News Briefs (March 11, 2002)

FEWER EARLY RETIREMENTS
Toronto — When it comes to retirement planning, working Canadians are counting on their employers to provide 20 per cent of their income and the government 17 per cent, according to a recent survey by Compas. The poll also asked when people think they will retire. Many young people maintain optimistic plans to retire early but many older workers, those 50 and older, believe they won’t be able to retire until after they are 65 — a finding that may allay some fears about imminent labour shortages as baby boomers retire en masse. Just 30 per cent of workers in their 40s said they will work until they are at least 65 but that number jumped to 43 per cent for people between the age of 50 and 64. A similar poll in the United States found that many Americans believe they will have to retire later now because investment portfolios have been so damaged in the recent market downturn.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT LOSING NEW HIRES
Ottawa — The federal government should take advantage of a temporary respite in the war for talent and dedicate resources to improve working conditions in the public sector to attract new workers and hold onto the thousands who say they plan to leave in the next five years, according to a report presented to a parliamentary committee by the Public Service Commission, last month. Surveys revealed 27 per cent of the 3,000 hires in 2000 intend to leave within five years and another eight per cent had quit as of March 2001. Young people and knowledge workers were more likely to depart for the private sector with 44 per cent of newly hired computer specialists saying they’ll leave within five years.

RELUCTANCE TO ASK QUESTIONS UPS INJURIES
Richmond, B.C. — Young working men (aged 15 to 24) are most likely to suffer an accident at the workplace but contrary to popular notions about reckless behaviour, it is often quiet, less assertive men reluctant to ask questions that are hurt while on the job, according to work done by the B.C. Workers Compensation Board. In 2000, the WCB accepted more than 11,000 lost time claims for young workers, five young workers were permanently disabled and six were killed on the job.

PROMOTION PAPER TRAIL MISSING
Toronto — Air Canada has been ordered by the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal to pay an employee thousands of dollars in lost wages after the airline was unable to produce documented evidence to counter charges of discrimination in the hiring process of merger partner Canadian Airlines. Kanags Premakumar was already working for the airline as a cabin cleaner when he applied for a job as a luggage attendant in 1998, with then Canadian Airlines. He did not get the job. In discrimination cases before the CHRT, if the complainant can convince the tribunal there is a chance of prejudice the accused has to prove the allegation is false, but the decision described the evidence brought by the airline as “entirely speculative and quite unsatisfactory.”

COURT THE SPOUSE
Mississauga, Ont. — Spouses play a key role when prospective hires evaluate new job opportunities, a survey by staffing firm Accountemps shows. Of 100 surveyed Canadian executives from leading firms, 52 per cent said the person they are most likely to approach first for input when considering a job change is their spouse or significant other, 22 two per cent said mentor, 13 per cent answered co-worker, nine per cent said friend and four per cent said other family member.

THE HAZARDS OF OPERA
New York — The Metropolitan Opera fired an extra earning $30 a night in a non-speaking role after the performer fell off the stage into the orchestra pit during Prokofiev’s War and Peace, delaying the production for several minutes. The opera’s general manager said a review of a tape showed the extra, who was playing a French soldier, became disoriented “because he was over-acting.”

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