The implications of human capital portability – including interactions between education, language skills and pre- and post-immigration occupational matching – for earnings are explored for new immigrants to Canada. Given the importance of occupation-specific skills, as a precursor we also...

We present hedonic general-equilibrium estimates of quality-of-life and productivity differences across Canada's metropolitan areas. These are based off of the estimated willingness-to-pay of heterogeneous households and firms to locate in various cities, which differ in their wage levels,...

Public-place smoking restrictions are the most important non-price tobacco control measures worldwide, yet surprisingly little is known about their effects on exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). We study these laws in Canada using data with questions about respondents' ETS exposure in...

We explore the effect of e-cigarette prices and an e-cigarette tax increase in Minnesota on youth use of e-cigarettes and cigarettes. Our price variation comes from 35,000 retailers participating in the Nielsen retail data system. We match this price and tax variation to survey data on current...

We examine local labor markets in the U.S. and Canada from 1990 to 2011 using comparable household and business data. Wage levels and inequality rise with city population in both countries, albeit less in Canada. Neither country saw wage levels converge despite contrasting migration patterns...

We use the 2012 Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies to examine proficiency in information-processing skills, educational attainment and labour market outcomes among Indigenous peoples in Canada. Similar to previous literature, we find negative earnings differentials,...

Canada's Youth Hires program was a targeted employment subsidy that rebated employment insurance premiums to employers with net increases in insurable earnings for youth aged 18-24. Using a difference-in-differences approach, in each of two datasets statistically and economically significant...

A substantial economics literature documents that tighter alcohol controls reduce alcohol related harms, but far less is known about mechanisms. We use the universe of Canadian mortality records to document that Canada's Minimum Legal Drinking Age (MLDA) significantly reduces mortality rates of...

Twenty-one states and the District of Columbia require youths to wear helmets when riding a bicycle, and there has been a push to extend such laws to adults. We provide new evidence on helmet laws by studying Canada using difference-in-differences models and restricted area-identified public...

The Canadian labour market experienced a period of unprecedented turmoil following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. We analyze the main changes using standard labour force statistics and new data on job postings. Envisaging a phase of temporary severing of employment relationships followed by...