Canada’s new immigrants make more income than those moved over previous decade

Immigrants coming to Canada in recent years make dramatically more than those who moved to the country in the previous decade, according to a new report.

The Office of the Parliamentary Budget Officer released Friday its independent report on income dynamics of new immigrants to Canada. The PBO provides independent economic and financial analysis to Parliament aimed at budget transparency and accountability.

 

 

The underlying causes of the income gains were unclear, but the PBO found trends in the data that hinted at why this median may have increased. One example is that some of these income gains occurred during a period where newcomers had more pre-existing social networks in Canada, such as through relatives already in the country.

“The labour market outcomes of new immigrants to Canada improved considerably during the 2010s,” said Parliamentary Budget Officer Yves Giroux in a news release Friday. “From 2014 to 2018, the median total income of new-immigrant tax-filers rose from 55 per cent of the median total income of all tax-filers, to 78 per cent. This reverses some of the relative losses that new immigrants experienced during the 1980s and afterwards.”

The federal government decided to boost the number of permanent residents Canada welcomes each year to 500,000 in 2025.

With files from The Canadian Press

 

This article was reported by CTV News