AFP, published on Saturday 18 June 2022 at 08:26
She makes ice cream and runs the register like she’s been doing it her whole life. A growing number of young Quebec teenagers, like 13-year-old Sofia-Rose Adams, are working after school in a region hit by severe labor shortages.
“Would you like your receipt?” the teenager asks, smiling at a customer at the Les Gourmandes café-restaurant in the greater Montreal area, where the young girl has just been hired several hours a week.
“I wanted to work to have a small part-time job, work hours here and there and also earn some pocket money,” said Sofia-Rose with a blue cap on her head and round glasses on her nose to the AFP news agency.
For her, who is passionate about music and improvisational theater in her little free time, it is “normal to start working at her age”.
There is no minimum age to work in Quebec, only parental consent is required for those under the age of 14.
There is also no limit on working hours, as long as it is not during school hours or at night for under 16s.
In the Gourmandes kitchen, other teenage girls are preparing soups.
At this small Quebec company, seven of the eight employees are under the age of 18.
“After the pandemic, we had major recruitment problems,” explains owner Marie-Eve Guertin, who had to turn to the under-15s for the first time in nine years this year.
“It’s very difficult for full-time jobs. I don’t have a resume,” she laments, so she relies on teenagers to keep her head above water. “A business, you want to expand it, you don’t want to cut it down,” she says, wanting to avoid reducing opening hours like many restaurants do.
– A “feature” from Quebec –
In the French-speaking province of Canada, where the unemployment rate is 3.9%, labor shortages in almost all occupations encourage employers to be resourceful to meet their needs. Hiring teenagers, and in some cases pre-teens, is sometimes the answer.
Although there is no data to identify the under-14s in the labor market, statistics show that one in two Quebecers aged 15-19 has a job.
“I started the job market when I was 14,” says Philippe Marcil, 17, now an employee of a men’s clothing store in the suburbs of metropolitan Quebec.
“I understood early on that gaining experience in the labor market is important, so I wanted to experience that,” the man, who worked for two years as a team leader at a fast food chain, tells AFP.
The hockey player and running fan-turned-lawyer says he manages to find a “balance” between social life, work and study by setting “rather precise agendas” that he tries to respect “as much as possible”.
Also very involved in school, Philippe has set a limit of 15 hours of work per week so that his professional life does not affect his academic results.
“Child labor has always been relatively present in Quebec, especially compared to European countries,” explains Charles Fleury, sociologist and professor of industrial relations at Laval University.
“Whether you’re a kid from a privileged or disadvantaged family, there’s really this kind of appreciation of work as a demonstration of autonomy,” he adds.
What is new, however, is that the type of employment is changing with the labor shortage. Teenagers are no longer content with babysitting, handing out newspapers or picking fruit.
And this situation is a cause for concern: Recently, Quebec Secretary of Labor Jean Boulet stated that he did not find it “normal” for 11-year-old children to work and suggested that Quebec consider legislation to make children’s work easier regulate most youngsters. Elsewhere in Canada, most other provinces have enacted minimum age legislation.
Even if these young people enter the labor market of their own free will, “there is still a risk of promoting school failure and dropping out”, believes Charles Fleury and speaks of an “attention situation”.