CWP48 Kelly Final Colour Revised

8/8/2019 CWP48 Kelly Final Colour Revised

1/43

WORKING PAPER SERIES

FILIPINOS IN CANADA:ECONOMIC DIMENSIONS OF

IMMIGRATION AND SETTLEMENT

Philip Kelly

CERIS Working Paper No. 48 (revised)

September 2006

Series Editor for 2006/07Michael J. Doucet, PhD

Department of GeographyRyerson University350 Victoria StreetToronto, Ontario

M5B [email protected]

Joint Centre of Excellence for Researchon Immigration and Settlement Toronto


2/43

The CERIS Working Paper Series

Manuscripts on topics related to immigration, settlement, and culturaldiversity in urban centres are welcome. Preference may be given to the

publication of manuscripts that are the result of research projects fundedthrough CERIS.

All manuscripts must be submitted in both digital and hard-copy form,and should include an Abstract of 100-200 words

and a list of keywords.

If you have comments or proposals regarding the CERIS Working PaperSeries please contact the Editor at:

(416) 946-3110 or e-mail at

Copyright of the articles in the CERIS Working Paper Seriesis retained by the author(s)

The views expressed in these articles are those of the author(s),and opinions on the content of the articles should be communicated

directly to the author(s) themselves.

JOINT CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE FOR RESEARCHON IMMIGRATION AND SETTLEMENT TORONTO (CERIS)

246 Bloor Street West, 7 Floor, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 1V4th

Telephone (416) 946-3110 Facsimile (416) 971-3094


3/43

i

Filipinos in Canada: Economic Dimensions of Immigration and Settlement

Philip KellyDepartment of Geography

York University

E-mail: [email protected]

ABSTRACT

The Philippines is now one of Canadas most significant sources of immigrants; yet,relatively little analysis of Filipino settlement experiences has been conducted, aside from closescrutiny of the Live-In Caregiver Programme. This paper uses data from the 2001 census, and fromthe landing records of immigrants in the 1980s and 1990s, to generate a numerical portrait of Filipino

immigration and settlement, with a particular focus on the economic dimensions of integration intoCanadian cities and labour markets. While aspects of cultural, social, and political integration have

been excluded here, and the qualitative dimensions of labour market processes also have beenneglected, some important conclusions about the aggregate experiences of Filipino immigrants doemerge. Overall, we see a community of relatively recent and highly educated immigrants who areculturally and linguistically prepared for life in Canada, and who integrate well into the residentiallandscapes and workplaces of Canadian cities. But we also see a group experiencing processes of deskilling and economic marginalization, with high levels of occupational segmentation in the labour market and low earnings.

KEYWORDS: Filipino, immigration, settlement, economic integration, employment

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I gratefully acknowledge Alex Lovell and Anne-Marie Debbane for their research assistance,CERIS for the supply of data sets, Michael Doucet for his editorial advice, and the ongoing researchcollaboration of Mila Astorga Garcia, Nel Moya, and the Community Alliance for Social Justice(CASJ). Versions of this paper have been presented to audiences at CASJ, at the Filipino-CanadianReal Estate Association, the University of the Philippines Alumni Association of Metro Toronto, andthe City of Toronto conference on Community Crisis Response.


4/43

ii

TABLE OF CONTENTS

ABSTRACT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . i

KEYWORDS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . i

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . i

INTRODUCTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 1

DATA AND DEFINITIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 2Identifying the Filipino . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 2The Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 4

IMMIGRATION AND ARRIVAL . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 5

Period of Arrival . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 5Immigration Programmes and Categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 9Canada in the Context of Global Filipino Migrations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 11The Geography of Settlement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 13

HUMAN CAPITAL AND DESKILLING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 17Educational Assets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 18Linguistic Assets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 20Deskilling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 21

FILIPINOS IN THE LABOUR MARKET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 23

ECONOMIC FORTUNES: INCOMES AND EARNINGS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 27

ECONOMIC COSTS AND CONTRIBUTIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 34

CONCLUSIONS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 35

REFERENCES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 37


5/43

Page 1

There are, howeve r, some rich narratives contained in several community profiles, but they are now rather dated .1See, for example, Chen 1998; Laquian 1973; Cusipag and Buenafe 1993.

INTRODUCTION

The Philippines now represents one of Canadas most important source countries for

immigrants ranking third in the 1990s, after China and India. In the 2001 census, just over 223,000immigrants in Canada identified themselves as Filipino, and over 10,000 new arrivals have beenadded to this number every year since then. When these arrivals are added to the Canadian-bornFilipino population, it is projected that Filipino-Canadians will number at least 500,000 by 2017(Statistics Canada 2005). Despite the significance of Filipino immigration, and the size of thecommunity, issues related to their settlement experiences have received relatively little scrutiny,either academically or politically. The exception to this has been the substantial attention focusedon the Live-In Caregiver Programme (LCP) an immigration channel dominated by Filipina womensince the early 1990s. Beyond the LCP, however, little is known about the Filipino immigration andsettlement experience. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to generate an aggregate portrait of 1

the economic integration of Filipinos in Canada, including, but not limited to, those who arrived as

caregivers.

This paper uses some of the extensive statistical data now available on Filipino immigrationand settlement in Canada to develop a preliminary, and strictly numerical, portrait of a community.The paper relies entirely upon data generated by government agencies, in particular Citizenship andImmigration Canada and Statistics Canada. In the first section, the sources and limitations of thesedata are discussed, along with the problems associated with constructing a statistical Filipino asthe object of inquiry. The second section examines the patterns of immigrant arrivals from thePhilippines, paying particular attention to the timing of immigration, the programmes under whichFilipinos have landed, and the geography of settlement. The subsequent sections then trace theeconomic integration of Filipino immigrants in various ways, examining the human capital withwhich Filipino immigrants arrive in Canada, the processes of deskilling and occupationalsegmentation in the urban labour market, their incomes relative to other groups, and the overalleconomic burdens and benefits of Filipino immigration to the Canadian exchequer.

There is much that will be left out of this portrait. While the community profiles cited above provided rich accounts of the social, cultural, religious and political lives of Filipinos in Canada, this paper is limited to the quantitative picture that emerges from immigration and census statistics. Itis also narrowly focused on the economic experiences of immigrants. Nevertheless, some importantissues are highlighted in the data presented here. Overall, the picture that will emerge is of a groupthat is arriving in Canada in large numbers and equipped with high levels of educational, linguistic,and cultural preparedness. These characteristics have been translated into high levels of participationin the workforce, low levels of unemployment, and widely dispersed patterns of residentialsettlement. At the same time, Filipinos have experienced anomalously high levels of occupationalsegmentation and low average earnings. There is also some evidence that recent immigrants remainthe most vulnerable to cyclical changes in the economy.


6/43

Page 2

In the 2001 census, 99,780 immigrants in the Toronto CM A counted themselves as fitting into the Filipino visible2

minority category. Of these 97,750 were born in the Philippines, and 98,565 classified their ethnic origin as Filipino 89,055 as Filipino alone, and 9,510 as Filipino in combination with another ethnic origin (the largest singlecombined respo nse being Chinese). In this paper, the visible minority response is primarily used to define theFilipino population when using Census data, while country of birth is used in the case of immigration data. Thedifferences between these definition, or one based on ethnic origin, are, at most, 1-2 per cent. For immigration data,the Landed Immigrant Data System (LIDS) records 223,572 immigrants landing in Canada between 1980 and 2001with the Philippines as their country of birth; 223,739 with Philippine citizenship; and 21 5,733 with the Philippinesas a country of last permanent residence. Clearly the last of these is the most unreliable (and reflects the practice of working elsewhere ov erseas before ap plying for immigration). In this paper, therefore, country of birth is used todefine Filipino immigrants when using immigrant landing data.

Although this paper is limited to a strictly statistical portrait of Filipino experiences, theeconomic marginalization described here is an important backdrop to, and outcome of, other

processes of cultural, social, and political marginalization. This account is, therefore, important in

understanding the context for recent Filipino political mobilization against racism and discrimination(described by Garcia, forthcoming).

DATA AND DEFINITIONS

Identifying the Filipino

Creating a coherent statistical account of the Filipino community in Canada is alluringly easy.

