Saskatchewan gets a “C” grade and ranks 21st out of 26 jurisdictions on the first How Canada Performs: Society report card that compares the social performance of Canada, its provinces, and 15 peer countries.

Ottawa, April 5, 2017–Saskatchewan gets a “C” grade and ranks 21st out of 26 jurisdictions on the first How Canada Performs: Society report card that compares the social performance of Canada, its provinces, and 15 peer countries.

“Saskatchewan’s ranking on the society report card highlights the need for improvement on some key social challenges, such as crime rates and wage gaps relating to gender, race, and immigrant status,” said Craig Alexander, Senior Vice-President and Chief Economist, The Conference Board of Canada. “A bright spot for Saskatchewan is its top rank among the provinces on youth employment. Integrating Canadians into the workforce at a younger age may contribute to a stronger social and economic performance for Saskatchewan in the years to come.”

Highlights

With an overall “C” grade, Saskatchewan is below the national average.

Saskatchewan's lowest grade is a “D-” on social network support.

Manitoba receives a “B” grade and is 15th overall, while Alberta gets a “C” and ranks 19th, just a few notches ahead of Saskatchewan. New Brunswick is the top-ranked province placing 10th among the 26 comparator regions.

Canada gets a “B” overall and ranks 10th among the 16 peer countries.

Social network support reflects an individual’s perception of being able to count on someone else in times of need. Saskatchewan receives its worst grade, a “D-”, on this measure, ranking below the poorest-ranking peer country, Japan, and ahead of only Prince Edward Island.

The province also performs poorly on the gender wage gap measure with a “D”, resulting from a difference in median weekly earnings of 21.6 per cent between men and women. In addition, Saskatchewan does not fare well relative to the other provinces on other equity indicators not included in the calculation of the overall rankings (due to the lack of comparable international data): immigrant wage gap, racial wage gap, and income of people with disabilities. Saskatchewan receives a “D” grade on immigrant wage gap, with a 37.1 per cent difference between the earnings of university-educated landed immigrants and Canadian-born citizens, a figure well above the national average of 20.6 per cent. Saskatchewan has the fourth largest racial wage gap among the provinces with university-educated, Canadian-born members of a visible minority earning 86.3 cents for every dollar earned by their Caucasian peers. Saskatchewan also does not do well on income of people with disabilities, placing just ahead of British Columbia, Quebec, and Alberta. The income for disabled persons in Saskatchewan is 71.7 per cent that of people without disabilities.

Saskatchewan’s only “C” grade is on homicides, with the third-highest average homicide rate among all 26 comparator jurisdictions—only the U.S. and Manitoba rank lower. Saskatchewan has the highest burglary rate among the provinces, with a three-year average rate of 754 burglaries per 100,000 population. However, the province still manages to get a “B” grade on this indicator, placing 19th overall, with a much lower burglary rate than the bottom-ranked peer country, the Netherlands.

The province is also a “B” performer on poverty, income inequality, voter turnout, and suicides. The province has the second-lowest poverty rate after Alberta. However, it is important to note that the latest available internationally comparable data for the poverty indicator is 2013, prior to the drop in commodity prices. Saskatchewan performs better than the national average on income inequality and voter turnout. However, the province’s three-year average suicide rate of 13.0 deaths per 100,000 population is higher than the national average of 11.0 deaths.

Saskatchewan is the only province to earn an “A” grade on the jobless youth indicator. With just 11 per cent of people aged 20-24 who are not in school nor working, the province does better than the national average (14.8 per cent) and places fourth overall, behind Norway, Germany, and the Netherlands.

Saskatchewan receives an “A+” and places first among all the comparator jurisdictions on life satisfaction. Overall, Canadians report relatively high levels of life satisfaction, with most provinces scoring an “A”.

Canada earns a “B” grade overall and ranks 10th among the 16 peer countries on the Society report card. The country ranks high on life satisfaction but does poorly relative to top-ranked peers on poverty, income inequality, gender wage gap, and voter turnout.

How Canada Performs is an ongoing research program at The Conference Board of Canada to help leaders identify relative strengths and weaknesses in Canada’s socio-economic performance. Six performance domains are assessed: Economy, Education and Skills, Innovation, Environment, Health, and Society.

Explore the results of the How Canada Performs: Society report card in-depth during a live webinar on April 19, 2017 at 02:00 PM EDT.