SAADIA MUZAFFAR
RESPONSIBLE INNOVATION / DECENT WORK / IMMIGRANT TALENT
2017-2018 Research Grant Recipient
Institute for Gender and the Economy (GATE) at the Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto promotes an understanding of gender inequalities and how they can be remedied – by people of all genders – in the world of business and, more broadly, in the economy.
Compounding Losses: Labour struggles of immigrant women in STEM
Nadia Caidi, Faculty of Information (iSchool) & Saadia Muzaffar, Founder TechGirls Canada
Among university graduates in Canada aged 25 to 34, immigrant women are twice as likely to have a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) degree as Canadian-born women (23% versus 13%). Yet, immigrant women face some of the highest levels of labour market challenges in Canada across indicators, including: unemployment rate, wage gap, part-time employment, and low-income rate. We seek to document the complex gendered "work-finding" hurdles for immigrant women in STEM fields in order to begin examining the Loss on Investment (LOI) being absorbed by the Canadian economy due to this untapped talent.