Study: Work absences due to injury or illness and employee retention in the child care services industry before the COVID-19 pandemic

Released: 2023-06-14

While the COVID-19 pandemic increased the work absences of early childhood educators and assistants (ECEAs) employed in the child care services industry, about 8% of ECEAs in the industry were absent because of injury or illness before the pandemic (i.e., in 2016). These ECEAs were more likely than other ECEAs to leave the child care services industry in the year.

Employee retention in the child care services industry is a key issue in the implementation of the Canada-wide early learning and child care system

In 2021, the federal government committed over $27.2 billion in funding through bilateral agreements with the provinces and territories to build a Canada-wide early learning and child care (ELCC) system.

The Canada-wide ELCC system is based on five principles with respect to child care: affordability, accessibility, inclusivity, flexibility and quality.

Providing high-quality child care requires, among other things, hiring and retaining well-educated child care workers. This task can be challenging in the current labour market context, where most child care centres report having difficulty filling vacant staff positions.

To inform discussions on employee retention in the child care services industry, this study examines the factors associated with high departure rates from the industry in 2016, before the implementation of the Canada-wide ELCC system. It is the first Canadian national study to assess the degree to which work absences due to injury or illness were associated with subsequent departures from the industry. Because of sample size limitations, the focus of the study is on women who are employed as ECEAs.

Work absences due to injury or illness in 2016 were associated with increased departure rates from the child care services industry in the same year

In 2016, 8.1% of women employed as ECEAs in the child care services industry had work absences because of injury or illness.

ECEAs who had work absences due to injury or illness (14.0%) in 2016 had higher departure rates from the child care services industry in the year than other ECEAs (10.5%).

The study shows that this 3.5 percentage-point difference in departure rates widens to 6.6 percentage points in multivariate analyses. This finding suggests that the work absences due to injury or illness experienced by ECEAs in 2016 were associated with significantly higher departure rates from the child care services industry in the year.

Several other factors associated with relatively high departure rates

Several other factors were associated with relatively high departure rates from the child care services industry in 2016.

All else equal, ECEAs who lived outside the province of Quebec, were recently hired, were younger than 35 years or had at most a high school diploma were more likely than other ECEAs to leave the child care services industry in 2016. The same was true for ECEAs who earned relatively low wages, had no pension plan in their job or were not unionized.

For example, 14.5% of ECEAs who had no registered pension plan or deferred profit sharing plan in their job left the child care services industry in 2016, more than three times the rate of 4.5% observed among their counterparts who had such plans.

Likewise, ECEAs working full time and earning less than $600 per week (13.2%) left the industry at a greater rate than their counterparts who earned $600 or more per week (5.8%).

Of all ECEAs living in Quebec, 5.9% left the child care services industry in 2016. Departure rates from the industry were higher in other provinces and varied between 11.2% in Nova Scotia and 19.1% in Prince Edward Island.

The differences mentioned above become smaller but persist in multivariate analyses.

Work absences due to injury or illness were relatively infrequent in the child care services industry before the pandemic

The study also shows that work absences due to injury or illness were relatively infrequent in the child care services industry before the pandemic. In 2018, 7.8% of women whose main employment was in the industry—as ECEAs or as other employees—had such work absences. The corresponding percentages were lower for women employed in elementary and secondary schools (4.2%) and higher for women employed in nursing and residential care facilities (10.6%).

Similarly, ECEA work absences due to injury or illness were, at 8.1%, relatively infrequent in 2016. Combined with the fact that 14.0% of the ECEAs who had such work absences left the child care services industry the same year, this finding has important implications. It suggests that eliminating injury- or illness-related work absences would likely have a limited impact on overall employee retention in the industry.

Specifically, eliminating such absences might reduce, on an annual basis, employees' departures from the child care services industry by at most 1.1 percentage points (8.1% times 14.0%) from a baseline departure rate of about 11%.

Work absences in the child care services industry increased during the pandemic

Lastly, the study shows—using the Labour Force Survey (LFS)—that the pandemic increased the percentage of ECEAs who, during the LFS reference week, were absent for a full week because of illness or disability by about 2 percentage points in 2020/2021, from a long-term average of 2.2%.

Products

The study "Work Absences Due to Injury or Illness and Employee Retention in the Child Care Services Industry Before the COVID-19 Pandemic," part of the Analytical Studies Branch Research Paper Series (Catalogue number11F0019M), is now available.

Contact information

For more information, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact us (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).