When the 2001 Census of Canada asked respondents about their visible minority status, Filipinowas an entirely separate category that specified a group far more closely than other responses, suchas Black or Arab. Filipino also counts as an ethnic origin response, either alone or incombination with others. Moreover, these responses overlap almost exactly, both with each other and with immigration data on country of birth and country of citizenship. In this way, Filipino2

represents one of the most coherent and well-defined identity categories provided within theCanadian multiculturalism framework. Its members are easily identified by overlapping signifiersof birthplace, visible minority, ethno-cultural belonging, and, to some extent, even language andreligion.

The result of this coherence is, however, that the statistical Filipino is presented all tooeasily to the analyst. Unlike other immigrant groups whose most keenly-felt identities might behidden beneath vague analytical categories such as Latin American or Chinese, there is a rarespecificity to the Filipino label, and it is tempting to construct an average Filipino for purposes of statistical representation. At the outset, therefore, it is important to make clear the diversity thatexists within the Filipino community (and, thus, to unpack the homogeneity which that word tendsto imply). As some of the data presented later will show, gender, education, immigration category,year of arrival, and other factors all create distinctions within the Filipino community. The 2,327


7/43

Page 3

Caregivers have, in fact, been resident in Canada a s non-immigrants for several years before landing. See also3footnote 8.

Seventy-eight per cent of Filipinos declared a strong sense of attachment to their identity, compared for examp le,4with 75 per cent of East Indians, 65 per ce nt of Portuguese, 58 per cent of Chinese, and 5 6 per cent of Italians(Statistics Canada 2003).

live-in caregivers who arrived from the Philippines in 2001, for example, will have very different3

settlement experiences from the 33 who arrived under the business immigrant category, or the 2,983who arrived as principal applicants in the skilled-worker category. All of them will have an entirely

different relationship to their host country from the 1,023 children under the age of 5 who alsoimmigrated in the same year, and who will receive all of their education in the Canadian schoolsystem. To these variables must be added the differing experiences of those who arrived in the earlyyears (of the late 1960s and early 1970s) versus those who have come later; those who settled in thethree gateway cities versus those who came to reside in smaller centres; and the differentexperiences of men and women. There is, in short, no such thing as an average Filipino immigrantand so there is a danger that statistical evidence will obscure as much as it reveals.

Despite the multiple cross-cutting identities that intersect with Filipino-ness, there are stillgood reasons why a statistical Filipino is worth pursuing. Not least among them is the intensity of

belonging felt by those who subscribe to a Filipino identity. In Statistics Canadas Ethnic Diversity

Survey in 2002, more Filipinos recorded a strong sense of belonging than any other ethno-culturalgroup (Statistics Canada, 2003). Clearly, then, Filipino-ness is a meaningful category to those who4

identify with it, even if great diversity exists within the group. A corollary, or more accurately perhaps, a cause, of this identification can be seen in its contribution to the formation of strong socialnetworks among the Philippine-born population in Canada. These play an important role insettlement, for example, in helping recent migrants to secure residential accommodation andemployment. Filipino also has become an identity from which political and citizenship claims arestaked. Much of the advocacy and activism around the Live-In Caregiver Programme, for example,has come from Filipino groups in Vancouver and Toronto in particular, which have come to identifythe problems with the programme as a Filipino issue.

Besides the significance invested in Filipino-ness from within the community, there are alsoreasons for retaining it as a foundational category, based on the exogenous definition andracialization of Filipinos as a group. In the mainstream Canadian media (and others around theworld), there has developed a strong association between Filipino-ness and the performance of

particular roles in the labour market. Within the Canada context, these relate especially to theidentification of Filipino femininity with jobs in childcare and nursing. As the analysis in this paper will show, such identification is not without some basis in empirical fact, but the representation andthe fact are mutually reinforcing the representation creates the fact, as much as it reflects it.Where such racialization exists, it is important to work with the category involved in order to dispelor add nuance to the stereotypes, assumptions, and associations that have been created.


8/43


9/43

Page 5

In the case of tax data from the IMDB, figures were available only provincially, and not atthe level of the CMA. Thus, Ontario had to be employed as the scale of analysis in this case. Itshould be noted, however, that around 85 per cent of all Filipino immigrants in Ontario lived in the

Toronto Census Metropolitan Area in 2001, thus making the change in scale less significant than itmight have been for other, less-concentrated groups. For data on the characteristics of immigrantsfrom landing records in LIDS, all of Canada is used as the scale of analysis. Although a specificdestination is listed on the landing record, there is no guarantee that an immigrant will actually stayin that location, and so it is inappropriate to use such records in order to characterize immigrant

populations at smaller scales. It is also true, of course, that immigrants landing in Canada may notstay in Canada, and that the characteristics (such as level of education) of immigrants change over time. Thus, there are inevitably discrepancies between the information captured in landing recordsand Census data.

A number of further and more detailed caveats will be noted in the course of analysis in this

paper, and all serve to reiterate the caution needed in constructing a statistical portrait of anyimmigrant group. Inevitably, the complexity, richness, and emotional engagement of individualstories are erased here and are reduced to numerical aggregations. The statistics, however, doconstitute a skeletal foundation from which personal narratives can subsequently be fleshed out. Italso should be noted that the data presented here remain at the level of descriptive statistics. I havenot attempted, except in the very general sense of interpreting patterns, to seek correlations withinthe databases using multivariate statistics. While the data presented here do show importantaggregate patterns, their usefulness in identifying causal relationships is limited.

IMMIGRATION AND ARRIVAL

Period of Arrival

Changes to Canadas immigration regulations in the 1960s removed the automatic preferencegiven to immigrants from Europe and the United States, and placed priority on education and skillsin the selection of independent immigrants (Li 2003). In particular, the adoption of a universalpoints system in 1967 significantly changed the composition of immigrant arrivals. Before thatwatershed, the number of Filipino settlers in Canada was very small indeed largely limited to smallnumbers of professionals (especially in healthcare) who were able to enter after earlier regulatorychanges in 1962. The flow of immigrants from the Philippines remained relatively small until theearly 1970s. The declaration of martial law in the Philippines in September 1972, however, was adefining moment that led many middle- and upper-class Filipinos to re-evaluate their futures in their homeland. Even those not specifically targeted as political enemies or challengers by PresidentFerdinand Marcos saw a suspension of political freedoms and a deterioration of economic prospects.At the same time, the Marcos regime was actively promoting overseas contract work as an economicdevelopment strategy. While such contracts took workers primarily to the booming oil economies


10/43

Page 6

of the Middle East, and later the industrializing tigers of East Asia, many also sought permanentsettlement in North America. At the same time, an expanding public sector in Canada led to anincreasing demand for professionals such as nurses and teachers.

Figure 1 shows the trend in Filipino immigration to Canada since 1967. The first wave of immigrants reached a peak in 1974, but subsequently declined as regulatory changes in the mid-1970s prevented immigration applications during visits to Canada, imposed restrictions on thedefinition of family for family reunification applications, and deducted points if applicants did nothave pre-arranged employment. Over this period, then, patterns of Filipino immigration followedoverall immigration trends. The same was true when arrivals increased again from the late 1980sonwards reflecting changes in Canadian economic and labour-market circumstances incombination with a political commitment to high levels of immigration.

Figure 1

Filipino Immigrant Arrivals to Canada, 1967-2004

Source: Citizenship and Immigration Cana da, www.cic.gc.ca

Note: Filipino is defined by country of last perman ent residence


11/43

Page 7

Thus, the data from the LIDS used later in this paper, which include all landings from 19 80-2001, represe nt a very6substantial share of all Filipino immigrants. Note, howe ver, that with continued large n umbers of arrivals from thePhilippines since 2001 , this proportion is effectively declining.

The age distribution of immigrants, who tend to be young o r middle-aged, suggests that this would be small. Also,7this is likely offset by the 5,000 or so immigrants who arrived in the early months of 2001 an d are, therefore, countedin the census (but not in the landing records).

Table 1 shows the result of these immigration trends as captured in the 2001 census. Filipinoimmigrants across Canada were predominantly recent immigrants. Less than 5 per cent of the

population had arrived prior to 1970, more than three-quarters had arrived since 1980, and in 20016

over half of all Filipinos in Canada had arrived in just the previous ten years.

Table 1Period of Arrival for Filipinos in Canada, 2001

Period of ImmigrationFilipino

ImmigrantsPercentage of TotalFilipino Immigrants

Before 1961 215 0.11961-1970 9,080 4.1

1971-1980 42,875 19.21981-1990 52,515 23.51991-1995 63,640 28.51996-2001 54,715 24.5Total 223,035 100.0

Source: Statistics Canada , 2001 Census, Metropolis Project Core Data Set Tabulations.

