More Canadians are working at home and realizing their home doesn’t have to be in the same province. Statistics Canada (Stat Can) studied people working from home for an employer in another province in Q1 2022. The agency found the trend is surging in growth, as remote work becomes more common. Distant suburbs of cities have already seen a rush of well paid remote workers. A surge in employees working from another province altogether is more unexpected, though. This can drastically change real estate markets in a very short period of time.
Canadian Businesses Expect 113,000 Employees To Work At Home In Another Province
Canadian businesses expect many employees will work at home in another province. Businesses estimate 113,000 employees to adopt an interprovincial work-life in Q1 2022. It represents a 796.8% surge in growth from 2016, when just 12,600 employees had a similar arrangement. Adoption of remote work was on the rise before 2020. Experts estimate the public health measures accelerated the trend by over a decade.
Canadian Employees Working From Home In Another Province
The number of employees in Canada working from home for a domestic company located in another province or territory.
Source: Statistics Canada; Better Dwelling.
The growth is huge but it needs to be emphasized how much faster it’s growing compared to the labor force. Stat Can estimates 0.85% of the labor force will work at home from another province in Q1 2022. In 2016, the share of those working from home was just 0.15% of the labor force. Those with this arrangement have increased four times faster than the size of the labor pool. Many assume these trends are temporary due to the public health measures. However, it might stick due to happier and more productive employees.
Canada Has Nearly 2.8 Million Employees Working At Home
Remember, this isn’t all of Canada’s remote employees. It’s just the number working for a company in another province. The agency estimates 963,000 employees will work at home in Q1 2022, and 1.8 million will adopt a hybrid work model. Hybrid models are a combination of work from home and in office.
Many consider hybrid work arrangements to be a soft test for adopting work from home. It’s easy to roll back one or two days a week of people working at home. Not so easy to get people back into the office once they’ve left, or moved further from the city.
Work At Home Is Underestimated In Canada
Since the data is captured at the employer level, the agency notes many more people might be working at home. Notably excluded are employees who work at home for a company not located in Canada. Companies have embraced Canada’s cheap but high quality labor for some time. An increased adoption of remote work means the barrier to do so is lowered. The weaker loonie is particularly attractive for American companies.
Real estate markets can see a big impact from the emerging trend, and it’s mostly good news. Stat Can found employees working from home tend to make more than the average employee. Those working from home in another province make even more, averaging six-figures.
Distant suburbs have seen a price boom from the influx of remote workers. The trend has been so large that resort towns are now the fastest growing markets. Other provinces are beginning to see a similar trend. Those with aging populations now suddenly have deep pocketed, young professionals. Though they bring money for the local economy, they also raise the cost of living. It’s a double edged sword that regions should examine before pursuing for growth.
At the same time, remote workers will force cities to begin competing. It becomes more difficult for cities to rest on proximity to jobs if skilled labor leaves. Cities will have to up their game or risk having this segment of professionals looking for greener pastures. Sometimes literally.
Low tax provinces, this is your time to shine. Only reason I haven’t relocated to Quebec is higher income taxes.
Doesn’t matter. I was told young Canadians will pile into smaller and smaller boxes and go further and further into debt just to be close to each other.
Also, there’s no young people outside of Vancouver apparently. They all have to meet at Earl’s or they’re boring.
I see a lot of Canadian say if your job can be done remote, it can be done offshore. It’s a good point that Canadians don’t realize their labor is close to offshore prices as well. An Indian PhD and a Canadian Masters are the same price in tech and the impact on knowledge is minimal so that’s what Canada competes with.
Politicians already sell Canadians as the discount labor. It’s going to be trouble when South and Central America have English and similar levels of education.
I’m torn if this is inflationary or deflationary. Everyone across Canada now competes for similar jobs and many have a lower cost of living and can stand lower wages. At the same time, why work for a Canadian company if you can work for a US company paying at least 30% more on just the exchange and likely a lot more?
If the job can be done remotely, What stops people from moving to another country where cost of living is a fraction of Canada and collect Canadian wage/salary.
Can’t speak for anyone else, but what stops me is that my entire family network is in Toronto. Would love to just pick up and go, but there’s something to be said about having family close to you.
Taxation policy, sin number if it were that easy companies would have left for Bangalore ages ago.
Barriers to communication, generally speaking the work is also a lot poorer in quality, and difficulty managing expectations and deadlines.
Then again, if u run a shitty bucket shop with poor margins and a business that you expect will not survive in a few years (like, a short venture), you probably aren’t hiring many nationals to begin with and are opting for eastern european devs, south americans, southeast asians etc.
What comments like this fail to see is that the transition is not as seamless as just hopping onto a laptop and zoom. Again this is assuming you have projects that are complex.
Because many companies are hysterically against remote work.