Economic Life

Institutional racism had many disruptive effects on the Chinese in Canada. Perhaps the most serious impact was on their economic life. Antagonism from white workers and the legal exclusion of Chinese from certain jobs placed them at a disadvantage in the labour market and jeopardized their ability to earn a living. Despite frequent allegations by white workers, however, there is little evidence that the Chinese were directly competing for jobs with the whites prior to 1880s. On the contrary, their employment as unskilled labourers probably made it easier for white workers to find jobs in the skilled-labour sector. In the coal mines, for example, Chinese were frequently hired, not as miners, but as helpers to white workers. Likewise, in placer mining the Chinese took up only the gold fields that had been abandoned by white miners.

The Royal Commission on Chinese and Japanese Immigration in 1902 produced evidence that in those sectors where Chinese were hired along with other workers, they received, in many instances, about half the wage paid to whites. Indeed, lower wages became the incentive for white employers to hire them, despite periodic protests from other workers. According to testimony presented to the commission, in some industries, such as coal mining and railway maintenance, the only jobs that the Chinese were allowed to perform were those that required low skills and carried low pay. In other areas, such as assembly-line manufacturing and agriculture, Chinese and white workers performed the same jobs but received unequal pay. White agricultural labourers earned $30 to $40 a month around 1900 and the Chinese about $20 to $25. Chinese cigar makers received 50 cents to $1.00 for making a hundred cigars, as compared with $1.10 to $1.90 for white workers. Chinese coal miners made $1.25 a day, while white miners earned $3 to $4. Throughout the manufacturing industries, Chinese lumber and cannery workers, boot-makers, and sewing-machine operators made about half of what other workers earned.

The differential wage system was maintained as late as the 1930s. The Board of Industrial Relations in British Columbia devised a minimum-wage system for the province’s sawmill industry in 1934 that set the general wage at 35 cents an hour. But the regulations allowed for up to 25 percent of plant employees to be paid 25 cents an hour, and in practice Asian labourers were assigned to this lower-wage group. Government officials argued that even though the wage was less than that paid to other employees, it was in most cases a considerable increase for Asian workers.

By the time that the Canadian Pacific Railway was completed in 1885, employers and contractors had begun to use Chinese labourers as scabs to break strikes. In many instances, management profited from such practice. Robert Dunsmuir, the owner of a number of mines at Wellington in British Columbia, introduced several hundred Chinese workers to his mines as a means of settling strikes in 1883. The Western Federation of Mines suffered a heavy setback in its attempts to mobilize a series of strikes in the province in 1903 because management imported Asian strike-breakers to the Nanaimo mines. These measures on the part of employers provoked further white working-class resentment towards the Chinese. The Knights of Labour, established in the province in 1884, was active in promoting anti-Chinese legislation, and white miners in Nanaimo, Wellington, and Comox collected 1,421 petitions in 1891 and 2,700 petitions the following year to protest against the hiring of Chinese in coal mines. By the turn of the century, many unions were barring them from membership and demanding their total exclusion from the country. The Trades and Labour Congress of Canada adopted an exclusion policy by 1899 and reiterated its position at subsequent annual conventions.

As anti-Orientalism among the white working class intensified, politicians passed measures to restrict the employment of Chinese, and employers were forced to heed the demands of the white population. Eventually the Chinese lost their right to work in many fields and were tolerated only in the jobs for which few white workers would compete. Many retreated into the ethnic business sector, mainly in the service industries, where they avoided competition with white employers and workers. They survived on marginal enterprises such as laundry and food services. The hostile job market was well summarized by the superintendent of the United Church’s mission to Asians west of the Great Lakes. “The chief difficulties arise as the [Chinese] graduates from high school and universities emerge into commercial life. Here discrimination is marked . . . There are few industries which are open to them except those carried on among themselves, such as the green grocer stores, Oriental shops, laundries and cafes.”

The available data indicate that between 1885 and 1931 there was a percentage decline of Chinese workers in the industrial sectors, accompanied by a corresponding increase in the ethnic business sector. For example, 15.8 percent of employed Chinese in 1885 were estimated to be in food canning, but the number had dropped to 0.4 percent by 1921 and to 1.0 percent ten years later. By contrast, Chinese engaged in laundry, domestic service, and restaurant work were estimated to be 5 percent of the workforce in 1885; the number of servants, cooks, waiters, and laundry workers had risen to 32 percent by 1921 and to 40 percent in the following decade.

