welfare to what? after workfare in toronto

Wel fare to what?

Af ter workfare in To ronto

Ernie Lightman, An drew Mitch ell and Dean Herd

Uni ver sity of To ronto, Can ada

An em ploy ment sur vey among peo ple in To ronto who left

On tario Works — a clas sic “work-first” re gime – shows clear

sec ond ary la bour mar ket sta tus. Most in ter ven tions typ i cal of

work-first programmes did not have a pos i tive ef fect on job

qual ity: con trary to the “step ping stones” the ory that poor

ini tial jobs lead to better jobs, those who changed jobs af ter

leav ing as sis tance ex pe ri enced poorer job qual ity. A shift in

ori en ta tion to “sus tain able em ploy ment” is re quired to

ad dress the em ploy ment needs of those on so cial as sis tance.

Pol icy must also ad dress the fact that the so cial as sis tance

case load in cludes a size able group that face sig nif i cant

barriers to employment other than education or skills.

Ontario Works, the name given to the work-

based public assis tance programme in Ontario,

was intro duced by a newly elected neoliberal

pro vin cial gov ern ment, begin ning in 1997. As a

cen tral pillar in the party’s elec tion man i festo,

the con cept of workfare was imported from ear -

lier wel fare reform ini tia tives in the United

States, which had been designed to divert claim -

ants away from sys tems of “pas sive” income

sup port in the direc tion of “active” labour market

engage ment.

This paper builds on the results of a follow-

up survey of former wel fare recip i ents in the City

of Toronto to assess the qual ity of employ ment

they expe ri enced in the period imme di ately fol -

low ing their leav ing wel fare, and to explore the

fac tors that impact on the qual ity of that employ -

ment. This is an issue of crit i cal impor tance

© In ter na tional So cial Se cu rity As so ci a tion, 2005 In ter na tional So cial Se cu rity Re view, Vol. 58, 4/2005

Pub lished by Blackwell Pub lish ing Ltd, 9600 Garsington Road, Ox ford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA

95

The au thors are, re spec tively, Prin ci pal In ves ti ga tor, Pro ject Co or di na tor, and Post doc toral Re search Fel low on theSo cial As sis tance in the New Econ omy (SANE) pro ject in the Fac ulty of So cial Work, Uni ver sity of To ronto. ErnieLightman is a pro fes sor of so cial pol icy at the Uni ver sity of To ronto.The au thors wish to thank the To ronto So cial Ser vices De part ment, which un der took the orig i nal sur vey on whichthis pa per is based. The anal y sis and in ter pre ta tion of find ings pre sented here, as well as the con clu sions and pol icy im pli ca tions drawn, are those of the au thors alone. Fund ing was pro vided by the So cial Sci ences and Hu man i tiesRe search Coun cil of Can ada (SSHRC).

given the increas ingly unequal labour market

out comes in Canada, as reflected in a grow ing

income and employ ment gap between those at

the bottom and every one else (Heisz et al.,

2002).

His tor i cally, many social assis tance recip i -

ents in Canada have typ i cally exited wel fare

pri mar ily for the lower reaches of the labour

market. How ever, they did so in ear lier times in

the con text of a more for giv ing wel fare system

and a less unequal labour market, where

low-end jobs were not at such dis tance from the

main stream. Can ada’s increas ingly unequal

labour market and ever-grow ing income and

employ ment gap may signal greater dif fi culty for

former social assis tance recip i ents to sus tain

them selves and their fam i lies in the labour

market and to move up out of lower-qual ity

employ ment. The con se quences are severe

for goals of social inclu sion and cohe sion.

The in ter na tional con text

Among west ern indus tri al ized coun tries there

has been a wide spread move in recent years

from so-called “pas sive” to “active” social

assis tance programmes (OECD, 2003). Asso -

ciated with this has been a restruc tur ing of

social assis tance away from programmes of

enti tle ment based on need, towards ones with

an explicit wel fare-to-work ori en ta tion, designed

directly to increase the short-term employ abil ity

of unem ployed people. The United States pio -

neered this new form of wel fare, but in recent

years coun tries as diverse as Sweden, Fin land,

Den mark, Aus tria, France, Ger many, the Neth -

er lands, Swit zer land, the United King dom,

Israel, Aus tra lia, New Zea land and Canada have

adopted sim i lar reforms (Gorlick and Brethour,

2002; HRDC, 2000; Lightman, 2003; Gal, 2004).

