Statistics Canada reports higher wages and better benefits in not-for-profit centres

A new report released by Statistics Canada in December 2024 further analyzes data from its 2022 Canadian Study on the Provision of Child Care Services. The report shows how workforce characteristics such as roles and composition of employees, rates of pay and benefits, employee turnover and vacancies, differ based on centre ownership and organizational structure.

Approximately half of child care workers are employed in not-for-profit or government operated centres

The total number of early childhood educators and assistants more than doubled in the 25 years from 1996 to 2022, from 95,200 to 207,830. 

In 2022, over half of child care centre staff (53.5%) were employed in not-for-profit (including government-operated centres), and less than half (46.5%) were employed in for-profit settings. 

Figure 1: Distribution of early childhood educator staff across centre types

Source: Data from Table 1, Statistics Canada, 2024, Child care centre workers serving children aged 0 to 5 years in Canada, 2021 to 2022

As Figure 1 shows, among employees working in not-for-profit centres there was a fairly even split between those in single site settings (also referred to as independent centres) and multi-site settings. Whereas, among employees working in for-profit centres, more worked in single-site for-profit centres than in multi-site for-profit centres. A multi-site centre is defined as “when an individual or organization holds licenses for multiple centre-based child care locations”.

Notably, not-for-profit centres devoted the highest share of their operating budgets to employee wages, with multi-site not-for-profit centres and single-site not-for-profit centres allocating 74% and 70% of their operating budgets to staff wages, respectively. This compared with 65% for for-profit multi-site centres and 61% of single-site for-profit centre operating budgets going toward staff wages. 

Pay rates were also higher for supervisors at not-for-profit centres. 

Most employees have access to some benefits

The analysis of the data from the survey found that three-quarters (76%) of child care centres provided some type of benefits to their employees in 2022, such as supplementary health and dental plans, pension plan contributions or group RRSPs, paid sick leave or paid time for training. This included:

  • 68% provided paid time for documentation, meetings or program planning. 
  • 60% of centres offered benefits such as supplementary health or dental plans
  • 61% provided paid sick leave 
  • 60% provided paid vacation leave, and 
  • 62% provided financial assistance or paid time for training (62%) 
  • 53% provided life insurance or disability insurance (53%) 
  • 54% had paid breaks or compensation for overtime 
  • 37% offered pension plan contributions or group RRSPs 
  • 27% had reduced child care fees for employees’ own children (27%) 
  • 10% had top-ups to maternity or parental leave

Not-for-profit multi-site centres were the most likely (93%) to offer any of these benefits, while for-profit single-site centres were the least likely (61%) to offer any of these benefits. For both for-profit multi-site centres and not-for-profit single site centres, approximately 78% offered benefits to employees. 

The data also showed that supervisors and staff with early childhood education credentials or training qualifications (i.e. certificate, diploma or degree) were paid higher in not-for-profit centres, compared with for-profit centres.

Turnover among qualified early childhood workers

One notable finding is that turnover of staff was higher for early childhood workers with an ECE credential or training, compared with supervisors and early childhood workers without qualifications. That is, 59% of all centres reported that one or more ECEs with credentials or training had departed the centre in the previous year. This compared to only 14.8% of centres reporting the departure of a supervisor, and 38.2% the departure of one or more ECEs without credentials or training. Similarly,  66% of centres reported they had hired one or more ECE with credentials or training, compared to 18.4% of centres reporting hiring a new supervisor and 51.1% of centres reporting hiring one or more ECE without a credential or training. 

There was also some evidence that not-for-profit single-site centres have lower turnover of ECE-trained staff because centres in this category had the lowest likelihood of departures of employees with ECE credentials or training, at 52.8%. 

The highest reported difficulty faced by centres when filling vacant positions was applicants lacking skills, experience or qualifications, at 72.1%. Other reported difficulties included: lacking time to recruit, lacking money or funding for recruiting, having few or no applicants to choose from, applicants’ needs not being met, and facing competition from other centres or schools.

Study data confirms previous findings about low pay of early childhood workers

Overall, the data from the study aligns with previous Canadian and international studies that show links between higher wages and benefits and staff turnover, as well as between auspice (not-for-profit or for-profit) with higher wages and access to benefits. Ongoing collection of these data will be integral to monitoring the impact of provincial and territorial wage grids and benefit plans on staff turnover, recruitment and retention.