Hecht, Alfred: A Socio-Economic Comparison of Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians in Canada, the Prairies and Winnipeg. In: Ahornblätter. Marburger Beiträge zur Kanada-Forschung. 11. Marburg 1998.(Schriften der Universitätsbibliothek Marburg ; 84)
http://archiv.ub.uni-marburg.de/sum/84/sum84-5.html

Alfred Hecht

A Socio-Economic Comparison of Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians in Canada, the Prairies and Winnipeg [1]

The Canadian population is made up of many diverse ethnic and religious groups. In some instances these two socio dimensions are intertwined. That most Canadians are rather proud of such backgrounds and affiliations goes without saying. A substantial amount of money is spent by individuals and governments on maintaining ethnic and religious institutions. Clearly they help to maintain ethnic and religious value structures of each group. In other words ethnic and religious affiliations contribute to the social well being of the individual as well as to the social fabric of Canadian society in general. Commitments of individuals to these institutions and their way of life however vary within each group and between the groups. Consequently it is hypothesized in this paper that the socio-economic conditions and status of individuals in different groups will vary depending on the groups involved. Such variation can be expected despite the fact that all three groups emigrated to Canada in larger numbers from Eastern Europe, mainly the Ukraine, at the end of the last century and the beginning of this century (Bryn et al. 1993; Luciuk 1991; Epp 1974). In other words their geographic and broad cultural milieu was very similar before arriving in Canada.

A socio-economic comparison of people with Jewish, Mennonite and Ukrainian background living in Canada can be extremely challenging. Part of the difficulty arises from the fact that the comparison is not between similar groups; one is an ethnic group, the Ukrainians, and the other two are religious groups. That the Jews and at times the Mennonites are also frequently analyzed from an ethnic perspective causes frequent vigorous discussions among academics and non academics. Such discussion is caused by the fact that people of Jewish faith usually also claim Judaism as their ethnicity. In fact Statistics Canada has used, in recent Census, the category "Jewish" for both ethnic and religious responses. On the other hand the term "Mennonite" is used only for a religious response category by Statistics Canada. The use of the term "Ukrainian" is restricted to an ethnic claim, although many Ukrainians also identify themselves as being of “Ukrainian- Catholic" faith. It should be clearly stated here that in this paper Mennonites and Jews are first and foremost viewed as religious designations. Ukrainians on the other hand are those individuals who claimed Ukrainian ethnicity in the 1991 Census as their only ethnic heritage. Those who claimed Ukrainian and another ethnic heritage for their cultural background are not included in this analysis . [2] Most data presented and analyses in this paper come, therefore, from their 1991 Census of Canada religious and ethnic affiliation response files.
What then are some of the overall demographic parameters of these three groups? The 1991 Canadian Census states that Canada had some 307,366 people of Jewish faith. Some 229,166 claimed Mennonite and Hutterite faith, the later being about 11% of the total. In the analysis section of this paper the Hutterites however are filtered out of the Mennonite data. Some 404,700 individuals claimed single Ukrainian ethnic origin and another 640,433 claimed Ukrainian with at least one other ethnic background. These multiethnic Ukrainians are however not analyzed in this paper. Of the single ethnic origin Ukrainians some 58% belonged to the Catholic faith. Similarly 238,933 people of Jewish faith also claimed Jewish ethnic origin. Another 119,200 claimed multiple ethnic backgrounds. The ethnic background of Mennonites was 24.3% multiple ethnic and the rest single. Of these single ethnic claimants, 49.4% said they were Germans and 12.2% Dutch. The remainder claimed various other single ethnic backgrounds . [3]

The above figures give the size of these groups and suggest some similarities and differences. Clearly Jews and Mennonites seem to have far fewer multiple ethnic claims when compared to the Ukrainians. The immediate question which arises is ‘are religious affiliations and their associated value structures a stronger force in keeping a group together (cohesive?) than the ethnic background factor’? Secondly it raises the question of what impacts these two cultural dimensions have on, for instance, the acquisition of education and wealth, the nature of work, the role of women and men in their respective societies and on the geographic milieu in which individuals prefer to live. In this paper these questions and others, especially income variation, will be pursued through surrogate data for each of these groups. Census sample data (3%) allows for detailed cross-tabulation at the Canadian, provincial and metropolitan level. Unfortunately the number of cross-tabulations feasible decreases rapidly with the increasing number of variables used. This problem notwithstanding it is hoped that comparative data will shed some light on the development path of each of these groups since leaving their Ukrainian and Russian homelands more than a century ago.