While there is no single model of “active”

labour market policy, there is an emerg ing ortho -

doxy around cer tain common ele ments, includ -

ing making ben e fits con di tional upon job search

and/or a dem on strated will ing ness to improve

employ abil ity (OECD, 2003). How ever, coun tries

and programmes exhibit a cer tain “path depend -

ency”, in that “estab lished insti tu tional arrange -

ments sig nif i cantly con strain the scope and tra -

jec tory of reform” (Brenner and The o dore, 2002,

p. 361). Thus, some — typ i cally the social dem -

o cratic wel fare states — tend to favour models

empha siz ing vol un ta rism and longer-term

human cap i tal devel op ment, while among

neoliberal states, includ ing Canada (Esping-

Andersen, 1990), there is a con ven tion solid i fy -

ing around work-first approaches with a con se -

quently greater pri or ity placed upon rapid labour

force attach ment through man da tory par tic i pa -

tion in job search and related activ i ties (Peck,

1999; Gorlick and Brethour, 2002; Daguerre,

2004).

Work-first programmes are dis tin guished by

a set of beliefs about labour mar kets and wel -

fare recip i ents: they tend to favour expla na tions

of pov erty and unem ploy ment that stress indi vid -

ual fail ings such as defi cient edu ca tion or work

expe ri ence, and/or moral fail ings such as

depend ency or poor work habits, while they

down play struc tural vari ables such as labour

demand or the struc ture of employ ment oppor tu -

ni ties (Peck and The o dore, 2000). The pri or ity is

on the first entry into the labour market — “any

job is a good job”, crudely speak ing, as wel fare

recip i ents are believed to stand a better chance

of obtain ing “good” jobs if they are already work -

ing. As a result, programmes stress the “short -

est route to paid employ ment” and rely on low-

cost and short-term inter ven tions to compel par -

tic i pants to enter the labour market as rap idly as

pos si ble. Typ i cally, programmes include activ i -

ties such as job search, job clubs, résumé/CV

and inter view skills work shops, work-for-wel fare

programmes, job place ment and basic edu ca -

tion. Less empha sis is placed on longer-term

and higher-cost inter ven tions such as edu ca tion

and skills train ing (Gray, 2003; Gorlick and

Brethour, 2002; HRDC, 2000).

In ter na tional So cial Se cu rity Re view, Vol. 58, 4/2005 © In ter na tional So cial Se cu rity As so ci a tion, 2005

96

In the United States, wel fare reform has for

some time been accom pa nied by a sub stan tial

research and eval u a tion effort, a pro cess which

only esca lated when Aid to Fam i lies with

Depend ent Chil dren (AFDC) was replaced with

Tem po rary Assis tance to Needy Fam i lies

(TANF). At first glance, this large research

literature sug gests the suc cess of work-first

approaches (Friedlander et al., 1993;

Friedlander and Burtless, 1995; Ham il ton,

2002). Yet, beneath the head line fig ures, the

con crete out comes of work-first programmes

are fre quently revealed as modest, as the lit er a -

ture tends to con firm the mar ginal employ ment

con di tions of most of those in wel fare-to-work

programmes (Brauner and Loprest, 1999;

Moffitt, 2002; Lichter and Jayakody, 2002;

Scott et al., 2004).

In Canada, a major fed eral ini tia tive, the

Canada Health and Social Trans fer (CHST) of

1995, allowed prov inces to exper i ment with wel -

fare reform free of fed eral restric tions (apart

from a pro hi bi tion on res i dency require ments).

This led prov inces to opt for models prom is ing

quick results in terms of reduced wel fare rolls

and spend ing (Gray, 2003; Gorlick and

Brethour, 2002). Prox im ity to the United States,

the exam ple set by their expe ri ence with

wel fare-to-work programmes, and the exten sive

eval u a tion lit er a ture which spoke to the sup -

posed suc cesses of those programmes led

prov inces to emu late US-style work-first models

(Gorlick and Brethour, 2002).

Eval u a tion of the Cana dian exper i ments with

wel fare reform is severely lim ited (Frenette and

Picot, 2003; HRDC, 2000; Ford et al., 2003).

That said, sim i lar find ings to the US eval u a tions

have emerged. For exam ple, one national

review of employ ment strat e gies for social assis -

tance recip i ents con cluded that “for cli ents who

have weak edu ca tional back grounds and who

encoun ter family/per sonal bar ri ers, these [labour

force attach ment programmes] alone may not

result in wage increases that raise them out of

pov erty and into self-suf fi ciency . . . More over,

many with out such bar ri ers also find dif fi culty

moving towards self-employ ment” (HRDC, 2000,

p. 13).