Note: These data refer to the arrival dates of imm igrants who d eclared themselves to be Filipino inresponse to the Visible Minority question in the 2001 census.

When landing records and census data are put together, an interesting discrepancy arises.Landing records indicate 254,742 arrivals between 1971 and 2000. But 2001 census data recordonly 213,745 Filipino immigrants who arrived between 1971 and the census date in May 2001 adiscrepancy of just over 40,000 people. Obviously, mortality accounts for some of the discrepancy. 7

The 20 per cent sample in the 2001 census also introduces a degree of error as well. Nevertheless,the magnitude of the difference suggests that there is a substantial amount of onward or reversemigration among Filipino immigrants. In the case of onward migration (for which data are notcollected by Canadian authorities), it seems likely that most is to the United States probably witha view to joining family members there or taking advantage of more liberal labour-marketregulations concerning professional licensing. In the case of return migration, it is possible thatsome (especially retirees) divide their time between the Philippines and Canada, but it is also


12/43

Page 8

possible that a number have returned permanently. Either way, it seems possible that there may bemore than 1,000 Filipino immigrants leaving Canada each year.

One point that both landing records and census data make clearly is that Canadas Filipinocommunity is predominantly comprised of recent immigrants and their children. This is illustrated by the demographic structure of Filipinos in Toronto (see Figure 2). Several features are clear. First,the recent nature of the immigration stream is evident in the age profile, with most Filipino-bornimmigrants in middle-aged cohorts and in the midst of their working lives. Second, nearly allCanadian-born Filipinos are children or young adults, and, thus, are the children of first-generationimmigrants. Third, a distinct gender imbalance is evident among Philippine-born Filipino-Canadians

an issue we will discuss further below.

Figure 2Demographic Structure of the Filipino Population in Toronto, 2001

Source: Calculated from Statistics Canad a, 2001 Census, Metropolis Project Core Data Set Tabulations.

It is worth noting that the relatively recent history of Filipino settlement in Canada havecreated a quite different situation from that which exists in the United States. There, a century of colonial and post-colonial ties have facilitated several waves of immigration from the Philippines


13/43

Page 9

as agricultural and fishery workers in Hawaii, California, and the Pacific Northwest in the earlyyears of the 20 century; as enlistees in the US Navy from the 1950s onwards, and as nurses,th

teachers; and other professionals since the 1960s (Espiritu 2003). These multiple waves of

immigration to the US, and the distinctive colonial ties upon which they were predicated, has meantthat the class, race, and gender identities of Filipinos in the US have been constructed in slightlydifferent ways from the Canadian context. As a result, Torontos Filipino community is quitedifferent from that found in San Diego or Los Angeles, for example, where a long history of immigration has created a more established and embedded community.

Immigration Programmes and Categories

A further distinctive feature of the migration stream from the Philippines has been the heavy

use of particular immigration programmes. Table 2 compares the immigration programmes used byimmigrants born in the Philippines, with those used by all immigrants to Canada between 1980 and2001. While the expense involved in the Investor and Entrepreneur class clearly have excludedmany Filipinos (and political circumstances in the country have never created a significant streamof designated refugees), the family and assisted relative categories have been heavily used. Mostnotable, however, has been the importance of the Live-In Caregiver category, which alone accountedfor 11.6 per cent of all Philippine-born arrivals during this period (including both principal applicantsand dependents). Indeed Filipinos accounted for 25,846 of the 32,474 arrivals (79.6 per cent) under the caregiver programme; and even this probably is a significant underestimate, as the programmes

predecessor, the Foreign Domestic Movement, was not counted separately, with the figures relatedto it incorporated into the Other Independent Class in Table 2.

Both the Foreign Domestic Movement (1980-1992) and the Live-In Caregiver Programme(1992-) involved the issuing of work visas to those who will work and live in the homes of their employers usually caring for the elderly or for young children. After two years of work in the

programme, participants can apply for immigrant status. Both scholars and activists have criticizedthese programmes in relation to workplace abuses, curtailed citizenship rights, the stigmatization andracialization of Filipina femininity, institutionalized deskilling, and the psychological traumas of family separation (see Pratt 2004; England and Stiell 1997; Bakan and Stasiulis 1997; McKay 2002).


14/43

Page 10

The word landing is used only in the sense that Canadian immigration a uthorities recognize the immigrant as8arriving in that particular year. In the case of dependents this may be true, but principal applicants in the domesticand caregiver catego ries will, of course, have been residing in Canada for several years before landing.

It is also quite likely that there is some kind o f multiplier effect from those who are counte d as applicants or 9depende nts in the domestic worker and caregive r categories. That is, a significant number of those counted as skilledworker or family reunification cases may be connected in some way with a formal sponsor, or even just a contact,

Table 2Landings by Immigrant Category, 1980-2001

All ImmigrantLandings 1980-2001 Philippine-born ImmigrantLandings, 1980-2001 Number Per Cent Number Percent

Family Class 1,394,935 35.4 101,427 45.4Other Independent Class(Skilled Worker) 1,085,499 27.5 56,380 25.2Assisted Relative Class 382,962 9.7 32,324 14.5Convention Refugee Class 303,016 7.7 314 0.1Designated Class 268,332 6.8 332 0.1Entrepreneur Class 180,009 4.6 2,383 1.1Investor Class 82,938 2.1 1,453 0.6

Self-Employed Class 65,886 1.7 819 0.4Retired Class 52,706 1.3 531 0.2Live-In Caregiver Class 32,474 0.8 25,846 11.6Independents andEntrepreneurs (Old Act1952) 31,385 0.8 773 0.3OTHER 60,705 1.5 990 0.4Total 3,940,852 100.0 223,572 100.0

Source: Landed Immigrant Data System, Citizenship and Immigration Canada

Figure 3 provides a more graphic illustration of the importance of these programmes (andincludes all foreign domestics and caregivers in a single category by extracting them, whereapplicable, from the skilled worker category). The use of such programmes peaked in the mid 1990s,with almost one third of all Philippine-born immigrants landing in the caregiver category in 1993.8

Over the full 22-year period covered by the LIDS database, 19.5 per cent of all Philippine-bornlandings have been as domestic workers, live-in caregivers, or their dependents, and as Figure 3shows, most of these were in the second half of this period. Despite the stereotypes that exist, then,caregivers and their dependents are far from being a majority of Filipino immigrants. Over 22 years,45 per cent arrived under family reunification categories, 32 per cent under skilled worker categories,and 2 per cent as business immigrants. Nevertheless, the size and the distinctive conditions under which caregivers enter Canada (and the consequences for their subsequent economic integration)

inevitably have shaped the overall statistical picture of the community as a whole.9


15/43

Page 11

who entered unde r the live-in caregiver programme and will in turn help them to integrate. The job -search andaccommo dation-search networks that these contacts prov ide will mean that the circumstances of caregivers after theygraduate from the programme w ith their own immigration papers has a much wider significance.

Figure 3

Immigration Categories of Philippine-Born Immigrants to Canada, 1980-2001


One notable result of the caregiver programme, which women have dominated, has been agendered migration stream, with women comprising almost 60 per cent of immigrants from thePhilippines in the period 1980-2001. This explains the distinctive gender profile among TorontosFilipino community seen earlier in Figure 2.

Canada in the Context of Global Filipino Migrations

The costs of applying for immigration to Canada under any programme are substantial representing, at a minimum, several months salary for a relatively well-paid professional in Manila.As a result, it is common for an application to be financed from wages earned overseas. This supportmight come from relatives of the applicant already in Canada, already elsewhere in the world (for


16/43

Page 12

Here and elsewhere in the paper Principal Applicants refers to Philippine-born immigrants who were principal10applicants on one of the following immigration catego ries: skilled worker; entrepreneur; investor; self-employed; andLive-In caregiver (the old Foreign Domestics category which preceded the caregiver programme is included withinskilled worker). All applicants in the family, refugee, and retired categories are excluded.

example, East Asia, the Middle East, or the US), or from the applicants own prior work overseas. No data exist to fully substantiate this point, but immigration data do show that 6.3 per cent of principal applicants (in all categories) who were born in the Philippines had their last permanent

residence outside the Philippines. Almost 100 countries are listed, with the most significant sourcesshown in Table 3.

