The number of migrant labourers working in Nova Scotia has doubled over the past five years. While such rapid increases benefit the Canadian economy, they pose difficult questions for policymakers. Recent immigrants are often used as an exploitable working population and are significantly more likely to be among the working-poor.
Howard Ramos, Associate Professor at Dalhousie University, recently published an article on this issue asking, “Do Canadians know how increasing numbers of temporary foreign workers is changing immigration?” Ramos thinks the issue is under-represented in public discourse, and that it will be, “important for this issue to enter the realm of public debate before Canada wakes-up to a quiet revolution in its immigration system.” Read the article here [2].
In a blog post on behindthenumbers.ca, researcher Jason Edwards discussed these trends and Ramos' take on them. Read the post, here [3].