Socio-Economic Variation of Ethnic Religious Groups: A Theoretical Perspective

In a lengthy paper in 1979, Becher and Tome developed a theory of individual income variation which hypothesized that sociological and economic backgrounds determine this. Their specific hypothesis is that income variation among individuals is a function of intergenerational mobility of human and non-human capital. Human capital are all those attributes a child receives growing up in a home which helps him/her to make a living. Non-human capital refers to actual capital received and inherited. "The income of children is raised (over a lifetime) when they receive more human and non-human capital from their parents" (p. 1181). They believe that income is being raised in children by the "endowment of genetically determined race, ability and other characteristics, family reputation and connection and knowledge and goals provided by their family environment" (p. 1181). Furthermore, they believe that people, especially parents, like to "maximize a utility function spanning several generations" (p. 1153). That the actual level of income a person receives is also determined in part by the "lottery" of the job market is not negated by them.

To the concept of children inheriting human and non-human capital and their associated attributes one should also add the idea of inheriting geographic capital. People tend to migrate for economic reasons. There is a constant flow from poor to economically healthy regions of the world despite international restrictions. This desire for economic improvement is not only done by the migrant for himself or herself, but also for their children. Within a given country people also try to move from low income, low opportunity areas to higher ones. This means moving to dynamic regions as well as to growing urban areas. Better opportunities for themselves and their children is frequently the underlying reason. In this sense such moves are clearly part of intergenerational human investment endeavours. When whole groups of people do this, eg, Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians moving to Canada, common geographical capital investments are made.

What then are some of the human attributes associated with these three capital elements that are passed on to children that will make them economically successful? In simple format they are the following:

A Human Capital

1. knowledge (the more education, the better)
2. religion (produces positive value structure)
3. ethnicity (causes life perspectives)
4. family (the more stable, the better)
5. human interaction skills (the more developed, the better)
6. financial perspective (knowing how to handle money)
7. work (positive perspective yields positive results)
8. occupation (the more "modern", the better)
9. languages (knowledge of the main society language is essential)
10. connectivity (socially well-connected with relatives, friends and societies)
11. family size (the smaller the size, the better)

B Geographical Capital

1. world (the more developed, the better)
2. region (the more dynamic region of a country, the better)
3. urban/rural (the more urban, the better)
4. neighbourhood (upward mobility ones)

C Non-Human Capital

1. Inheritances (the more that is left, the better for children)

The above is naturally, only a partial list and many of the elements could be broken down into subcategories. To what degree any one of these is instilled by the parents in their children depends on individuals and the group value structure they adhere to. Some characteristics will cause better economic well-being, others will hinder it. For instance, it is frequently claimed that the Protestant work ethic produces greater economic well-being, i.e., higher incomes, than most other Christian religious perspectives.

In the following pages therefore, some human and geographic capital characteristics of Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians are examined to see if there are differences between them. The above theory would suggest there are. In the second section of the paper income variations of these groups is examined in a multiple regression model using their human and geographic capital characteristics as explanatory variables. It is hypothesized that any differences are caused by their ethnic/religious value structures.

Period of Settlements

At the turn of the century Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians together accounted for 1% of the total population of Canada (Table 2), with Mennonites accounting for more than half of their combined total. By 1951 together they had increased to 5.14% with the Ukrainians alone now being 2.8%. Since that time the percentage has gone down to 3.42%. In part, this lower figure is the result of many Ukrainians claiming multiple ethnic background and these are not included in Table 2. They represent some 2.36% of total Canadian population. From the table it can also be deduced where the early settlements occurred. Mennonites were concentrated in two areas in Canada. In Waterloo County, Ontario and in the Prairies (Hecht 1994). Of the 16,400 Jews living in Canada in 1901 most lived in Ontario and Quebec; only two out of 16 lived in the Prairies but of these half lived in Winnipeg. Others were found mainly in the central cities of Toronto. In 1901 all 5,000 or so Ukrainians lived in the Prairies.