Table 3Country of Last Permanent Residence for Philippine-born Principal Applicants 10

Immigrating to Canada, 1980-2001

Country of LastPermanent Residence Number %Philippines 66,803 93.7Saudi Arabia 736 1.0

Hong Kong 596 0.8France 381 0.5United Arab Emirates 328 0.5U.S.A. 236 0.3Singapore 201 0.3Kuwait 193 0.3Jordan 165 0.2Italy 128 0.2Spain 126 0.2England 116 0.2Bahrain 111 0.2Brunei 101 0.1OTHER 1,102 1.5TOTAL 71,323 100.0

Source: Landed Immigrant Data System,Citizenship and Immigration Canada

Middle-Eastern countries feature prominently in this list, as would be expected given themost common destinations for Filipino contract workers. It is likely, however, that the list as awhole greatly underestimates the number of immigration applications financed from overseasearnings some funds will come from relatives and not the applicant themselves, in other cases the

applicant will return to reside in the Philippines before applying (and the country of last permanentresidence will, therefore, appear as the Philippines). In her research in Vancouver, Deirdre McKay(2002) has noted the widespread phenomenon of Filipina immigrants under the Live-In Caregiver Programme entering Canada after spending time in a third country on contract work. Of her 42


17/43

Page 13

respondents, 31 had spent time in other countries prior to applying for immigration to Canada. Notsurprisingly, some of McKays respondents referred to Canada as a graduate school for caregivers(McKay 2002, 16). The reasons for this were partly financial, but also because work experience

required under the caregiver programme could be more easily documented and demonstrated when performed under formal contract outside the Philippines.

The Geography of Settlement

The geography of Filipino settlement in Canada has been both decidedly urban andconcentrated in just a handful of predictable gateway cities. Of the 308,575 people who declaredtheir visible minority status to be Filipino in the 2001 census (including both immigrants andCanadian-born), 133,675 were resident in the Toronto Census Metropolitan Area (43.3 per cent).

Many of the rest were in the Vancouver, Winnipeg, and Montreal metropolitan areas (see Figure 4).Filipinos have, therefore, tended to settle in Canadas urban centres, with Toronto the single largestdestination.

Within Toronto and Vancouver, however, Filipinos are remarkably dispersed. Analysis hasshown that, statistically, Filipinos exhibit among the lowest levels of segregation of any visibleminority group in Canada (see Bauder and Sharpe 2003). Figure 5 shows the distribution of Filipinos in the Toronto region. Although some areas of distinct concentration are apparent alonga corridor extending north up Bathurst Street from St Clair and in several locations in Scarborough,Mississauga, and Brampton the overall picture is one of wide dispersal. There are multiple areasof Filipino settlement, few of them with exceptionally high concentrations, and all of them spreadwidely across the metropolitan region. This provides an indication of the spatial integration of Filipinos into the urban fabric of Toronto.


18/43

Page 14

Figure 4Distribution of Filipinos in Canada by Major Census Metropolitan Areas, 2001


Note: Filipino refers here to immigrants and non-immigrants who declared themselves to be Filipino inresponse to the visible minority question in the 200 1 census


19/43

Page 15

Figure 5Distribution of Filipino Population in Toronto by Census Dissemination Area

and Census Tract, 2001

Source: Statistics Canada, 2001Census .

An alternative way of establishing the degree of concentration exhibited by different groupsis to examine the number of census tracts that need to be counted in order to locate 50 per cent of

the groups members in a given urban area. The larger the number of tracts that need to be countedin such an analysis, the lower the level of concentration of a group. Table 4 provides both theabsolute populations of visible minority groups in three Canadian cities, and the percentage of censustracts that are required to reach the 50 per cent threshold.


20/43

Page 16

Table 4Per Cent of Census Tracts Needed to Locate 50 Per Cent of Visible Minority Group, and

Absolute Visible Minority Populations, in Vancouver, Winnipeg, and Toronto, 2001

VisibleMinority

Group

Vancouver% of CTs

Vancouver,population

Winnipeg% of CTs

Winnipeg,population

Toronto% of CTs

Toronto,population

Chinese 15.5 342,664 12.9 10,925 9.3 409,535W. Asian 7.8 21,430 6.7 830 9.8 52,980S.E. Asia 11.4 28,460 8.6 5,030 10.0 53,565Korean 12.4 28,845 7.4 955 10.5 42,620Arab 10.4 5,905 6.7 1,115 11.6 42,835L. Amer. 17.9 18,715 14.1 4,550 12.6 75,910S. Asian 10.1 164,360 8.6 12,285 13.3 473,805

Japanese 19.9 24,025 13.5 1,585 14.9 17,415Filipino 16.8 57,025 6.7 30,100 15.0 133,680Black 19.9 18,405 19.6 11,440 15.8 310,500

Source: Statistics Canada, 2001 Census

Note: Visible minor ity groups are ranked according to levels of concentration in Toronto. In this case, the figures include both imm igrants and non -immigrants. However, the difference between the two groups is likelyto be very small, as most Filipino non-immigrants are the children of immigrants, and many are relatively

young see Figure 2.

These data need to be treated with caution, as many visible minority categories contain a

great deal more internal heterogeneity than the Filipino category. When using this index, the lowrelative level of concentration recorded for Blacks in Toronto, for example, is likely a reflection of the many distinctive communities within the Black identity each of which may, in isolation, showhigh levels of concentration. Nevertheless, the data indicate the particularly low relative levels of concentration for Filipinos in Toronto, fairly low levels in Vancouver, but quite high levels inWinnipeg. Explaining these patterns of settlement can only be speculative, but it would seem likelythat the immigration of Filipinos seeking employment in Winnipegs textile industry in the early1970s led to identifiable residential clusters in certain parts of the city. In Vancouver and Torontoon the other hand, the larger Filipino communities present in these cities, the diversity of immigration programmes used (included the LCP, which seems likely to be a de-concentratingfactor), and perhaps the high levels of employment in spatially dispersed sectors such as public

healthcare, all have combined to facilitate dispersal. It is, however, also important to note that thecultural and linguistic familiarity of Filipino immigrants with their host society has meant that livingin a Filipino neighbourhood has not been seen as a necessity. Hence, the cities with the largestFilipino populations have not developed little Manilas or Filipino-towns in the way that they havefor other minority groups.

Although issues of political representation and mobilization are beyond the scope of thisanalysis, it is worth hypothesizing that the relatively low levels of residential concentration among


21/43

Page 17

Filipino immigrants are one reason for the relative absence of Filipino legislators in federal, provincial, and municipal governments. Table 5 shows the twelve federal electoral ridings with thelargest Filipino populations and the percentage of the total population in each. With the exception

of two ridings in Winnipeg, the Filipino population does not exceed 8 per cent anywhere in thecountry. It is no coincidence, then, that the only Filipino federal Member of Parliament ever electedin Canada represented Winnipeg (Rey Pagtakhan), and only in Manitoba have provincial andmunicipal levels of government seen any consistent Filipino representation.

Table 5Filipino Populations in Selected Federal Ridings, 2001

FEDERAL RIDINGTotal RidingPopulation

FilipinoPopulation

Per CentFilipino

Winnipeg North, MB79,415 14,070 17.7

Winnipeg Centre, MB 80,930 10,290 12.7

Vancouver Kingsway, BC 115,325 8,325 7.2

Scarborough Rouge River, ON 115,430 7,780 6.7

Mississauga East-Cooksville, ON 122,565 7,385 6.0

Scarborough Centre, ON 102,810 7,020 6.8

Montreal - Mont Royal, QC 98,340 6,750 6.9

Scarborough Southwest, ON 105,435 6,195 5.9

Vancouver South, BC 113,065 6,115 5.4

York Centre, ON 113,195 6,100 5.4

Mississauga Brampton-South, ON 113,825 6,055 5.3

Toronto Centre, ON 114,680 5,850 5.1

Source: Statistics Canada, 2001 Census

Note: Filipino here refers to the visible minority category and including bo th immigrants and non-immigran ts.(It also includes those who are ineligible to vote, for example due to age or citizenship).

HUMAN CAPITAL AND DESKILLING

A key question in assessing the economic integration of Filipino immigrants (and, indeed,

all immigrants) is whether their skills and qualifications (or human capital) are fully recognized inthe host labour market. Extensive evidence suggests that immigrants, in general, face substantial


22/43

Page 18

barriers in getting their credentials recognized and, therefore, suffer a process of deskilling as theyare consigned to work that is mismatched with their qualifications.

Educational Assets

The Landed Immigrant Data System provides a rich source of information on immigrantseducational qualifications at the time of their arrival, although it does not give any indication of qualifications obtained after arriving in Canada. Philippine-born principal applicants in the period1980-2001 had an average of 13.1 years of schooling, while principal applicants from all countriesof origin had a mean of 14.3 years. With a mean of 12.4 years of schooling, Filipino principalapplicants in the Live-In Caregiver category had, on average, slightly less formal education thanother categories, but not significantly so.