In Ontario, wel fare “reform” found expres sion

in the “Common Sense Rev o lu tion”, the 1995

elec tion blue print of the Pro gres sive Con ser va -

tive Party, which pledged to break the “cycle of

depend ency” by “requir ing all able bodied recip i -

ents . . . either to work or be retrained in return

for their ben e fits” (Ontario Pro gres sive Con ser -

va tive Party, 1994). The oper a tional out come

was Ontario Works (OW), a clas sic work-first

programme. Though the employ ment assis tance

com po nent of OW includes a vari ety of options

such as com mu nity par tic i pa tion (unpaid

work-for-wel fare), job search or lit er acy train ing,

the clear pri or ity, empha sized repeat edly, is on

rapid labour market entry: the first and gov ern -

ing prin ci ple is “deter min ing and taking steps

that rep re sent the short est route to paid employ -

ment” (Ontario, 1999a). To the lim ited extent

that programmes of edu ca tion and train ing are

avail able, refer ral depends on such programmes

rep re sent ing the “short est route to paid employ -

ment” (Ontario, 1999b).

Although Ontario was argu ably the most rad -

i cal of the prov inces in its wel fare reforms, out -

come research is essen tially non-exis tent,

except for two (1996 and 1998) prov ince-wide

tele phone sur veys of wel fare leav ers (Ontario,

1998). These stud ies were lim ited to descrip tive

reviews of the cur rent employ ment cir cum -

stances of wel fare leav ers and did not attempt

to exam ine the cor re lates of labour market out -

comes, a lim i ta tion the pres ent paper seeks to

address.

The To ronto so cial ser vices wel fare leav ers sur vey

In 2001, the City of Toronto com mis sioned its

own tele phone survey of wel fare leav ers. A

random sample of 3,335 poten tial respon dents

© In ter na tional So cial Se cu rity As so ci a tion, 2005 International So cial Se cu rity Re view, Vol. 58, 4/2005


97

was drawn from those who had left the case load

between Jan u ary and March 2001, and

804 inter views were suc cess fully com pleted in

Novem ber and Decem ber of that year. The

survey explored a range of sub jects includ ing

the rea sons for leav ing assis tance, ini tial and

cur rent job char ac ter is tics, and mate rial hard -

ships expe ri enced both on and off social assis -

tance. (When explor ing jobs after wel fare,

respon dents were asked to answer about the

main job held by either the respon dent or the

spouse. The main job was the one that either

had the most hours or paid the most money.)

Sur veys could be con ducted in either Eng lish or

French, although only one inter view was con -

ducted in French. House hold inter pret ers com -

pleted a fur ther 27 inter views (City of Toronto,

2002).

Life af ter wel fare

Per haps the most impor tant single ques tion is

whether work-first reforms lead to employ ment

out comes. Approx i mately 56 per cent of the

respon dents to the Toronto survey reported that

they left assis tance for either their own or a

spouse’s “employ ment-related rea sons” (which

included begin ning a new job or return ing to a

pre vi ous job, obtain ing a better job, or get ting a

raise, pro mo tion or more hours of work). A fur -

ther 11 per cent left for what may be loosely

termed “system rea sons”: inel i gi bil ity, didn’t want

to stay on assis tance, or had dif fi cul ties with the

bureau cracy. The remain der reported leav ing for

other rea sons includ ing receiv ing another gov -

ern ment ben e fit (8 per cent), family or house -

hold rea sons (6 per cent) or start ing school

(6 per cent).

A sim i lar study under taken in 1997 by

Toronto Social Ser vices had found that 43 per

cent of people left for employ ment, com pared

with 57 per cent for non-employ ment-related

rea sons. The appar ent improve ment in results in

2001 was prob a bly due to a much stron ger

econ omy. The incomes of former recip i ents also

increased in 2001 over the 1997 results,

although increases in the costs of living, par tic u -

larly hous ing, likely erased many of these gains

(City of Toronto, 2002).

Qual ity of em ploy ment

Over a decade ago the Eco nomic Coun cil of

Canada (1990) iden ti fied the growth in “non-

stan dard” employ ment — tem po rary jobs, part-

time employ ment, own-account self- employ ment

and mul ti ple job-hold ing — and the qual ity of

employ ment in the grow ing ser vice sector of the

econ omy as sig nif i cant con cerns. Since then,

the con cept of non-stan dard employ ment has

been given greater nuance and extended into

con cepts such as “pre car i ous employ ment” and

“vul ner a ble work ers”, which incor po rate issues

of low pay, access to non- wage ben e fits and

degree of reg u la tory pro tec tion (Cranford et al.,

2003; Jack son, 2003; Saunders, 2003).