In terms of relative concentration we can see that the Mennonites and the Ukrainians are, and always have been, proportionally strong in the Prairies, and Winnipeg than in Canada as a whole. The same, however cannot be said for the Jews. Early in this century their fraction of the total population of the Prairies was higher than their corresponding fraction in Canada as a whole. But it became consistently lower after 1951. Yet in Winnipeg itself they have had substantial representation. In 1931 they had nearly 8% of the total population. The Ukrainians surpassed this percentage in 1971 with nearly 12%. Mennonites in contrast have increased their proportion consistently over time but their share of Winnipeg's population in 1991 was still only 3.39%.

What is also of interest is the reallocation of the absolute number of people in each group. Mennonites have increased in each decade since 1901 in Canada, the Prairies, and in Winnipeg. The same can be said for the Ukrainians at least until 1971. After that their share of Canada’s total population decreased but this was probably due to the fact that many claimed multi-ethnic origins in the 1981 and 1991 full census which was not possible in 1971 and earlier. But the Jewish population has a different pattern. Although they increased steadily in Canada as a whole they have declined in absolute numbers in proportion since the 1960s in the Prairies and Winnipeg. It suggests either net negative interprovincial migration balance or a negative birth minus death situation or a combination of both. It however means that compared to the other two groups Jews are decreasing their presence and possible influence in the Prairies. Nevertheless, since the Prairies have not been a growth region for some time it could mean that Jews are leaving this region for the metropolitan areas of Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, in part to provide a better future for their children.

A Comparison of Demographic Characteristics

It is always interesting to examine from where Canadian religious and ethnic groups have come from or where they were born. From Table 3 it can be seen that nearly 90% of Ukrainians were born in Canada, substantially higher than the 83% for the Mennonites and only 63% for the Jews. Clearly few Ukrainians have entered Canada lately. With the introduction of democracy in Eastern Europe this may change. Only 7.4% were born in the former USSR and 3.1% in Poland. All other countries of birth have 1% or less. The percentages by country of birth for Ukrainians in the Prairies and in Winnipeg are similar. Mennonites exhibit a very similar place of birth picture as Ukrainians except that they have some 7.4% of their people born in South or Central America. Many of these are former Canadian Mennonite emigrants whose children are returning to Canada from Mexico, Brazil and Bolivia. Again, the Jews differ substantially from the other two groups. First their proportion born in Canada is substantially lower as indicated above. The fact that the proportion of Canadian Jews born in the Prairies is 10% higher than the average and those in Winnipeg another 5% greater clearly tells us that the more recent immigrants have gone mainly to Quebec and Ontario. The fraction of African, Middle East and American born Jews is substantially lower in the Prairies than in Canada as a whole. It clearly indicates a selective immigration destination in Canada. Those born in the USSR, Poland and other European countries are about the same as the Ukrainians and Mennonites and indicates a common geographic origin for their immigration origins (Table 3).

Mobility over the last five years also tells us much about the geographic dynamics of the groups. As expected from the place of birth data, the Ukrainians again exhibited greater stability than the Mennonites and Jews. But both Ukrainians and Jews had about 30% of their people move within the past five years. About 10% more of the Mennonites in Winnipeg had changed their residence than Jews and Ukrainians. It may reflect the late rural to urban migration of Mennonites in Manitoba. Jews in the Prairies were also quite mobile between provinces. As alluded to earlier Canada has received a substantial number of recent Jewish immigrants. In fact a total of 6.2 arrived in the five year period before 1991. The 6.2% of migrants from outside Canada represents some 19,000 people, a vital source of additional people for the Jews in Canada.

An examination of household size brings out some interesting differences. Ukrainians in Canada have just over 40% of their people in one or two person households, compared to 36.7% for Jews and only 26.8% for Mennonites. For the Prairies and Winnipeg those figures are higher for all three groups pointing to an older population and a higher proportion of non-traditional families. If one looks at the other spectrum of household size, large households, households with 5 members, we see that the Ukrainian percentage is only about half as high as that of the Mennonites, 8.3% vs 16.6%. Why the percentage of 5 person households for Jews is so high in the Prairies as well as in Winnipeg needs more research, especially in light of the fact that the Winnipeg Jewish population has been declining in absolute numbers over the last four decades.