If educational qualifications, rather than years of schooling, are used as an indicator of humancapital, some striking patterns emerge. Table 6 provides a simplified breakdown of educationalattainment for Philippine-born principal applicants alongside all principal applicants. The data showthat Filipino male principal applicants have been unusually highly qualified with more than 60 per cent holding a bachelors degree or higher (compared with only 50 per cent across all immigrant

principal applicants). It is also worth noting that the education system in the Philippines largely has been built upon American institutional foundations, and specific courses frequently use Americantexts. It is, therefore, reasonable to assume that, while there is a range of quality among Philippinedegree-granting institutions (as in the United States), the curricular content of many degrees fromPhilippine institutions is commensurate with that of equivalent programmes in North America.According to the data, fewer than average Filipina women had university educations prior to their arrival in Canada, but more had had non-university post-secondary training. As with so much of theFilipino immigrant profile, this likely reflects the importance of the domestic worker and caregiver categories which do not have the same requirements for degree-level qualifications.


23/43

Page 19

The Census also, of course, encom passes all Filipinos resident in Canada, including those who immigrated prior to111980, a group which is not captured in the LIDS data.

Table 6Educational Qualifications of Philippine-born and All Principal Applicants, 1980-2001

Qualification

% of PHILIPPINE

- B

O RN

Principal ApplicantsHolding Qualification

% of ALL PrincipalApplicants Holding

Qualification

Males High School or less 14.9 21.4Post-Secondary Training (nodegree) 23.4 28.6Degree - BA or higher 61.7 50.0

Females High School or less 34.5 29.9Post-Secondary Training (nodegree) 37.2 35.9Degree - BA or higher 28.3 34.2


As noted earlier, the data from immigrant landings provide only a very partial picture of thehuman capital obtained by immigrants in Canada because they exclude any qualifications obtainedafter arrival. Census data, therefore, provide a better indication of educational attainment in theimmigrant workforce. Figure 6 compares immigrant Filipino educational attainment with both that11

of all immigrants and the total population in the Toronto CMA. It indicates a strikingly high levelof educational attainment among immigrant Filipinos in Toronto, 57 per cent of whom haveuniversity qualifications (compared with 33.1 per cent for all immigrants and 34.6 per cent for thetotal population).


24/43

Page 20

Meaning a language other than English or French.12

Figure 6Population 15 years and over by highest level of schooling for Toronto CMA, 2001


Linguistic Assets

A further, and important, dimension of human capital held by Filipino immigrants is a strongcommand of the English language. In the Philippines, English is widely spoken and is the formallanguage of government, most print media, a large number of television broadcasts, and instructionin tertiary education. In practice, the lingua franca is usually a combination of local dialects andEnglish, but exposure to English is, nevertheless, very high. This is reflected in the CanadianLanguage Capability recorded for Filipino immigrants in the Landed Immigrant Data System.

Proficiency in neither English nor French was recorded for 44 per cent of all immigrants between1980-2001, but for only 21 per cent of Philippine-born immigrants.

Census data also make this point. According to the 2001 census, only 18.3 per cent of Filipino immigrants in Toronto reported using neither English nor French as a home language(21.3 per cent used English alone, and 59.4 used English and a non-official language in most12


25/43

Page 21

Significant data problems do , however, exist intended occupation, for example, may simply reflect what the13immigrant was doing in their country of origin; only where an immigrant has a job waiting will they know with anycertainty what the Canadian labo ur market has in store for them. However, these percentages are ca lculated using the

proportions of those with a declared and intended occupation (thus excluding those who have no intended job), andthe uncertainty applies equally to the different groups and so a comp arison, at least, is legitimate.

cases a Filipino dialect). This compares with 29.3 per cent of all immigrants who reported usingonly non-official languages in their homes. We should probably not read too much into thesestatistics (use of another language at home does not, for example, preclude high proficiency in

English, and nor does the colloquial use of English imply a high level of technical competency), butalongside the landing data they do serve as a reminder that Filipino immigrants are generally arrivingin Canada with a good command of the English language.

Deskilling

It is now commonplace to note that immigrants to Canada tend to be deskilled uponintegration into the Canadian workforce. That is, they tend to be channeled into jobs that do notmatch their level of education or training. Anecdotal evidence of this process abounds nurses

working as nannies, accountants working as data entry clerks, and engineers as production operators.One way of demonstrating this process statistically is through data on wages and labour-marketsegmentation, and this will be discussed later. Another source of data, however, is available fromthe Landed Immigrant Data System (LIDS), which provides educational attainment and an intendedoccupation for every landing immigrant. For each of these occupations a skill requirement (definedin terms of educational achievement) is assigned. A motor mechanic, for example, would be assigneda skill level of Community College or Technical Institute (Two Years), while a sewing machineoperator would be assigned One to Four Years of Secondary Education. Using the dataset as awhole allows immigrants educational profile on landing to be compared with the skills required tocarry out the jobs for which they are destined. 13

The data in Table 7 reveal some striking comparisons. When all principal applicants areexamined, there is a fairly close correspondence between those with university educations (lines 6and 12), and those destined for jobs requiring these skills. In fact, for male principal applicants the

proportion intending to work in such jobs exceeds those qualified for them. For Filipinoimmigrants, however, there is a clear disconnect between qualifications and level of employment.While over 60 per cent of Filipino male principal applicants captured in the LIDS data helduniversity degrees (line 3), less than 30 per cent were destined, at the time of arrival, for commensurate employment. For Filipina women (line 9), the figures were even more dramatic.While 28.3 per cent of such principal applicants had a university education, only 11.3 per cent weredestined for appropriate jobs. Indeed, more than 75 per cent intended to work in jobs designated atthe lowest level skill (high school graduation or less) (line 7). Again, the effects of the Live-InCaregiver programme are evident, although this alone cannot account for all of the discrepancy, nor can it account for the male Filipino experience.


26/43

Page 22

Table 7Comparison of Educational Attainment and Intended Occupation Skill Requirements, for

Principal Applicants Landing in Canada, 1980-2001

Level of Education On LandingPer

CentLevel of Skill Required for

Intended O ccupation*Per

Cent1 % of Filipino Male P.A.s with High

School or less14.9

% of Filipino Male P.A.s destined for jobs requiring High School or less

19.0

2% of Filipino Male P.A.s with Post-Sec Educ (no degree)

23.4% of Filipino Male P.A.s destined for

jobs requiring Community College or Tech Institute Qual

53.1

3% of Filipino Male P.A.s with Degree- BA or higher

61.7% of Filipino Male P.A.s destined for Management or jobs requiring BAhigher

28.0

4 % of All Male P.A.s with High School

or less 21.4% of All Male P.A.s destined for jobsrequiring High School or less 10.7

5% of All Male P.A.s with Post-SecEduc (no degree)

28.6% of All Male P.A.s destined for jobsrequiring Comm College or TechInstit Qual

33.0

6% of All Male P.A.s with Degree - BAor higher

50.0% of All Male P.A.s destined for Management or jobs requiring BAhigher

56.3

7 % of Filipino Female P.A.s with High

School or less34.5

% of Filipino Female P.A.s destinedfor jobs requiring High Schoo l or less

75.8

8% of Filipino Female P.A.s with Post-Sec Educ (no degree)

37.2% of Filipino Female P.A.s destinedfor jobs requiring Comm Coll. or Tech Instit Qual

12.9

9% of Filipino Female P.A.s withDegree - BA or higher

28.3% of Filipino Female P.A.s destinedfor Management or jobs requiring BAhigher

11.3

10 % of All Female P.A.s with High

School or less29.9

% of All Female P.A.s destined for jobs requiring High School or less

34.0

11% of All Female P.A.s with Post-SecEduc (no degree)

35.9% of All Female P.A.s destined for

jobs requiring Comm Coll. or TechInstit Qual

31.5

12% of All Female P.A.s with Degree -BA or higher

34.2% of All Female P.A.s destined for Management or jobs requiring BAhigher

34.5


Note: These figures are a percentage of the total number who intended to wo rk. Those not intending to work are excluded from the total. The figures for educational attainment, however, relate to all principal applicantsand not just those intending to work. (The difference is actually negligible: over 97 per cent of principal applicants do intend to work)


27/43

Page 23

Overall, the picture that emerges at the time of landing is one in which a highly qualifiedcohort of immigrants is being channeled into work that is not commensurate with their skills andqualifications. In the next section, the patterns of labour market participation for Filipinos in Canada

will be examined in more detail.