Many of the dimen sions of vul ner a ble

employ ment were char ac ter is tics of the jobs that

typ i cally faced the wel fare leav ers in our survey.

Postwelfare employ ment sta bil ity was modest.

By the date of the survey (eight to 10 months

after leav ing OW), 17 per cent of the orig i nal

sample had returned to the case load. Of these,

31 per cent returned owing to ill ness or dis abil ity

and 20 per cent fol low ing job loss, 12 per cent

were unable to find a job, 10 per cent came

back as a result of finan cial dif fi cul ties and for

8 per cent it was due to changes in family cir -

cum stances.

Of those who ini tially left assis tance for

employ ment (n = 435), 84 per cent were cur -

rently employed at the time of the inter view —

70 per cent in the same job as they left assis -

tance for and 14 per cent in a dif fer ent job. The

remain ing 16 per cent were not work ing, but had

worked since leav ing assis tance. That is, nearly

one-third (30 per cent) of those who had left

social assis tance for employ ment-related rea -


98

sons had either changed job or lost that job and

were not work ing at the time of the survey. Just

under half (48 per cent) of those who left their

first job after wel fare gave rea sons for leav ing,

and these were pri mar ily invol un tary: a con tract

ended, they were laid off or fired (40 per cent) or

the busi ness relo cated (2 per cent). A fur ther

16 per cent said they quit their job, and ill ness

was reported by 4 per cent.

Of those who left assis tance for non-employ -

ment rea sons (n = 339), 40 per cent were cur -

rently employed, 9 per cent were not employed

but had worked at some point since leav ing

assis tance, and 51 per cent had not worked

since leav ing assis tance.

In sum, just over half of all respon dents had

left wel fare for employ ment rea sons, and at the

time of the inter view nearly two-thirds of the

respon dents were employed. Another 13 per

cent were not cur rently employed but had

worked at some point since leav ing assis tance,

and 22 per cent had not worked at all.

Respon dents gen er ally fared worse than the

over all Ontario adult labour force (aged 25 and

over) when com pared on a number of indi ca tors

of job qual ity (Table 1). Thirty per cent of

respon dents were in jobs that they under stood

as tem po rary — sea sonal, con tract or casual —

a rate over four times that for the total Ontario

labour force in 2001. As well, just over a quar ter

of respon dents employed at the time of the

survey (28 per cent) were work ing only

part-time, more than double the rate (13 per

cent) for the entire prov ince.



99

Table 1. Job qual ity for wel fare leav ers versus Ontario labour market

Job char ac ter is tic To ronto OW leav ers

On tario (2001, aged 25 and over)

Job per ma nence Per ma nent 69% 93%

Tem po rary 31% 7%

Full-time/part-time Full-time 72% 87%

Part-time 28% 13%

Av er age weekly hours 1-29 23% 13%

30-39 26% 27%

40 or more 52% 61%

Av er age usual hours 36 38.3

Hourly wages Un der $10 37% 13%

$10-$13.99 35% 20%

$14 or more 28% 67%

Av er age hourly wages $12.69 $19.81

Me dian hourly wages $10.17 $18.00

Weekly earn ings Un der $400 51% 24%

$400-$599 29% 30%

$600 or more 20% 45%

Av er age weekly earn ings $442 $758

Me dian weekly earn ings $385 $692

Sources: City of To ronto, 2002; Sta tis tics Can ada, an nual.

Lim ited hours were common: although, on

aver age, wel fare leav ers had only slightly fewer

hours of work (36) than across Ontario gen er ally

(38), nearly one-quar ter (23 per cent) of them

had less than 30 hours of work a week, com -

pared with 13 per cent of employed adults in the

total prov ince.

Median hourly earn ings among those cur -

rently employed were sub stan tially below those

of adult employ ees in the prov ince as a whole

($10 versus $18). Over a third (37 per cent) of

those cur rently employed earned less than

$10 per hour, an infor mal but widely accepted

thresh old for the “work ing poor”: this rate is

roughly three times that for the entire prov ince

(13 per cent). Twenty-eight per cent earned over

$14 an hour, far below the 67 per cent of

Ontario earn ers at this level (Can$ 1 = US$0.80

= €0.65 approx.).

Median weekly earn ings for the respon dents

were 55 per cent of those for the prov ince

($385 com pared with $692). Over half had

weekly earn ings of less than $400 com pared

with under one-quar ter of adult employ ees in

Ontario. Only about 12 per cent of those who left

wel fare had weekly earn ings at or above the

pro vin cial median.

