Education level is one of the most important factors in determining success in the local labour market, according to a report published Tuesday by the Toronto Workforce Innovation Group.

Titled, 95 Months: Turbulent Times in Toronto’s Labour Market, the report traces changes in Toronto’s economy since December 2007, just before the global economy lurched into the so-called Great Recession.

John MacLaughlin, one of the report’s co-authors and director of policy at TWIG, said the goal was to compare the current state of the economy with how things stood before the recession. The report highlights several trends, including the growing income gap, preponderance of precarious work and increasing proportion of jobs that are part-time. But the biggest take-away is that “an education is more valuable now than it’s ever been,” McLaughlin said.

“That holds true for younger workers, middle-aged workers and older workers,” he told the Star in an interview. “You’re in big trouble if you don’t have a post-secondary degree in Toronto.”

According to data compiled for the report, it is more difficult for lesser educated workers to find jobs in the city. University graduates make twice as much as someone with no post-secondary education, and nearly 30 per cent more than those with college diplomas. These ratios held true before, during and after the recession, the report says.

On top of that, during the first eight months of 2015, Ontario added 45,600 jobs for people 25 and older. All of them “were concentrated among those with post-secondary credentials,” the report states. During the same period, more than 91,000 people with a high school education or less lost their jobs.

“The reality is that our labour market is very bleak for someone (with) high school or less,” McLaughlin said. “They’re always in a recession.”

The report also notes that, while many other studies and analyses have focused on youth unemployment, workers in Toronto who are between 55 and 65 years old have also been hit hard in recent years. By July 2015, this cohort of workers represented 12.7 per cent of Employment Insurance recipients in Toronto, up from 7.5 per cent in December 2007. This coincides with a marked increase in the average amount time that someone from this age group spends being unemployed when they lose a job. In 2007 it was 20 weeks; now it’s more than 35.

“You’re less likely to be unemployed, but if you do lose your job, you’re apparently in some trouble,” McLaughlin said.

As perceived through the rest of the country, more people are working in part-time jobs in Toronto since before the 2008 recession. Using data from the Toronto Labour Force Survey, the report concludes that the portion of the labour force working part-time jobs crept up from 17 per cent to more than 18 per cent between 2007 and 2014. The authors note that workers who are 55 and older now represent 8 per cent of Torontonians in part-time jobs, more than double what it was before the recession.

Median pre-tax income has generally been climbing in Toronto since 2007, except for a slight dip in 2010. The report notes, however, that the share of this income growth has been uneven; according to the recently released Vital Signs 2015 report, Toronto’s income gap is the second biggest in Canada and is growing at twice the national average. Several factors could contribute to determine who is on which side of the wealth gap, the report says, including gender, location and culture.

In a final section, the report predicts that technological advances will reinforce the importance of post-secondary education in Toronto, as automation machines and computers replace certain jobs that demand a lower degree of “social and creative skills.”

The report used data from the Toronto Labour Force Survey, Ontario Works and Statistics Canada.