Compared to white Canadians, visible minorities and aboriginal people with a university education are less likely to hold managerial and professional jobs. Of those who do, more than half are self-employed, compared to one-third of white Canadians.

Foreign born visible minorities and aboriginal people are over-represented in the bottom 20 percent of income earners and are under-represented in the top 20 percent of income earners.

Foreign born visible minorities earned, on average, 78 cents for every dollar earned by a foreign-born white Canadian.

Employment equity measures should move beyond recruitment to focus on retention and promotion. While legislation may alter the behaviour of employers, attitudes toward racial minorities have been slower to change.

Racial discrimination today has become more subtle or hidden compared to the overt forms of the past. Public education is important for raising awareness of racial inequality in order to eliminate it in the future.

Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission
Policy Relating to Aboriginal People as a Designated Group

Section 47 of The Saskatchewan Human Rights Code gives the Saskatchewan Human Rights Commission authority to approve programs designed to prevent, eliminate or reduce disadvantages experienced by groups of individuals because of a prohibited ground of discrimination. To date, the Commission has approved equity plans for four groups: women, Aboriginal people, people with disabilities and visible minorities. All four groups have experienced historical inequities that have become entrenched within educational, economic and other systems. To address ongoing systemic discrimination against these groups, the Commission has developed employment equity and education equity programs.

In 1996, Aboriginal people in Saskatchewan had the highest rates of unemployment and the lowest rates of participation relative to the general, provincial population. Twenty-five percent of the Aboriginal working-age population in Saskatchewan was unemployed, compared with a 10 percent unemployment rate for the general population. Only 54 percent¹ of working-age Aboriginal people in Regina and Saskatoon participated in the workforce in 1996 compared with a rate of 70 percent for the total population.²

With Saskatchewan's aging population, shrinking workforce and increasing labour needs, the province cannot afford to bypass this group of potential workers.

Demographic changes will see large increases in the Aboriginal working-age population over the next two decades. In 1996, 42 percent of the Aboriginal population in Saskatchewan was under 15 years old compared with 20 percent of the non-Aboriginal population.³ Between 1991 and 1996, the Aboriginal working-age population across Canada grew 33.3 percent compared with the non-Aboriginal population growth of 5.4⁴ percent. 

There has also been a tendency toward rural Aboriginal depopulation since the 1960s, increasing the working-age population in the urban centres. By the year 2016 it is estimated that at least 16 percent of the Aboriginal working-age population will be concentrated in Regina and Saskatoon.⁶

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