Job changes and mo bil ity

Job mobil ity, if vol un tary, is gen er ally assumed

to be desir able, as those moving are pre sum -

ably doing so for rea sons of self-improve ment:

ini tial jobs upon leav ing wel fare may be

bad jobs, rep re sent ing a foot hold from which

people might move up to better jobs. How ever,

when mobil ity is forced, such as fol lows from

dis missal or layoff, the impli ca tions are less

clear.

In an attempt to deter mine whether mobil ity

of wel fare leav ers was a pos i tive or neg a tive

pro cess, we explored the employ ment tra jec to -

ries of the respon dents. We com pared a number

of indi ca tors of job qual ity between the first jobs

and the cur rent jobs (where these dif fered)

among those who had left assis tance for

employ ment. Although the detailed results are

not reported here, in no case were the dif fer -

ences sta tis ti cally sig nif i cant. It appears that

those who changed jobs did not improve their

job sit u a tion sig nif i cantly over those who

remained in their ini tial job. (It should be noted

that the time frame was too short to fully assess

the pos si bil i ties for upward mobil ity, and the

number of respon dents was small.)

An exam i na tion of the dis tri bu tional sta tis tics

(mean, median, stan dard devi a tion) sug gests

that job chang ers’ cur rent jobs are more het er o -

ge neous than their first jobs. The spread,

between the ini tial and cur rent job, is greater for

aver age and median weekly hours, hourly

wages and weekly earn ings, as well as for the

stan dard devi a tions. Access to spe cific

non-wage ben e fits also shows a def i nite ten -

dency towards greater dichotomization, with a

decline in the per cent age who report one or two

of four named ben e fits (drugs; dental/med i cal;

pen sion; paid vaca tion) and an increase in those

report ing all four non-mon e tary ben e fits.

The increas ing aver age earn ings, with a fall -

ing median, and the more polar ized ben e fits

sug gest that job chang ers are dichotomized

between those who suc cess fully make tran si -

tions to better jobs, and those for whom such

tran si tions result in down ward move ments to

worse jobs.

Do ed u ca tion and train ing pay off?

The respon dents in the sample — as well as

the social assis tance case load gen er ally — tend

to have lower levels of edu ca tion than the adult

pop u la tion of Ontario as a whole. Nearly 30 per

cent of the wel fare leav ers had less than a

high-school edu ca tion, com pared with 22 per

cent of the over all pop u la tion of Toronto. Fifty-

seven per cent of the adult pop u la tion of Ontario

have post-sec ond ary edu ca tion or greater,


100

com pared with 43 per cent of the leav ers.

Nev er the less, fully 30 per cent of our sample

had com pleted a post-sec ond ary edu ca tion.

The alter na tive to a work-first wel fare-to-

work programme is one that empha sizes edu ca -

tion and skill devel op ment in pref er ence to rapid

labour force attach ment. The rea son ing is based

on the straight for ward human cap i tal argu ment

that with a stron ger skill set, former recip i ents

are in a better posi tion to main tain employ ment

and grad u ate to better jobs, thereby making

recid i vism less likely.

The data pro vide some sup port for this

hypoth e sis, as shown in Table 2.

As the level of edu ca tion rose, respon -

dents were more likely to have had stron ger

attach ment to the labour market, a cor re la tion

that was highly sig nif i cant. Hourly and weekly

earn ings were pos i tively asso ci ated with edu ca -

tion and were sta tis ti cally sig nif i cant. Weekly

hours were not asso ci ated with edu ca tion,

sug gest ing that edu ca tion had an impact on

hourly earn ings rather than weekly hours of

work.

The improved job qual ity that comes with

higher edu ca tion and improved skills should be

asso ci ated with lower levels of recid i vism. There

is some sup port for this hypoth e sis as well, as

shown in Table 3. There was a sig nif i cant neg a -

tive asso ci a tion between the level of edu ca tion

and the like li hood of being back on assis tance at

the time of the inter view.

Not sur pris ingly, the reason for leav ing assis -

tance was also asso ci ated with recid i vism, with

those leav ing for employ ment rea sons less likely

to have returned at the time of the inter view than

those who left for non-employ ment rea sons

(par tic u larly social assis tance system rea sons,

family or house hold rea sons, or receipt of

another gov ern ment ben e fit). This is a sig nif i -

cant find ing when placed in the con text of wel -

fare reforms that seek to reduce case loads

through stricter eli gi bil ity and enforce ment prac -

tices (Herd et al., 2005). The data indi cate that

for many this simply results in a later return to

assis tance.

