Newly-arrived immigrants’ incomes are growing faster than those of other Canadians, reveals a report prepared for the Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer of Canada.

“During the period 2014 to 2018, their relative income went from 55 per cent to 78 per cent of that of all Canadian tax filers,” note Philip Bagnoli, Chris Matier and Xiaoyi Yan in Income Dynamics Of New Immigrants To Canada.

Although the boost in the incomes of immigrants was broad-based, those who came to Canada from Asian countries, including India, the Philippines and China, seemed to have fared best and so did those with higher education coming to take higher-paying jobs.

“Those in professional occupations (e.g., engineers, applied scientists, teachers, accountants, physicians, etc.) were responsible for much of the narrowed gap, in terms of their incomes one year after landing,” note the authors of the report.

Strong family networks in Canada prior to immigration and the ability to work as temporary foreign workers or international students before gaining permanent residency seemed to have helped immigrants to Canada boost their incomes during those years.

“The Canadian experience of immigrants just before landing was an important correlate. An increasing number of immigrants are working in Canada on a temporary basis, and then gain permanent status,” the report states.

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“Their median total Canadian income in the year before landing has been increasing since 2007: it went from about 49 per cent of all residents in 2006, to about 89 per cent in 2013.”

Newcomers who settled in Ontario and British Columbia, both of which have large immigrant communities, seemed to do best. 

Family Ties, Community Networks Important To Immigrants’ Success In Canada

“A related finding is that the increase in income occurred while the number of immigrants with family ties in Canada was increasing, suggesting that pre-existing social networks are important for economic outcomes,” notes the report.

The latest Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) data reveals Canada had welcomed 434,360 new permanent residents for the year as of the end of November.

Based on that trend in the first 11 months of that year, Canada was then poised to have welcomed 473,847 new permanent residents by the end of 2023, or 8.3 per cent more than the 437,590 it welcomed in 2022.

That projected level of immigration would be 1.9 per cent higher than Canada’s target of 465,000 new permanent residents for 2023.

Under the 2024-2026 Immigration Levels Plan, Canada is now planning to welcome 485,000 new permanent residents in 2024, another 500,000 in 2025 and then hold the line on immigration in 2026 with another 500,000 newcomers.

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That’s a total of 1.485 million immigrants to Canada over those three years. 

Canada operates a two-tier immigration system, accepting applications for permanent residence through its federal Express Entry system’s Federal Skilled Worker (FSW) program, Federal Skilled Trades (FST) program and Canadian Experience Class (CEC), as well as the Provincial Nominee Programs (PNP) of its 10 Canadian provinces.

Foreign workers hoping to come to Canada to take up jobs here can also do so through the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) and the International Mobility Program (IMP).

The Global Talent Stream (GTS), a part of the TFWP, can under normal processing situations lead to the granting of Canadian work permits and processing of visa applications within two weeks