Although discrimination and exclusion provided the conditions for the emergence of ethnic business among the Chinese, their success before World War II reflected the community’s ability to make use of kinship ties in such ventures. A study of enterprises in Canada between 1910 and 1947 shows that the Chinese entered the restaurant business in order to create self-employment. The activity provided a haven for many Chinese before World War II, and it remained an important source of employment and self-employment for members of the community after the war, even when opportunities in professional and technical occupations opened up to them. In the absence of immediate family in Canada, many Chinese immigrants resorted to partnerships with relatives and friends as a means of pooling resources and labour. Business relationships were formed with fathers, sons, uncles, nephews, and brothers, and at times with distant relatives or other individuals from the same region in the homeland.

Between the wars the majority of Chinese in Canada were employed in the service industries. Servants, janitors, laundry and restaurant employees, and unskilled workers accounted for 57 percent of the employed Chinese in 1921 and 61 percent ten years later. In comparison with the occupational patterns of their predecessors before World War II, Chinese Canadians in recent years have been upwardly mobile. By the 1960s the relative importance of the service sector as a source of employment had substantially declined, as new opportunities in professional and technical fields became available. About 26 percent of the employed Chinese were in service occupations in 1981 and 24 percent five years later; for other Canadians the figure was about 13 percent in both years. Hence, despite the declining importance of the service sector for the Chinese, it still employed about one-quarter of the Chinese labour force in the 1980s, and Chinese Canadians were twice as likely as others to engage in service jobs.

Less than 1 percent of employed Chinese in 1921 and 1931 were in professional occupations. In contrast, for both census years of 1981 and 1986, professional and technical occupations accounted for over 18 percent.

There were also gains in other white-collar occupations. In 1971, 11 percent of the Chinese were in clerical and related jobs. Ten years later the percentage had grown to 19, and it continued at 18 per cent in 1986. When managerial, professional, and clerical occupations are taken into account, as many as 43 percent of the Chinese were employed in these occupations in 1981 and 42 percent five years later. In actual numbers, the Chinese in such jobs totaled 92,757 in 1986. The upward mobility of the post-war Chinese has to be evaluated in light of occupational patterns for other Canadians. The 1986 census shows that 42.5 percent of the rest of the population was in managerial, professional, and clerical occupations. In other words, by that year the likelihood of Chinese Canadians being in middle-class occupations was about the same as for other Canadians.

Several factors explain this upward movement. No doubt, the gaining of civil rights by the Chinese after the war facilitated the entry of many into positions that had historically been closed to them. But the most important reason was the change in Canadian immigration policy in the 1960s that resulted in the acceptance of immigrants with professional and educational expertise. The country was expanding its industrial production and required a larger technically trained workforce. Between 1968 and 1986, 326,333 new immigrants were in managerial, professional, and technical occupations, of which 21 percent came from Asia. A large number of Chinese immigrants with professional and educational qualifications were able to enter Canada after 1967, and their arrival contributed to the growth of the Chinese middle class.

Although Chinese Canadians are just as likely as others to have middle-class jobs, there have been marked differences in the types of occupations in which they tended to concentrate. An analysis of managerial, professional, and technical occupations held by Chinese and other Canadians using the 1981 census data shows that over 33 percent of the Chinese in these jobs were in the fields of natural sciences, engineering, and mathematics, as compared with only 13.5 percent among other Canadians. In contrast, 30.6 percent of the Chinese in professional and technical jobs were in managerial and administrative positions, as opposed to 36.1 percent in the rest of the population. Thus, when compared to other Canadians, the Chinese middle class is more likely to be employed in technical fields and less in managerial positions.

There is also evidence to suggest that, despite parity in education, the type of work performed, and the work experience, the Chinese continue to receive lower pay in the job market than most Canadians of European origin. A study of income levels among ethnic groups using the 1981 census data indicates that the Chinese earned about $1,300 a year less than the average Canadian in the labour market, whereas those of British origin made $356 more and those of Jewish origin $6,260 more. When differences in education, work experience, sector of employment, social class, age, nativity, and gender were adjusted, the income gap between the Chinese and the average Canadian remained $820 a year. The 1981 census data also reveal that Chinese in managerial, professional, and technical occupations earned $1,295 a year less than the average Canadian in similar jobs, even taking into account variations in schooling, occupational class, and other factors. On the basis of such evidence, it has been suggested that the Chinese have adapted to the Canadian economy by concentrating on certain lines of work that tend to minimize their racial disadvantage and that, despite their occupational achievement, they have yet to cross the barrier of racial discrimination in the labour market.

