By Jeanne McGuire
The issue of racism has been largely absent from mainstream political discourse during the current federal election campaign. This is something that we must challenge and change, particularly at a time of rising racism and xenophobia.
Racism has four functions in capitalism. First, it allows super exploitation through a wage system that pays less than the going wage to members of visible minorities. Second, and as a function of the first, it puts downward pressure on the wages of all workers. Third, it provides a scapegoat for the existence of problems which are, in fact, the result of capitalist policies, not the minority. And fourth, it creates divisions within the working class to the benefit of the capitalist class
The most distinct and historically important expression of racism in Canada is, of course, the experience of the Indigenous population. The racism that has victimized Indigenous communities and individuals has included genocide (cultural and physical), assimilation, physical and economic exclusion, sexual violence, child abuse and murder. It has also included all the other forms of racism experienced by visible minority immigrants – discrimination in employment, housing, education, healthcare, the justice system, and so on.
All the social indices of wellbeing – income, access to healthcare, level of education, housing, incarceration – show that Indigenous people continue to experience disadvantage in every area. Unfortunately, StatsCan statistics are organized (by government category of Indigenous grouping – Status either on Reserve or off Reserve, non-Status, Metis, Inuit) so as to make it difficult to summarize for the community as a whole.
However, the following statistics from 2021 do make the overall conditions clear:
Median income for Indigenous people ranged from a high of $48,800 (Metis) to a low of $3200 (Status, living on a Reserve), compared with $50,400 for a non-Indigenous person.
The labour force participation rate for Indigenous people living off a Reserve is 69.1 percent. The rate for non-Indigenous people is 81 percent.
Indigenous people living off a Reserve are 73.3 percent likely to have a High School diploma or equivalent. For non-Indigenous people, the figure is 89.6 percent.
Among Indigenous people living on a Reserve, 35.5 percent live in crowded housing. For Indigenous people living off a Reserve, it is 17 percent. For non-Indigenous, the figure is 9.4 percent.
Racism experienced by others in Canada
According to a StatsCan study based on the 2021 census and released in January of 2023, visible minorities are the victims of employment discrimination in hiring and promotion as well as in wages. The 2021 census also shows the diversity in educational characteristics between, and within, racialized groups in Canada.
For example, over 40 percent of Filipino people also had a bachelor’s degree or higher, but they were underrepresented in occupations requiring a bachelor’s degree. This group was particularly likely to study registered nursing.
Southeast Asian people had lower levels of education. Nearly 22 percent had neither a high school diploma nor a postsecondary credential – larger than the share for any other racialized group – because many arrived as refugees in 1979 and the 1980s.
Black children of African immigrants were 46.3 percent likely to have a bachelor’s degree or higher, compared with 15.8 percent of Black children of Canadian-born parents
The Black population also faced the challenge of overqualification, but in contrast to most other racialized groups, this was not mainly associated with foreign credential recognition. Sixteen percent of Black workers with a bachelor’s degree or higher from a Canadian institution worked in occupations that required a high school diploma or less. This was the highest overqualification rate of any Canadian-educated racialized group, with the next highest being South Asian people at 14.2 percent. The average for the Canadian-educated population was 11.1 percent.
Moreover, the overqualification rate was similar across first-generation (15.8 percent), second-generation (16.6 percent) and third-generation-or-more (15.7 percent) Black populations. This is consistent with other data relating to challenges faced by Black workers, namely that they were more likely than other workers to report facing discrimination or unfair treatment in the workplace.
In general, two years after earning a bachelor’s degree, the employment income was lower among racialized graduates than non-racialized, non-Indigenous graduates. It was also lower among women than men. Employment income averaged $45,700 per year for racialized women and $47,800 for non-racialized and non-Indigenous women, compared with $51,600 for racialized men and $54,100 for non-racialized and non-Indigenous men.
Racialized graduates also reported lower rates of unionization and employer pension plan coverage than their non-racialized, non-Indigenous counterparts. These rates were generally higher among women than men, for both racialized graduates and non-racialized, non-Indigenous graduates. Thus, the problem of poverty in old age is intensified.
Temporary worker programs pose a serious injustice which primarily affects members of visible minorities who are brought in to work in agriculture, domestic service and, increasingly, other low wage sectors. Such workers are abused, super exploited and are denied any of the labour protections of other workers.
A central demand must be that anyone who works in Canada is due all the rights, benefits and services available to any other worker, Canadian born, permanent resident or temporary worker.
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