Canada
For many individuals, a postsecondary education represents one of the largest investments made in a lifetime. However, longitudinal estimates of the long-term individual benefits of Canadian postsecondary investments simply do not exist given data constraints.
With the creation of a new linked file consisting of the 1991 Census of Population and the Longitudinal Worker File (LWF), it is now possible to follow individuals in the labour market for a longer period of time than is feasible with existing survey data. The purpose of this study is to compare labour market outcomes of individuals with different levels of educational attainment over a 20-year period spanning their mid-30s to their mid-50s. Three levels of education are considered, corresponding to the decisions made by students following high school graduation: no post-secondary studies, a college certificate, and a bachelor’s degree. Longitudinal data are used to track total earnings (wages and salaries plus net self-employment income), coverage in an employer-sponsored pension plan, employment, union membership, and permanent and temporary layoffs over the period 1991 to 2010.
