Canada’s wage subsidy policy announced good news for immigrants

The Prime Minister of Canada, Justin Trudeau, announced the extension of the federal wage subsidy program until December. The Prime Minister says it should provide “more certainty and support” to businesses as Canada plans to reopen its economy.

The announcement should help support the recovery of jobs lost as a result of the coronavirus foreclosure measures. This should allow Canadians and immigrants to leave work faster. In addition, discussions are underway with the provinces and territories on the “safe restart program”.

The Canadian Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS) was introduced in March to help ease the financial burden expected of businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The program was also introduced to encourage companies affected by COVID-19 to rehire laid-off workers and to avoid future layoffs. The government hoped to achieve this by providing eligible businesses with a 75% wage subsidy of up to $ 847 per week.

Generally, businesses and non-profit organizations could apply for the grant if they saw a 30% reduction in revenue. For March, it was 15%.

The business community, while welcoming the extension of CEWS, still criticizes the conditions of eligibility and hopes that more companies will be able to access them.

Therefore, the government has said that the eligibility criteria could be adjusted this week.

This is the second time that CEWS has been extended after 12 weeks were added to the program on May 15.

Until July 6, the federal government had paid just over $ 18 billion to employers through the federal wage subsidy. A total of 581,800 out of 587,060 (or 99.1%) requests were approved.

Last week, the government increased CIRA’s budget to $ 82.3 billion, which is considerably higher than the original budget of only $ 45 billion.

As the economy begins to reopen, many people who received the Canadian Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) are now choosing to return to work. In addition, many people are more optimistic about the potential of finding a job.

In fact, the months of May and June saw an increase of 1.24 million jobs as unemployment rates across the country dropped significantly. These statistics and the extension of the wage subsidy are good news for hopeful immigrants as they would expect a stronger job market once they become permanent residents.

The last Express Entry of Canada draw is good news, as it was the first draw for all programs since the start of the pandemic. This means that applicants for the Federal Skilled Worker Program (FSWP) were also considered.

Reference is taken from CIC News