional requirements are often much higher than Canadian ones. Very often the only purpose of these chambers is not as much as to protect standards as to protect the members and the chambers’ existence.

However, even non-organized jobs are often off-limits to immigrants. Even their Canadian-born children may struggle on job markets.

One of the reasons could be their names. They sound, look and are foreign. Nomen est omen According to a research conducted by Philip Oreopoulos, professor of economics at the University of British Columbia, applicants with English names are 40% more likely to receive an call back for an job interview than foreign-named applicants who submitted identical resumes for the identical job. Matthews Wilsons and Gregs Johnsons would be selected over Arjuns Kumars and Chaundrys Mohammads. The rate dropped to 20% when the name contained both English and foreign parts, such as Vivian Zhang or Jennifer Li.

The research method was devised in a way that made a name the most prevalent feature determining whether a person received a call back. At the same time, it allowed the team of researchers to determine the effect of other individual categories such as foreign versus Canadian education and foreign versus Canadian work experience. The research concludes that “overall, the results suggest considerable employer discrimination against applicants with ethnic names or with experience from foreign firms.”

According to Professor Oreopoulos this apparent name-based discrimination, while contravening anti-discrimination regulations, may or may not be intentional. For example, jobs requiring specific language or social skills may induce higher non-call back rates for bearers of ethnic names since, statistically or based on experience, their level of English may not.

Statistics, however, cannot explain a 40% difference. Professor Oreopoulos stayed clear of drawing far reaching conclusions and limited his reasoning to admitting “an element of unfairness”.

The report, albeit conclusive, has few shortcomings. The research took place in Toronto, where a half of the population is foreign born. Not just of foreign descent. Foreign born. Is Toronto less immigrant-friendly? Is it based on statistical experience? Other regions of Canada can produce different results.

The researchers only evaluated Indian, Pakistani and Chinese names. What about less visible minorities? There are many distinctly non-English names in Canada of say, Russian, Italian, Polish, Slovak or Czech origin. Ignatieff and Gretzky may be anglicized but their original is distinctly Russian (Ignatiev and Greckij). London (Britain) based HR agencies are very careful to avoid accusations of discriminating against South Asian job seekers but often feel free to discriminate against job-seekers from EU countries, especially those coming from Central and Eastern Europe.

Still, the outcome of Professor Oreopoulos’s research is rather conclusive. Is the observed state of the affairs triggered by immigration-related issues only? Or is it a fear of foreign elements?

* I use the term for the convenience’s sake and not to determine a category or social status. The UN describes the term as “racist”.

Striking Canada

France has the image of a country, where workers strike more than they actually work. Yes, they work less than their US counterparts, but, according to the OECD 2007 estimates, France GDP per hour worked as a % of USA’s was 100.6%. Not that this is in any way relevant… Unions go on strike everywhere, not just in France.

But who would have thought that a French way of striking can serve as a good example. Bringing Paris to a halt for a few days makes a point and both unions and the other party are usually smart enough to negotiate 24/7 and come up with a compromise. Alienating the public for too long would be counterproductive and would hardly win more support for the unions and the political party that’s in charge of the city or the country. Even the wide-spread November 2007 strike was over in 9 days. It was a strike against reforms that were supposed to change France’s work and pension systems in a very dramatic way.

In Canada, they do things, obviously, differently. Ottawa’s transit strike entered its 44th day on Thursday. And apparently, even if the strike ended now, it would take two weeks to resume full service – on 70% of routes. Ottawanians had miserable Christmas and New Year’s celebrations, commuting, which is always a challenge in snow laden Ottawa at -20 degrees Celsius was hell. Taxi drivers, on the other hand, are having a party. Formal negotiations haven’t taken place since December 23. Informal talks are, apparently, way to go.

Meanwhile, in Toronto, University of York’s students had a great time. Union members of the staff went on strike on November 6, academic activities were suspended and 50 thousands students out of class, seriously jeopardizing not just their studies but also their prospective careers. Negotiations between university and the unions ended on January 9.

Both cases show that neither of the sides cares much about the consequences their respective actions have on the outside world, on those who depend on services they pay for, be it education or transport. A few day strike usually means that the public can blame either unions for raising unacceptable demands or the employer for making unacceptable proposals. There’s a winner and a looser. But in the cases of Ottawa transport and University of York strikes, the only losers are tens of thousands of innocent students and commuters.

There must be heads rolling. The question is, who has the authority and who has the will.