A new report from United Way Centraide Canada (UWCC) highlights growing workforce pressures across Canada’s nonprofit care economy and calls for coordinated action to strengthen the labour force delivering essential community services.

Prepared for UWCC by Common Good Strategies, Making the Case for the Care Economy: A Data Roadmap for Canada’s Nonprofit Labour Force brings together existing Statistics Canada data, sector surveys, administrative filings, and research to provide a clearer picture of workforce shortages, wages, retention, job quality, and organizational capacity. The report argues that while nonprofit workforce data is fragmented, enough information already exists to identify where pressures are greatest and where action is needed.

The findings show that demand for community services is growing faster than the workforce and resources available to meet it. Employment in the community nonprofit sector increased by 10% between 2019 and 2024, while expenditures rose by 32%, and more than 70% of charities reported demand for services exceeding their capacity.

Key findings include:

  • Vacancies in core community-care occupations have increased by 140% since 2015, while health-related vacancies have risen by 173%.
  • 45% of occupations closely associated with nonprofit care work are projected to face a strong labour-shortage risk by 2033, compared with 6% of other occupations.
  • Community nonprofit workers earn approximately 31% less than the economy-wide average and 26% less than workers in government nonprofits.
  • In social services, 26% of workers report being likely to leave their job within six months.
  • Offered wages in core care occupations grew 11 percentage points more slowly than wages across the rest of the labour market between 2015 and 2025.
  • Social services have lost an estimated $7 billion in annual volunteer capacity over the past decade, equivalent to approximately 115,000 full-time positions.

The report was produced as part of UWCC’s McConnell Foundation-supported work to develop a national labour force strategy for the community services sector of the care economy. UWCC is also working with sector partners on a shared snapshot of the nonprofit care economy workforce, expected to be released this fall.

For further information, or to read the full report: click here