Roughly 10,000 baby boomers retire every day in North America, millennials are transforming the dynamics of today’s job market, and about 75 percent of current jobs will no longer exist by 2040. Moreover, the tools we will need to get the new jobs done have yet to be invented. But that is not all: the Canadian industry faces skills shortages, which in turn will cost the economy billions of dollars each year. Adding insult to injury is the declining birth rate in G7 countries. All Western economies are facing similar labor force challenges.
A case in point is Ontario, Canada’s largest province of 14 million people, and a strong contributor to the Canadian economy. In 2013, citing a comprehensive study on skills shortages, the widely respected Conference Board of Canada reported that the province would lose out on more than C$24 billion in economic activity and nearly C$4 billion in provincial tax revenues each year because “employers could not find people with the skills they need to innovate and grow in the current economy.”