Study: Education and labour market transitions in young adulthood

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In general, men and women have followed the same pathways from school to adult life during the past eight years. However, their timing for various transitions has been quite different.

A long-term study of several thousand young people between 2000 and 2008 showed the most common sequence of events to adulthood was to leave school, find a full-time job, leave the parental home, form a relationship and have children.

However, a higher proportion of men left school and started working on a full-time basis earlier than women. In contrast, a higher proportion of women left the parental home, formed a relationship and had children earlier than men. Throughout the eight years, a higher proportion of men worked full time and still lived with their parents.

At the beginning of the survey in 2000, when respondents were aged 18 to 20, about 55% of men and women had participated in some form of postsecondary education either at college, university or a private institution. In 2008, by time they were aged 26 to 28, this proportion had increased to 81%.

The most commonly attended institutions during the entire eight years for both men and women were college (43%) and university (42%).

Participation in all types of postsecondary education was higher for women than men. Even though participation rates for both sexes increased over the years, the gap between men and women persisted.

By the time they were aged 26 to 28 in 2008, participation rates were 8 percentage points higher for women than men in university, and 7 points higher in college.

There were also differences between the sexes in terms of the transition from school to the labour market.

Over the full eight years of the study, a smaller proportion of women than men were in the labour market, and a smaller proportion of women were working on a full-time basis.

In 2008, 80% of men aged 26 to 28 had a job and were not in school, compared with 72% of women. About 75% of men were working on a full-time basis, compared with 63% of women.

At the outset of the survey in 2000, there were initially as many women as men who were not in school and did not have a job (8%). By 2008, about 13% of women were not in school and did not have a job, more than twice the proportion (6%) among men.

Gender differences in labour market participation at age 26 to 28 may, in part, be explained by the timing of other major transitions: a higher proportion of women formed a relationship and had children earlier than men.

In 2008, 57% of women aged 26 to 28 were or had been in a married or common-law relationship compared with 42% of men. Almost twice as many women than men aged 26 to 28 had children (32% versus 18% respectively).

Note: The report "Education and labour market transitions in young adulthood" uses data from the first five cycles of the Youth in Transition Survey (YITS) to examine the education and labour market status of young people and their pathways to adulthood.

The YITS is a longitudinal survey undertaken jointly by Statistics Canada and Human Resources and Skills Development Canada. The same respondents were contacted at two-year intervals. As a result, YITS provides information on patterns of education and work activities over time for the same individuals.

More than 22,000 youth aged 18 to 20 from all 10 provinces participated in the first cycle in 2000. Follow-up interviews occurred in 2002, 2004, 2006 and 2008.

Definitions, data sources and methods: survey number 4435.

The report "Education and labour market transitions in young adulthood" is now available as part of the Culture, Tourism and the Centre for Education Statistics: Research Papers (81-595-M2009075, free). From the Publications module of our website, choose Publications by subject, then Education, training and learning.

To obtain more information, to order data, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact Client Services (toll-free 1-800-307-3382; 613-951-7608; fax: 613-951-4441; TTY: 1-800-363-7629; educationstats@statcan.gc.ca), Tourism and the Centre for Education Statistics.