FILIPINOS IN THE LABOUR MARKET

Filipinos exhibit exceptionally high levels of participation in the labour market, significantlyexceeding, on average, immigrants as a whole and the population in general (as shown in Table 8).Filipina women, in particular, are far more likely to participate in the workforce than immigrantwomen in general. Filipino men show even higher levels of participation. Many factors couldcontribute to this phenomenon, but the demographic profile of Filipino immigrants (primarily of

working age see Figure 2 above) is surely a factor, as is the concentration of Filipinos in lower-paidemployment (see below), which necessitates high levels of participation by household members.

Moreover, this participation is relatively successful, at least in terms of finding employment.Only 5 per cent of Filipina women participating in Torontos labour market are unemployed, andonly 4 per cent of Filipino men. These figures are lower than the equivalents for all immigrants andfor the population as a whole.

Table 8Labour-Market Participation and Unemployment Rates in Toronto

for Adults 25 Years and Over

FilipinoImmigrants

AllImmigrants

TotalPopulation

Participation rate - Males 25 years and over 83 74 77.6Unemployment rate - Males 25 years and over 4 5 4.3Participation rate - Females 25 years and over 75 59 63.2Unemployment rate - Females 25 years and over 5 7 5.5


While participation in the labour market is high among Filipinos, for most of them it tendsto be as an employee, rather than in a self-employed capacity. As shown in Table 9, levels of self-employment among the Filipino community are exceptionally low compared with figures for other recent immigrant groups.


28/43

Page 24

Table 9Self-Employment among Various Immigrant Visible Minority Groups, Toronto, 2001

Immigrant VisibleMinority Population

% of labour force that isself employed

Korean 36.0

Japanese 20.3

West Asian 16.6

Arab 15.3

Chinese 13.5

South Asian 9.4

Latin American 8.2

South East Asian 6.7

Black 6.1

Filipino 3.2


In some ways, this low level of self-employment could be seen as a testament to successfuleconomic integration, given that immigrant self-employment and entrepreneurship is often a way of coping with the linguistic, cultural, and institutional barriers to entering the formal waged workplace.Given the high levels of participation, and low levels of unemployment, workplace integration wouldnot appear to be a problem for Filipino immigrants.

If finding work is apparently unproblematic, the question remains concerning the kinds of jobs Filipinos are finding. In terms of sectoral distribution, Filipino immigrants exhibit one of thehighest levels of concentration of any group in the Canadian labour market with large numbersoccupying relatively few labour market niches (e.g. see Hiebert 1999). Clerical work, healthcare,hospitality, retail, and manufacturing, in particular, are prime destinations for working Filipinos, asshown in Table 10.


29/43

Page 25

Table 10Occupational Distribution of Filipino Immigrants 15 years and over in the Labour Force,

Toronto CMA, 2001

Occupational CategoryMale

FilipinoImmigrants

Occupational CategoryFemaleFilipina

ImmigrantsClerical 3,370 Clerical 8,180Sales and service 2,880 Child care and home support 4,160Machine operators inmanufacturing 2,515 Sales and service 3,285

Assemblers inmanufacturing 2,515 Nurse supervisors and RNs 2,495

Technical jobs related tonatural and applied sciences 1,895

Assisting occupations insupport of health services 2,135

Professional occupations innatural and applied sciences 1,885

Professional occupations in business and finance 1,620

Trades helpers, constructionand transportation labourers 1,095 Assemblers in manufacturing 1,300

Mechanics 1,025 Retail salespersons and salesclerks 1,280

Labourers in processing,manufacturing and utilities 980

Technical and relatedoccupations in health 1,250

Professional occupations in business and finance 900 Cashiers 1,055

OTHER Occupations 10,905 OTHER Occupations 14,020Total MALE FilipinoImmigrants in the LabourForce

29,965Total FEMALE FilipinaImmigrants in the LabourForce

40,780


Note: Filipino is defined in this case according to the F ilipino visible minority response to the census

A numerical way of representing concentration in the labour market using the 2001 censusis to calculate the ratio (or location quotient) between the percentage of Filipinos in a job category

and the percentage of the population as a whole in a job category. In healthcare, for example,Filipino men and women are respectively 5.3 and 3.3 times as likely to be working in assistingoccupations than the population as a whole. But in occupations such as physician, dentist, or surgeon, Filipinos are greatly under-represented using a similar calculation, there are about onequarter as many Filipino men and about one half as many Filipina women as there should be insuch occupations. Table 11 shows the occupational categories in which Filipino immigrant men andwomen are most under- and over-represented. Higher location quotients (LQs) denote over-representation, lower LQs represent under-representation.


30/43

Page 26

Table 11Selected Occupational Location Quotients (LQ)

for Filipino Immigrants in Toronto, 2001

LQ MALE Filipino Immigrants LQ FEMALE Filipina Immigrants5.4 Nurse supervisors and registered nurses 4.1 Child care and home support

workers5.3 Assisting occupations in support of

health services3.3 Assisting occupations in support

of health services3.6 Child care and home support workers 2.7 Nurse supervisors and registered

nurses3.0 Assemblers in manufacturing 2.2 Technical and related occupations

in health

2.9 Technical and related occupations inhealth

1.8 Assemblers in manufacturing

2.5 Machine operators in manufacturing 1.7 Mechanics2.1 Labourers in processing, manufacturing

and utilities1.4 Machinists, metal forming,

shaping and erecting occupations0.4 Judges, lawyers, psychologists, social

workers, ministers of religion, and policy and program officers

0.3 Senior management occupations

0.4 Construction trades 0.3 Technical occupations in art,culture, recreation and sport

0.3 Professional occupations in art andculture

0.3 Professional occupations in art andculture

0.2 Professional occupations in health 0.2 Teachers and professors0.2 Teachers and professors 0.0 Construction trades0.2 Senior management occupations 0.0 Heavy equipment and crane

operators, including drillers


The pattern of relative concentration in Table 11 displays important differences from Table10. While Filipino men or Filipina women might be in a particular sector in large numbers, it is onlywhen such concentrations are high relative to the population as a whole that segmentation is really

taking place. Thus, the large numbers involved in clerical and sales/service jobs are not unusual. Buthigh concentrations in health services and in manufacturing are clearly anomalous relative to the restof the population. It is also notable that within given sectors, Filipinos are over-concentrated inlower-end occupations and under-represented in higher-end, higher paid, jobs. This is reflected inthe income data to be discussed in the next section.


31/43

Page 27

ECONOMIC FORTUNES: INCOMES AND EARNINGS

A first cut at determining income levels for Filipino immigrants is possible using the IMDB,which provides employment earnings for the tax year 1997, covering all Philippine-born immigrantswho landed between 1980 and 1996. The figures, shown in Table 12, exhibit a notable gender gap

between men and women among both Filipinos and immigrants as whole. They also indicate thatFilipino men lag substantially behind immigrant men as a whole. Filipina women, on the other hand,had average employment earnings that exceeded female immigrants in general. These figures do,however, need to be treated with caution. Most importantly, they represented only employmentearnings and, therefore, exclude all individuals without wages from a formal employer. Thoseworking as self-employed nannies, baby-sitters, and the like, would not be included here, nor wouldthose without employment. The figures also do not indicate whether the earnings recorded camefrom full-time or part-time work, and whether part-time income was supplemented in other ways.

Table 12Mean 1997 Employment Earnings for Immigrants in Ontario

Who Landed in Canada 1980-1996.*

Tax-Filing Immigrants in OntarioWho Landed 1980-1996

Philippine-born All Immigrants

Mean M ALE Employment Earningsfor those with such income ($)

$24,321 $27,834

Mean F EMALE EmploymentEarnings for those with such income($)

$19,114 $18,272

Total Number of 1980-1996immigrants Filing Taxes

54,390 745,930

Source: IMDB

Note: This average includes only those who reported employm ent earnings

Another caveat that must be applied to these figures is that they represent only a single

snapshot of immigrant earnings. Given the increasing share of Filipinos in Canadas immigrationstreams, and the higher proportion of Filipino immigrants (than of all immigrants) who are recent arrivals, it is likely that earnings for Filipinos represent in part the effect of a shorter residency inCanada. As Figure 7 shows for 1997, earnings for recent immigrants were significantly less than for those who had been in residence for some time indeed there is a fairly linear relationship betweenresidence and average employment income. Figure 7 indicates that (for 1997 at least) Filipino menneeded 6-7 years of residency before reaching the average income for all Ontarians, while Filipinawomen required 8-14 years.