Larger fam i lies were less likely to return to

assis tance, and sin gles and lone par ents more

likely to return, than couple fam i lies. The pres -

ence and number of young chil dren did not

affect recid i vism.



101

Table 2. Cor re la tion between

edu ca tion level and selected indi ca tors

of employ ment qual ity

Spearman cor re la -tion co ef fi cient (n)

Cur rent em ploy ment sta tus –0.17****

(790)

Weekly earn ings 0.219****

(441)

Hourly wages 0.196****

(436)

Weekly hours 0.012

(511)

Full-time/part-time –0.012

(511)

Ben e fits 0.09

(511)

**** p <0.0001

Notes on vari ables:

Ed u ca tion was treated as a con tin u ous vari able: 1 = Grade school or less, 2 = Some high school, 3 = Grad u ated high school, 4 = Some post-sec ond ary, 5 = Com pleted post-sec ond ary or greater.

Cur rent em ploy ment sta tus. Re spon dents were groupedinto the fol low ing cat e go ries: 1 = Cur rently em ployed, 2 = Not cur rently em ployed but have worked since leav ing as sis tance, 3 = Have not worked since leav ing as sis tance. The neg a tive sign there fore im plies a pos i tive as so ci a tionwith ed u ca tion.

Weekly and hourly earn ings and weekly hours were con tin u ous vari ables.

Full-time/part-time. Re spon dents were grouped as 1 = full-time, 2 = part-time.

Ben efits. The vari able is con tin u ous from 0 to 4, re flect ingthe num ber of the four non-mon e tary ben efits re ceived:den tal plan, drug or med i cal ben efits, paid va ca tion, orpen sion.

Fac tors af fect ing em ploy ment qual ity

While many respon dents expe ri ence lower-

qual ity employ ment in gen eral, this is not true of

all respon dents. A minor ity man aged to enter

better-paid and stable jobs. It is of con sid er able

inter est which, if any, fac tors are asso ci ated with

improved job qual ity. To explore this, a multi -

variate model was used which enabled us to

inves ti gate the inde pend ent impact of a number

of dis tinct vari ables on job qual ity (mea sured

with an index that included hourly wages,

weekly hours and access to non-wage ben e fits).

The rea sons for leav ing assis tance, and

demo graphic vari ables such as age and gender,

were not asso ci ated with later job qual ity, but

those leav ers with higher levels of edu ca tion

had sig nif i cantly higher qual ity. Those born out -

side Canada, how ever, expe ri enced lower job

qual ity when other fac tors such as age, gender

and espe cially edu ca tion were con trolled for.

Empha siz ing the ini tial tran si tion into employ -

ment is an approach based on a “step ping

stone” theory, pre dict ing that once in the labour

market, people will acquire addi tional skills and

expe ri ence that will enable them to move up.

Ear lier in this paper, we found that among those

chang ing jobs there appeared to be a degree of

polar iza tion: some people man aged to move to

better jobs while others moved to worse jobs.

Over all, the multivariate anal y sis indi cates that,

at least within the time frame cap tured by this

research, chang ing jobs did not lead to im -

proved job qual ity: in fact, the reverse was true.

We also exam ined the impact on job qual ity

of par tic i pa tion in var i ous OW employ ment ser -

vices. There was no dis cern ible effect in most

cases, such as use of an employ ment resource

centre or par tic i pa tion in a train ing course,

programme of edu ca tion or Eng lish-as-a-

second-lan guage course. How ever, per form ing

vol un teer work (“Com mu nity Par tic i pa tion” in the

lan guage of Ontario Works) was asso ci ated with

lower job qual ity. Within wel fare-to-work

programmes, work expe ri ence ini tia tives such

as Com mu nity Par tic i pa tion are often tar geted

on those con sid ered to have bar ri ers to employ -

ment, such as lim ited work expe ri ence and/or

few job-spe cific skills (which were not picked up

directly in the survey). The “par tic i pa tion” vari -

able may there fore be acting as a proxy for

these unmea sured vari ables.

Receipt of funds for trans por ta tion had a

pos i tive asso ci a tion with job qual ity, pre sum ably

because the money facil i tates job search and

allows a wider area of search. This may permit

access to better jobs and better job match ing.


