Children who came to Canada in the 1960s earned two per cent less than Canadian-born, but gap disappeared for those who arrived in the 1970s
Immigrants who came to Canada as children were more likely to obtain a university education than their Canadian-born counterparts, according to a Statistics Canada report.
And the difference in university attainment between childhood immigrants and their Canadian-born counterparts increased successively from those who arrived in the 1960s to those who arrived in the 1980s, found "Reversal of Fortunes or Continued Success? Cohort Differences in Education and Earnings of Childhood Immigrants."
Among male immigrants who arrived in the 1980s, at age 12 or younger, nearly 32 per cent held a university degree by the age of 25 to 34, compared with just more than 20 per cent of the Canadian-born comparison group. Male childhood immigrants who arrived in the 1960s had a university completion rate about six percentage points higher than their Canadian-born peers.
The pattern was similar among women, although the share of women with a university degree increased faster than the share of men, for both childhood immigrants and the Canadian-born.
In terms of earnings, male childhood immigrants who arrived in the 1960s had weekly wages about two per cent lower than the Canadian-born with similar socio-demographic characteristics. This gap disappeared for the 1970s and 1980s cohorts.
Female childhood immigrants who arrived in the 1960s and 1970s had similar earnings to the Canadian-born comparison group. However, the 1980s cohort had higher earnings than the Canadian-born comparison group.