32/43

Page 28

Figure 7Average 1997 Employment Income,

Plotted against Year of Immigrant Landing, Ontario

Source: IMDB

One way of controlling for the effects of recent immigrancy on earnings is to look at earningsat a specific interval following arrival for both Filipinos and all immigrants. Figure 8 does this usinga two year interval - that is, it charts employment earnings of immigrants for the tax year two yearsafter their landing year. These figures show that male Filipinos have always earned less than themale immigrant average with two years of residency, except for a short period in the early 1990s.Interestingly, female Filipina immigrants have consistently exceeded the average for immigrantwomen.

The same pattern appears, but it is accentuated further, when a 5-year gap between landingand income measurement is used (see Figure 9). Here we see that Filipino men are consistently

below the average for all male immigrants (with some narrowing of the gap towards the end of this period), while Filipina women are consistently above average. A very substantial gender gap inearning still exists for both groups, and in fact is greater for immigrants as a whole than it is for Filipino immigrants in particular.


33/43

Page 29

Figure 8Mean Employment Earnings for Immigrants with 2 Years of Residency,

Ontario, 1982-1997

Figure 9Mean Employment Earnings for Immigrants with 5 Years Residency,

Ontario, 1985-1997


34/43

Page 30

Unfortunately, data were not available that were c ross-tabulated with country of origin.14

These figures are difficult to interpret in any more depth without a great many caveats. Asnoted earlier, they refer only to the average employment earnings among those who actually filed taxreturns with employment earnings in a given year. They thus exclude all without employment

earnings (and, therefore, do little to indicate extreme economic marginalization). They also excludeself-employment earnings, and do not distinguish between full time and part-time work. Both mayapply to many Filipina women who have immigrated under the live-in caregiver category and work as self-employed nannies, babysitters, and the like. Finally, while Figures 8 and 9 isolate the effectsof gender and length of residency on employment earnings, they do not reflect the significantchanges in the composition of Filipino immigration over the years. Thus, while independentcategories were a significant part of Filipino immigration in the late 1980s, by the early 1990s, thefamily-reunification and domestic-worker categories were predominant. A more finely grainedanalysis of this kind would require, for example, the use of employment earnings for independent(that is, skilled-worker) immigrants alone. 14

Given these caveats (and of course the now rather-dated vintage of the data being used), anyconclusions from these data are best stated as hypotheses for further exploration, rather thanconclusions, but they are intriguing nevertheless. First, the pattern of earnings in Figure 8 shows amuch more accentuated rise and then decline between the late 1980s and mid-1990s, coinciding witha period of general economic expansion followed by decline and recession. In Figure 9, however,the pattern of earnings for 5-year immigrants is far more modulated. This would seem to suggestthat recent immigrants (with 2 years of residency) are far more vulnerable to the vicissitudes of cyclical economic activity than are longer-term residents. This could form the basis, at least, of ananalysis that explores the structural role played by recent immigrants in the labour market. Is thereeconomic evidence to suggest that recent immigrants are absorbing the worst effects of economicrecession?

The second hypothesis that arises from these figures is that Filipino men, while fewer innumber than Filipina women, are more economically marginalized. That is, their averageemployment earnings are consistently below those of all male immigrants after 5 years of residency,while female Filipinas consistently exceed the earnings of immigrant women as a whole. At thesame time, it needs to be reiterated that, in general, men earn far more than women. The genderingof labour markets is well known, but the performance of Filipino men has not been addressed in theliterature on immigrant labour markets. It would seem likely that there are issues around thesegmentation of Filipino men in the labour market, which may well be connected with racialization,and these need to be addressed.

One way of addressing some of the problems with the IMDB data (while at the same timeintroducing other problems), is to use census data. Census tabulations from 2001 provide averageearnings for the year 2000 in the Toronto CMA, among men and women over the age of 15 whoworked full time for the full year. Use of these data removes the problem of part time work, or self-employed income (which is also included here). It does, however, re-introduce the problem of


35/43

Page 31

It should also be noted that the two sets of data have different geograp hies the IMDB taxfile data are for 15Ontario, while the census data used here are for the Toronto CMA.

immigrant residency, in that it does not differentiate the data according to year of landing (which,as Figure 7 showed, is highly correlated with income).

Notwithstanding these problems, the data from the 2001 census are dramatic, with Filipinomen and women earning less than any other comparison group indeed only gender was a moresignificant predictor of earnings than being Filipino (Table 13). Figure 10 presents some of thesefigures in graphical form.

Table 13Earnings (C$) of Filipinos and Others in the Toronto CMA, 2000

FilipinoImmigrants

All VisibleMinority

Immigrants

All VisibleMinority Non-

Immigrants

Al lImmigrants

All Non-Immigrants

EntirePopulation

MaleIncome $39,295 $43,162 $46,746 $50,748 $66,133 $58,789FemaleIncome

$31,846 $33,273 $39,088 $36,198 $45,395 $40,984


Note: These figures refer to average employment incomes in Canadian dollars from full-year full-timeemployment in 2000 for the Toronto Census Metropolitan Area.

These data place the situation of Filipina women, in particular, in a somewhat different light.

In the 1997 employment earnings data, Filipina women were seen to earn more, on average, thanimmigrant women in general. However, once all types of earnings are accounted for, and part-timework is excluded, it becomes evident that Filipinas are, in fact, earning considerably less thanimmigrant women generally. 15

The picture of Filipino incomes, then, is not a positive one. Despite the high average levelsof employment, education, and cultural capital that are exhibited by the Filipino immigrant

population of Toronto, their incomes remain among the lowest in the entire region. While is it onlya weak indicator of economic marginalization, a mapping of Filipino residential patterns over lowincome areas of Toronto suggests a strong correlation between the two. Thus, not only are Filipinoimmigrants earning low incomes relative to most other comparison groups they are also, as might

be expected, living in the lower income neighbourhoods (Figure 11).


36/43

Page 32

Figure 10Average Employment Income (C$) in Toronto in 2000, for Population over 15 Years

with Full-Year, Full-Time Employment



37/43

Page 33

Figure 11Filipino Residential Settlement in Toronto and Per Cent Incidence of Families below Low

Income Cut-Off (LICO) in Toronto Census Tracts, 2001

Source: Statistics Canada, 2001 Census.

Note: Filipinos a re defined by visible minority status. Dots are located over Census Dissemination Areas(comprising 400-700 individuals). The underlying map is divided by Census Tracts, and is shaded according to the percentage of the entire population (Filipino and Non -Filipino) living below the Low Incom e Cut Off (LICO). The LICO is an index of poverty based on the percentage of income that individuals and families

spend on the basic needs o r necessities in comparison with the rest of Canadians.


38/43

Page 34

These data relate to all Filipino immigrants who landed between 1980 and 1996 and who then filed an income tax16return in 1997.

ECONOMIC COSTS AND CONTRIBUTIONS

The immigration debate in Canada has occasionally descended into rather crass calculationsconcerning the financial costs and benefits of immigrants. These calculations are often spurious asthey lump together immigrants with enormously diverse profiles into a single identity. Thus, aninvestor-class immigrant from Hong Kong is grouped with a refugee from Somalia under a commonanalytical category, immigrant. Such analyses also assume very simplistic quantitative calculationsof contributions (in the form of taxes) and costs (in the form of welfare and other benefits). Quiteaside from the incompleteness of such accountings on their own terms (which generally do notinclude all forms of either the financial costs or benefits), they also assume that immigrants benefitthe Canadian economy only in the extent to which they pay taxes. There is, of course, a great dealmore at stake than that, including measures of productivity not just among Filipino workersthemselves, but also among the wealthier employers whose lucrative working lives they facilitate

through their much lower-paid childcare services. Nor do such calculations give any weight tounquantifiable cultural enrichment. Most importantly, and ironically, such calculations fail toacknowledge that it is those immigrants who pay the least in taxes, because they earn the least, whoare contributing the most to Canadas corporate profitability and competitiveness. If immigrants are

paid less, and overall this is conclusively true, then their surplus value is serving to collectivelyenrich others.