102

Table 3. Fac tors asso ci ated with

recid i vism

Spearman cor re la -tion co ef fi cient

Level of ed u ca tion –0.13***

Rea son for leav ing as sis tance 0.19****

Re spon dent age 0.05

Fam ily size –0.07**

Num ber of chil dren un der age 5 –0.02

P2

Fam ily type 13.9**

Pres ence of young chil dren 0.53

**** p <0.0001

*** p <0.001

** p <0.05

Notes on vari ables:

Re cid i vism: Re spon dents were grouped into two cat e go -ries: 0 = Not on so cial as sis tance at the time of the in ter -view, 1 = On so cial as sis tance.

Ed u ca tion was treated as a con tin u ous vari able: 1 = Grade school or less, 2 = Some high school, 3 = Grad u ated high school, 4 = Some post-sec ond ary,5 = Com pleted post-sec ond ary or greater.

Rea son for leav ing as sis tance: 0 = Em ploy ment, 1 = Non-em ploy ment.

Fam ily type. Re spon dents were grouped into the fol low -ing types: sin gle per son, lone par ent, cou ple with chil -dren, cou ple with no chil dren.

Pres ence of young chil dren: 0 = No chil dren un der5 years of age, 1 = One or more chil dren un der 5.

Lastly, use of the drug card, which is avail -

able to OW recip i ents, was asso ci ated with

poorer job qual ity. In this case, use of the card

may be a proxy for poor health, which in turn

likely affects one’s abil ity to access and keep

better jobs.

Per haps the lim ited impact of many of the

typ i cal work-first inter ven tions can be explained

by the nature of labour demand, which limits the

kinds of jobs that are avail able, irre spec tive of

peo ple’s skills. Alter na tively, the short dura tion

and focus on imme di ate employ abil ity of the skill

train ing and edu ca tional upgrad ing under

Ontario Works may simply be insuf fi cient. Or

per haps the work-first ori en ta tion of Ontario

Works, which pushes people to accept the first

avail able job, may mean that these inter ven tions

are effec tively neu tral ized.

Com ments and im pli ca tions

Despite a period of sus tained pros per ity in the

late 1990s, the labour market in Ontario remains

a deeply polar ized one, with a large seg ment

work ing in what is termed “non-stan dard

employ ment” — jobs that are part-time, tem po -

rary or con tract employ ment or own-account

self-employ ment (Eco nomic Coun cil of Canada,

1990; HRDC, 2000). In addi tion there has been

a marked increase in family income inequal ity

and earn ings inequal ity (Zyblock, 1996).

Better and more rig or ous knowl edge about

the out comes of programmes is a pre req ui site to

better policymaking. The lack of care ful research

into the out comes of Ontario Works, or indeed

most wel fare-to-work programmes in Canada,

limits any com par i son with other forms of wel -

fare-to-work programme, or with the out comes

of wel fare programmes in pre vi ous eras. Nev er -

the less, the out comes of this survey were

reveal ing. Over all there was a much higher inci -

dence of part-time and tem po rary employ ment

among those leav ing assis tance than among the

over all labour force. Wages and weekly earn -

ings were far lower. In today’s seg mented labour

market, lower-qual ity, sec ond ary labour market

jobs are the des ti na tion of many people who

leave social assis tance. Whether the leav ers are

able to use the lower-qual ity jobs first obtained

as “step ping stones” to better jobs, or whether

they become trapped in the sec ond ary labour

market, is not a ques tion that can be fully

answered here. How ever, within the con straints

of this study, the results are not encour ag ing:

they sug gest that in the short term, chang ing

jobs was asso ci ated with lower job qual ity.

The OW programme has the typ i cal

work-first empha sis on rapid employ ment over

longer-term skill devel op ment. While skill invest -

ments are not absent entirely from Ontario

Works, the programme makes only a lim ited

invest ment in edu ca tion and skills train ing, avail -

able to only a small minor ity of par tic i pants.

Those invest ments are con strained by the

programme objec tives estab lished by the

prov ince (the inter ven tion must con sti tute the

short est route to paid employ ment; any train ing

is geared only to imme di ate labour market

needs), the pro vin cial fund ing model and the

par tic i pa tion tar gets set by the prov ince for the

munic i pal i ties. These skew the approach into a

work-first regime whereby social assis tance

policy func tions to ensure a ready and will ing

supply of labour for the lowest tiers of the

labour market, an approach which clearly fits

the “McWelfare for the McJobs” econ omy char -

ac ter iza tion of wel fare-to-work programmes

(Peck, 2001).