Historically, self-employment in laundries, restaurants, and small retailing businesses provided an alternative means of economic survival for the Chinese. As employment opportunities in middle-class jobs improved and more immigrants with professional and technical skills entered Canada, the relative importance of self-employment has declined. Data from the 1986 census show that 10 percent of the Chinese were self-employed in the non-agricultural sectors of Canada; nationally, the figure was 7.7 percent. Hence, by that year the Chinese showed only a slightly higher probability of being self-employed, and they tended to be concentrated in a limited number of sectors. About 27 percent were in retail trade and another 25 percent in accommodation and food services. Together, retailing and food services, the traditional foothold of the Chinese, accounted for over half the self-employed. The comparative figure for Canadians of European origin in these sectors was only 26 percent. The 1986 census data also show that about 12 percent of self-employed Chinese were in health and welfare services and another 11 percent in finance, insurance, real estate, and business management. Taken together, the statistics reflect the continued presence of the Chinese in retailing and personal service businesses, as well as their conspicuous entry into professional services.

The increase in Chinese immigration to Canada since 1967, especially after changes in policy regarding business immigrants in 1985, produced favourable conditions for the expansion of Chinese businesses in the major cities. Thus, the growth of the Chinese population in Toronto by the mid-1980s, for example, increased the demand for ethnic cuisine and cultural products, as well as for non-ethnic goods and services from Chinese proprietors. In Richmond, British Columbia, in the early 1990s the expansion of Chinese businesses in professional services and food retailing was the result of an increase in the Chinese population in the lower mainland. In particular, the rising middle class has created a sustained demand for professional services and quality products from Chinese professionals and entrepreneurs.

Although the business immigrants admitted to Canada between 1985 and 1991 were only about 8 percent of the total, their economic impact has been immense. In 1987 the 2,484 individuals approved as entrepreneurial immigrants had a net worth of $2.5 billion, and their investments were to create about 12,000 jobs and retain another 2,155. Between 1987 and 1990 the 11,000 entrepreneurial immigrants brought into Canada an estimated net worth of about $14.3 billion and created some 48,000 jobs. The capital provided by investor immigrants was also impressive. Between 1987 and 1990, the 1,933 approved immigrants were estimated to have a net worth of about $3.2 billion, of which $751 million was directly invested in various Canadian funds.

Many entrepreneurial immigrants from Hong Kong chose British Columbia as the province in which to invest. Between 1987 and 1990, 1,511 immigrants from Hong Kong, or about 14 per cent of the entrepreneurs given visas in this period, settled in the province; their total net worth was about $1.9 billion, or 13 percent of the net worth of all entrepreneurial immigrants. Investor immigrants from Hong Kong have also had a strong inclination to invest in British Columbia. Between 1987 and 1990, 698 visas in this category, or 36 percent of the total, were given to immigrants from Hong Kong destined for the province; their investments amounted to $343 million, or 46 percent of the total.

Without doubt, the injection of such capital by Chinese business immigrants and offshore corporations has stimulated the growth of large-scale, capital-intensive ethnic enterprises in Canada. At times, the distinction between so-called ethnic business and offshore investments is unclear, since many investors maintain residence in both Canada and their country of origin, and corporations with headquarters in Asian countries operate through branches in Canada. Furthermore, business immigrant capital sometimes joins forces with offshore capital through investment syndicates, as, for example, in the joint venture of President Asian Enterprises of Taiwan with President Canada Syndicated Incorporated, a Vancouver-based company that employs immigrant investor funds, in the development of a large shopping and hotel complex in Richmond. Another example is Pacific Place Development on the eighty-hectare former Expo 86 site in Vancouver; the project is controlled by Concord Property and Finance Group of Vancouver, whose chairman is Victor Li, a naturalized Canadian citizen and the son of a Hong Kong billionaire.

The scale of Chinese investments and business development in recent years suggests that capital formation plays a critical role in the expansion of corporate ethnic enterprise in Canada. The intensive accumulation of capital in Hong Kong and Taiwan over several decades and more recently in south China has generated a surplus for many entrepreneurs who have made their fortunes in manufacturing, commercial enterprise, and real estate in Asia. The business-immigrant program has facilitated the development of capital-intensive Chinese businesses in Canada.