The number of Canadians working from home has contracted but still remains more than twice as high as it was prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, according to Statistics Canada.
“The onset of the pandemic led to a sharp contraction in the number of commuters due to a drop in employment and more people mostly working from home,” the agency
said in an Aug. 26 report.
The agency said while the share of Canadians working from home rose from 7.1 percent in 2016 to 24.3 percent in 2021, it has since declined to 20.1 percent in 2023 and 18.7 percent in 2024.
Over the last year, the share of people working from home has fallen by 3.8 percent in Quebec, 1.8 percent in Saskatchewan, and 1.4 percent in Ontario. Meanwhile, the share increased by 3 percent in Nova Scotia and 2.5 percent in Prince Edward Island.
The city of Ottawa had 34.2 percent of employees working from home in May 2024, the highest in Canada, while Toronto had 24.7 percent, Vancouver had 22.4 percent, and Montreal had 20.6 percent.
A StatCan report from January found that work-from-home policies were linked to a long-term decline in transit usage in Canada, with the number of commuters nationwide having dropped from 12.6 percent in 2016 to 10.1 percent in 2023. The report noted that the reduction in workers going to offices had eased traffic, prompting some office workers to switch to
commuting by car.
The federal government
announced in May that civil servants would be required to spend at least three days per week in the office, while executives would need to be in the office for four days. Currently, civil servants only need to be in the office two days per week.
The new policy is set to take effect on Sept. 9, 2024. During the Public Service Alliance of Canada (PSAC)’s strike of 120,000 workers in 2023, the union had requested the option for employees to work from home
full-time as part of its demands. PSAC was ultimately unsuccessful in having that demand enshrined in the new contract.