Our anal y sis sug gests that many typ i cal

work-first inter ven tions have little impact on

even tual job qual ity. Only pro vid ing addi tional

money for trans por ta tion had a pos i tive impact

on job qual ity, pos si bly because it facil i tated a

broader job search. Since the goal of work-first

is employ ment, with the qual ity of the employ -

ment a sec ond ary con sid er ation at best, this is

per haps not sur pris ing. Per form ing vol un teer

work and use of the drug card pro vided to social



103

assis tance recip i ents both were neg a tively asso -

ci ated with job qual ity, although, as noted, both

vari ables might have acted as prox ies for other

unmea sured bar ri ers. In con trast to tra di tional

work-first pre cepts, tra di tional human cap i tal, in

the form of formal edu ca tion, was pos i tively

asso ci ated with improved job qual ity.

These kinds of out comes, in the con text of

an increas ingly unequal labour market, are

wor ri some in that they signal greater dif fi culty

for former social assis tance recip i ents to sus tain

them selves and their fam i lies in paid work, with

con se quences for mate rial hard ship and social

inclu sion and cohe sion. Indeed, within our

sample there was a strong and sta tis ti cally sig -

nif i cant neg a tive asso ci a tion between the qual ity

of employ ment and the expe ri ence of spe cific

mate rial hard ships such as need to use a food

bank, paying the rent late, or having tele phone

or elec tric ity dis con nected. Although those cur -

rently employed were less likely to expe ri ence

mate rial hard ships, some degree of mate rial

hard ship was common to most of the sample,

regard less of cur rent employ ment status.

If the goal of wel fare reform is more ambi -

tious than simply reduc ing “depend ence”, then

a shift in policy ori en ta tion from work-first to

“sus tain able employ ment” is required. Such a

shift would reject the lim ited goals of work-first

and rec og nize both the het er o ge neous nature

of the pop u la tion and the wide vari ety of needs

they face, as well as design policy to address

those needs. At the very least a shift to “sus tain -

able employ ment” implies a seri ous invest ment

in skills.

At the same time there is a size able group

who face sig nif i cant bar ri ers other than edu ca -

tion or skills. Nearly one-third of those forced to

return to social assis tance did so owing to ill -

ness or dis abil ity. This and the doc u mented

prob lems of access to ben e fits for people with

dis abil i ties indi cate a seri ous need to revisit the

cri te ria for and pro cess of access to dis abil ity

ben e fits (Fraser et al., 2003). As well, a size able

pro por tion (37 per cent) of the immi grants in the

sample arrived in Canada after 1995. Those

born out side the coun try had lower job qual ity

than those born within, when other vari ables —

par tic u larly edu ca tion — were con trolled for. In

part this may reflect the dif fi culty immi grants

face in receiv ing rec og ni tion for for eign train ing.

Sta bil ity and con ti nu ity of employ ment are

another impor tant area for policy to address:

over half (56 per cent) of those who lost their

first job were still unem ployed at the time of the

inter view, and 27 per cent of those who returned

to wel fare did so because of job loss. Assist ing

people in remain ing employed through sup ports

and ser vices once they have left wel fare might

be a con struc tive avenue for reform. Job reten -

tion and advance ment programmes, tested in

some com mu ni ties, have shown some prom is -

ing results (Camp bell et al., 2002; City of

Ottawa, 2002).

How ever, the supply side of the labour mar -

ket on its own will not resolve these prob lems.

As long as the labour market pro duces large

num bers of low-qual ity jobs, this will be the des -

ti na tion of many former social assis tance recip i -

ents. Simply main tain ing low unem ploy ment will

not suf fice to ensure that those leav ing assis -

tance gain a firm foot hold in the labour market.

The Toronto survey was con ducted in 2001

when the econ omy was per form ing at its peak.

Unem ploy ment was extremely low by recent his -

tor i cal stan dards. The dis tinc tion between good

jobs and bad jobs, first high lighted by the Eco -

nomic Coun cil of Canada (1990), appears to

mirror the expe ri ences of many people as they

leave wel fare for work in Ontario. While some

are undoubt edly win ners in this pro cess, many

more fall behind, trapped in jobs that are tem po -

rary, tran sient and unsta ble. Given that the edu -

ca tion levels of wel fare leav ers are below those

of the com mu nity as a whole, it appears likely

that if this group of people is to have any real

chance of avoid ing long-term marginalization

then a seri ous strat egy of human cap i tal invest -


104

ment is called for. “The short est route to a job”

may well reduce the num bers on short-term

assis tance and, in so doing, meet the polit i cal

needs of the gov ern ment of the day, but as a

means to improve the lives of wel fare claim ants

on a con tin u ing basis, the approach is sorely

defi cient.

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welfare to what? after workfare in toronto

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