“At a time when\u00a0governments across\u00a0Canada\u00a0are facing immense fiscal pressures, bringing\u00a0government\u00a0sector\u00a0compensation\u00a0in\u00a0line with the\u00a0private\u00a0sector\u00a0would help reduce costs without necessarily disrupting services,” said Jake Fuss, director of fiscal studies at the Fraser Institute.<\/p>\n
The study,\u00a0Comparing\u00a0Government\u00a0and\u00a0Private\u00a0Sector\u00a0Compensation\u00a0in\u00a0Canada, 2025 Edition<\/a>, finds that\u00a0government\u00a0employees across\u00a0Canada\u2014including federal, provincial\u00a0and\u00a0municipal workers\u2014were paid 26.1 per cent higher wages, on average, than workers\u00a0in\u00a0the\u00a0private\u00a0sector\u00a0in\u00a02024, the most recent year of available comparable data from Statistics\u00a0Canada’s Labour Force Survey.<\/p>\n Even after adjusting for differences such as age, gender, education, tenure, type of work,\u00a0industry,\u00a0and\u00a0occupation,\u00a0government\u00a0employees are still paid 4.8 per cent higher wages.<\/p>\n But wages are only part of overall\u00a0compensation.\u00a0Government\u00a0workers across\u00a0Canada\u00a0enjoy much more generous non-wage benefits, too, such as:<\/p>\n Pensions: In 2024, 86.7 per cent of public-sector workers were covered by a registered pension plan compared to only 21.8 per cent in the private sector. Of those covered, almost all government workers (91.5 per cent) enjoyed defined-benefit pensions, which offer a guaranteed level of income and benefits in retirement, compared to 40.7 per cent among private sector workers.<\/p>\n Early retirement: Public-sector workers retired 2.2 years earlier, on average, than the country’s private-sector workers.<\/p>\n Personal leave: Government workers were absent from their jobs for personal reasons more often than private sector workers\u201415.7 days compared to 9.3 days.<\/p>\n Job security: In 2024, public-sector employees were approximately five times less likely to experience job loss than private-sector workers\u20140.6 per cent compared to 3.2 per cent.<\/p>\n “All levels of\u00a0government\u00a0in\u00a0Canada\u2014municipal, provincial\u00a0and\u00a0federal\u2014must find ways to reduce costs as spending\u00a0and\u00a0borrowing have continued to ramp up across the country,” Fuss said.<\/p>\n “Closing the compensation gap between the government and private sectors would reduce costs and help governments move towards balancing their budgets.”<\/p>\n Follow the Fraser Institute on\u00a0Twitter<\/a>\u00a0and Facebook<\/a><\/p>\n The Fraser Institute is an independent Canadian public policy research and educational organization with offices in Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto, Halifax and Montreal and ties to a global network of think-tanks in 87 countries. Its mission is to improve the quality of life for Canadians, their families and future generations by studying, measuring and broadly communicating the effects of government policies, entrepreneurship and choice on their well-being. To protect the Institute’s independence, it does not accept grants from governments or contracts for research. Visit www.fraserinstitute.org<\/a><\/p>\n SOURCE The Fraser Institute<\/p>\n View original content to download multimedia: http:\/\/www.newswire.ca\/en\/releases\/archive\/October2025\/02\/c6748.html<\/a><\/p>\n Cision <\/p>\n