Disincentives to Employment: Facing the Glass Ceiling

Another barrier to employment for recipients of Ontario Works who are eager to enter the job market is the glass ceiling. Since individuals who enter Ontario Works are individuals who have proven immediate financial need, they are already oppressed as citizens in poverty. While the intention of Ontario Works is to provide training for jobs that will help recipients exit social assistance and support themselves with an income, Ontario Works fails to do so because the training and job opportunities provided are so poor that they provide recipients with basic skills that will only give them jobs that keep them in a very low income bracket, or below the poverty line.

Examples of the “job specific” training provided can be found on the Ontario Works section of the city of Kingston homepage. Education and job-specific skills for upgrading include:

Completing your Grade 12 diploma or equivalency;
Improving language skills;
Upgrading reading, math, and writing skills;
Training required for certain jobs such as basic computer skills, typing, forklift operations, personal support worker (PSW).
Furthermore, upon a search of the upcoming job-specific skills workshops, one will find that the only recent workshop offered is standard CPR/First Aid training. What does this mean for Ontario Works recipients who have dreams of learning job-specific skills to start a career when they leave social assistance? This means that they cannot do so because Ontario Works does not provide the skills and training at a post-secondary level of education that is required for one to learn the skills to pursue meaningful employment. Ontario Works recipients are provided education up to grade 12 only, which does nothing for recipients who were already in poverty because they could not afford a post-secondary education even though they were already high school graduates. While basic academic skills such as language, reading, math, and writing are required for all jobs, failure to advance beyond these skills towards training in jobs that require higher order thinking and problem solving oppresses recipients to be eligible only for the lowest paying jobs once they leave Ontario Works. Since Ontario works does not provide training at the post-secondary level, barely pays out enough for one’s own living expenses, and prepares recipients for jobs whereby they are not paid enough to even save for a post-secondary education, it traps recipients below the glass ceiling when they attempt to leave the program and apply for a job.

In a survey of former Ontario Works recipients in the city of Toronto , comparisons were made between their financial situation while on, and off Ontario Works. The average weekly rate of pay for Ontario Works recipients who had transitioned into the job market was $400, which was 30% below the average weekly rate of pay for employees in the city of Toronto . When reporting incomes, 92% of respondents reported and average income below Statistic’s Canada ’s 2001 Low income cut-off. When reflecting on job-related training, recipients had opportunities to work and receive education in the following fields: retail/sales, office worker, restaurant worker, trades worker/mechanic, with 15% identified as an obscure category of professional/manager. Clearly, Ontario Works participants are limited to basic employment training and are not afforded training in higher paying jobs that call for knowledge in fields of academia.

Following input from former Ontario Work’s recipients, the reality behind the intended advantages of the program, for recipients to leave social services and sustain their living expenses with employment is clear. The program is failing. Without meaningful post-secondary level training, and opportunities to enter jobs paying above the low-income cut-off, former recipients are trapped in low-pay work where they have no access to benefits, and no opportunities to save for an education to help them climb the career ladder. They are oppressed to find work only in low-paying jobs, whether as employees or as returnees to Ontario Works, and are unlikely to ever break through the glass ceiling in search of a meaningful, sustaining career.



Information about Ontario Works training found on the Ontario Works Section of the City of Kingston home page. http://www.cityofkingston.ca/residents/social/ontarioworks/employment.asp#top



Information from former Ontario Works recipients found in: “After Ontario Works: A survey of people who left Ontario Works in Toronto in 2001.” Toronto Community & Neighbourhood Services, 2001. http://www.toronto.ca/socialservices/pdf/afterowsurvey.pdf