Statistics Canada is proud to complete Canada’s statistical portrait with the seventh release of findings from the 2021 Census. This release includes data insights on education; labour and language of work; commuting; and instruction in the official minority language in Canada. Thanks to the participation of all Canadians, Statistics Canada has been able to share insights on the Canadian population which can be used to inform decision-making and planning. Here are a few key highlights from the release:
Education
- Canada has a larger share of the population with a college or university credential than any other country in the G7.
- From 2016 to 2021, the working-age population saw an increase of nearly one-fifth (+19.1%) in the number of people with a bachelor’s degree or higher, including even larger rises in degree-holders in the fields of health care (+24.1%) and computer and information science (+46.3%).
- Recent immigrants made up nearly half of the growth in the share of Canadians with a bachelor’s degree or higher. However, their talents remain underutilized, as over one-quarter of immigrants with foreign degrees were working in jobs that require, at most, a high school diploma.
- Growth in professional, scientific and technical services employment outpaces that of all other industries, with 1.5 million employed in 2021.
- In 2021, English and French remained the most commonly used languages in workplaces across Canada. The use of these two languages varied greatly across the country; however, outside of Quebec and New Brunswick, English was generally the predominant language.
- Non-official languages used at work include Mandarin (about 130,000 people), Punjabi (102,000), Yue (Cantonese) (83,000) and Spanish (81,000).
- Across Canada, 39,600 workers used an Indigenous language at work on a regular basis.
- Lockdowns to slow the spread of COVID-19 and changes in how and where Canadians worked during the pandemic altered the face of commuting in Canada in 2021 – leading to 2.8 million fewer commuters compared with five years earlier.
- In May 2021, during Wave 3 of the pandemic, there were 4.2 million people usually working at home, or 24.3% of workers, compared with 1.3 million or 7.4% of workers in May 2016.
- The number of people driving to work rebounded in 2022 to 2016 levels, but public transit use by commuters remained 40% below those seen six years earlier.
- In 2021, 897,000 children were eligible for primary and secondary education in the minority official language, either in English in Quebec (304,000), or in French outside of Quebec (593,000).
- For the first time, these findings will provide planners and practitioners with the number of children eligible for instruction in the minority official language according to the three criteria set out in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
- This new data can provide evidence-based information to provincial ministries as well as school boards and other stakeholders for service planning purposes.
- Please note that new detailed data tables on children eligible for instruction in the minority official language and the associated products, given their complexity, will be made available on December 15, 2022.
- Engage on social media using our #2021Census hashtag.
- Leverage resources including web images, social media content, and email templates available in our Community Supporter Toolkit.