Notwithstanding these criticisms, a cost-benefit analysis can quickly dispense with any notionthat the Filipino community is a burden upon the Canadian treasury. As Table 14 shows, in thetaxation year 1997, Filipino immigrants claimed far less as a proportion of total earnings in the formof unemployment or welfare benefits (4.1 per cent) than immigrants as a whole (8.1 per cent). 16

Furthermore, while the percentage of the Filipino immigrant population claiming UnemploymentInsurance was higher (12.5 per cent, compared with 10.5 per cent of all immigrants), the proportionclaiming welfare benefits was far lower (5.8 per cent of Filipinos compared with 12.7 per cent of allimmigrants). Comparable data for the non-immigrant population, or for immigrants from other time

periods, are not available, but clearly the evidence at hand suggests that Filipino immigrants are far from being a burden on the Canadian welfare state.


39/43

Page 35

Table 14Benefits Claimed and Incomes Earned, in 1997,

by Immigrants Who Landed in 1980-1996, Ontario

Philippine-bornImmigrants

All Immigrants

Welfare + Unemployment Insurance, aspercentage of Employment and Self-Employment Earnings

4.1 8.1

Per cent of population claiming UI 12.0 10.5Per cent of population claiming Welfare 5.8 12.7Per cent of population with Self-Employment Income

4.4 11.6

Mean Male Employment Earnings $24,320.8 $27,833.5

Mean Female Employment Earnings $19,113.5 $18,272.3

Source: IMBD

Note: Mean employm ent earnings is the average if those with such earnings. Those without are not included in this calculation.

CONCLUSIONS

A great many notes of caution have been sounded throughout this paper both in relationto the statistical Filipino who gets constructed all too easily out of convenient analytical categories,and with regard to the limitations of the data that can be generated to try to shed light on this group.

Nevertheless, some aggregate patterns are apparent in the experiences of Filipino immigrants inCanada (and, more specifically, in Toronto), and they are distinctive enough that they justify therelevance of starting with Filipino as an analytical category. In short, the data presented here showthat Filipinos comprise an important, and relatively recent, stream of immigration to Canada, onethat has a distinctive profile in terms of the immigration programmes/categories that they have used.In particular, the Live-In Caregiver Programme has been an important part of the immigration

process and has had several consequences in terms of both labour-market outcomes for graduatesfrom the programme and a gender-skewed demographic profile for the community as a whole. The

LCP does not, however, provide the full story when accounting for the labour-market experiencesof Filipino immigrants.

On arrival, Filipino immigrants tend to have high levels of education as well as less tangibleforms of cultural preparedness, such as high levels of English language competency. Overall, theseassets have resulted in a relatively successful integration, both into the social fabric of Canadiancities and into formal employment. Filipinos have very high levels of participation in the labour force, low levels of unemployment and welfare claims, and a low incidence of self-employment.


40/43

Page 36

Nevertheless, integration has tended to be in subordinated places and roles. In Toronto, Filipinos,while quite spatially dispersed residentially, generally are living in poorer neighbourhoods and areheavily concentrated in certain occupational roles. These roles tend to be deprofessionalized

versions of their occupational identities back home in the Philippines and result in anomalously lowearnings. There is also some evidence that recent immigrants, both male and female, suffer thevagaries of cyclical economic downturns far more acutely than those with longer periods of residency.

Several avenues for further research are suggested by the foregoing analysis. First, thequantitative data presented here could be analyzed with greater sensitivity to distinctions within theFilipino community. While some attempt has been made to distinguish Filipino immigrants basedon gender and length of residency, further attention to the experiences of immigrants arriving under different programmes is needed. In particular, the differences between those arriving under the LCPand those under the independent skilled-worker programmes need to be better understood. Second,

the construction of Filipino masculinity in Canada has not been explored in any detail. While theLCP has received substantial attention, the labour market experiences of Filipino men are largelyunknown. Qualitative research is needed to fill this gap. Third, the micro-politics and practices of

job searches, interviews, promotion panels, and inter-ethnic relationships in the workplace need to be explored in more qualitative depth. While there are well-known barriers based on credentialrecognition in certain licensed professions, there are also more subtle barriers to advancement basedon the ways in which Filipino identity gets socially constructed in workplaces and labour markets.Ultimately, then, an understanding of the Filipino experience in Canada must come to terms withthe construction of difference in Canadian society through processes of racialization,discrimination, and stereotyping of Filipino-ness.


41/43

Page 37

REFERENCES

Bakan, Isabel and Stasiulis, Daiva, eds. 1997. Not One of the Family: Foreign Domestic Workers

in Canada . Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

Bauder, Harald and Sharpe, Bob. 2002. Residential Segregation of Visible Minorities in CanadasGateway Cities. The Canadian Geographer 46: 204-22.

Chen, A. B. 1998. From Sunbelt to Snowbelt: Filipinos in Canada . Calgary: Canadian EthnicStudies Association, University of Calgary.

Cusipag, Ruben and Buenafe, Maria. 1993. Portrait of Filipino Canadians in Ontario (1960-1990) .Toronto: Kalayaan Media Ltd.

England, Kim and Stiell, Bernadette. 1997. They think youre as stupid as your English is:Constructing Foreign Domestic Workers in Toronto. Environment and Planning A 29: 195-215.

Espiritu, Yen Le. 2003. Home Bound: Filipino American Lives across Cultures, Communities, and Countries . Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press.

Garcia, M. (forthcoming) The Road to Empowerment, Moving from Crisis to Community Capacity Building . Toronto: Joint Centre of Excellence for Research on Immigration and Settlement -Toronto.

Hiebert, Daniel. 1999. Local Geographies of Labour Market Segmentation: Montreal, Toronto,and Vancouver. Economic Geography 75: 339-69.

Laquian, E. R. 1973. A Study of Filipino Immigration to Canada, 1962-1972 , 2 ed. Ottawa: Unitednd

Council of Filipino Associations in Canada.

Li, P. 2003. Destination Canada: Immigration Debates and Issues . Toronto: Oxford UniversityPress.

McKay, Deirdre, 2002. Filipina Identities: Geographies of Social Integration/Exclusion in theCanadian Metropolis , Working Paper Series, No.02-18. Vancouver: Centre of Excellence: Researchon Immigration and Integration in the Metropolis (RIIM).

Pratt, Geraldine. 2004. Working Feminism . Philadelphia: Temple University Press.

Statistics Canada. 2003 Ethnic Diversity Survey: Portrait of a Multicultural Society (89-593-XIE2003001). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.

Statistics Canada. 2005. Population Projections of Visible Minority Groups, Canada, Provinces and Regions, 2001 to 2017 (91-541-XIE). Ottawa: Statistics Canada.


42/43

CERIS

The Joint Centre of Excellence for Research on Immigration and Settlement - Toronto (CERIS) isone of five Canadian Metropolis centres dedicated to ensuring that scientific expertise contributes

to the improvement of migration and diversity policy.

CERIS is a collaboration of Ryerson University, York University, and the University of Toronto, aswell as the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants, the United Way of Greater Toronto,

and the Community Social Planning Council of Toronto.

CERIS wishes to acknowledge receipt of financial grants from the Social Sciences and HumanitiesResearch Council of Canada and Citizenship and Immigration Canada and the data provided by

Statistics Canada.

CERIS appreciates the support of the departments and agenciesparticipating in the Metropolis Project:

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of CanadaCitizenship & Immigration CanadaDepartment of Canadian Heritage

Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation

Status of Women CanadaStatistics CanadaHuman Resources an d Skills Development Canada

Atlantic Canada Opportunities AgencyRoyal Canadian Mounted Police

Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness CanadaDepartment of Justice Canada

For more information about CERIS contact:

The Joint Centre of Excellence for Research on Immigration and Settlement - Toronto246 Bloor Street West, 7 Floor, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M5S 1V4th

Telephone: (416) 946-3110 Facsimile: (416) 971-3094http://ceris.metropolis.net


43/43

The Metropolis Project

Launched in 1996, the Metropolis Project strives to improve policies for managing migration anddiversity by focusing scholarly attention on critical issues. All project initiatives involve

policymakers, researchers, and members of non-governmental organizations.

Metropolis Project goals are to:

Enhance academic research capacity;

Focus academic research on critical policy issues and policy options;

Develop ways to facilitate the use of research in decision-making.

The Canadian and international components of the Metropolis Project encourage and facilitatecommunication between interested stakeholders at the annual national and international

conferences and at topical workshops, seminars, and roundtables organized by project members.

For more information about the Metropolis Projectvisit the Metropolis web sites at:

http://canada.metropolis.nethttp://international.metropolis.net

Documents

CWP48 Kelly Final Colour Revised