A Comparison of Socio-Economic Characteristics

Marriage is frequently seen by society as an indicator of a stable lifestyle. In addition, since religious commitment is frequently thought to produce stable marriages one might also view a high marriage rate as an indication of religious commitment within a group. From Table 4 we can see that the marriage rates of Mennonite males is nearly 10% higher than that of the other two groups while for women it is 7% higher. The fact that the rate for religious Jews is so much lower than for the Mennonites is rising. The consistently higher rate of males over females is probably due to the longer life expectancy of females over males and the resulting longer period of widowhood.

An indicator of assimilation into overall society is the degree to which people have adopted English as the home language. Mennonites are the lowest, followed by Jews and Ukrainians, the latter being some 10% higher than the Mennonites. The lower value for the Jews may be due to the fact that some in Montreal may have French as their home language. The stronger language retention of the Mennonites may be due to their more rural nature and the recent inflow from Central and South America. Recent immigration for the Jews may also account for their lower percentages. One of the distinguishing features of the Jews is their high commitment to education (Table 4). Nearly a quarter of all their adults between 25 and 64 years of age have at least one university degree. This despite the fact that a number of them had come from the developing areas of the world, Africa and the Middle East. It represents a very strong human capital investment in the children. The difference between males and females is only about 1%. The differences between males and females among the Ukrainians and the Mennonites is also only about 1% but their overall percentages are less than half, 10% on average for males, of the percentages for the Jews. Why do the Jews have such high commitment towards education? Apparently early Jewish settlers to Manitoba already had a strong commitment to education (Manitoba Department of Culture, 1991). Bryn (1993) further points out that Jewish immigrants to Canada were urban-oriented and had good occupational skills. In other words, high value for skills and urban life had been instilled even before they arrived in Canada.

Commitment to work, frequently referred to as the Protestant work ethic is another characteristics of great interest to overall Canadian society. From Table 4 we can see that the highest proportion of males in the labour force full time were Mennonites, Jews and Ukrainians in that order. Mennonite males were 4.6% higher than their Ukrainian counterparts. On the other hand Mennonite women were 10% lower than Ukrainians and Jews. Since the concept that a mother should stay at home is still fairly strongly ingrained in Mennonite church teachings, this lower percentage is not surprising.

It is a well known fact that many Mennonites, especially those of the more conservative persuasion, value the farming occupation highly. Not surprisingly 16.6% of all Mennonite males and 11.1% of females between 25 and 65 years of age (Table 4) have farming, horticulture or animal husbandry occupations. The Ukrainians on the other hand have 8.4% and the Jews only .1%. Women are proportionately less involved in agriculture, 4.0% for Ukrainians and .1% for Jews. For Canada as a whole the overall percentage is 3.4% of all people 15 years of age and over. Although these values are not directly comparable it would seem that both the Mennonites and the Ukrainians are far above the Canadian average (this was also the case in 1981, Kordan, 1990, p. 20). It again points to their initial agricultural settlement focus upon arriving in Canada and their continuous strong attachment to rural life.

As expected there is also a substantial difference between the proportion of people in the manufacturing, fabricating and assembly occupations. Both Mennonite and Ukrainian men are about 11%. Jews on the other hand are only 3%. Since manufacturing frequently does not require formal training the data clearly indicates the lesser commitment for higher education of Mennonites and Ukrainians. It may however also indicate that they left the agricultural way of life later in this century than the Jews. Since agricultural activities required little formal education, they had few skills on arriving in the cities and consequently took on the less demanding manufacturing jobs.

In western society, especially North America, the status of an individual is frequently measured by the income an individual receives. There is no doubt that the higher the income the higher the status. Good paying professions are especially valued. But, so is successful entrepreneurship. Although Christianity points to the danger to the soul for a person with great wealth, it has seldom discourage Christians to pursue economic well-being if it can be pursued within acceptable Christian guidelines. These guidelines tend to be less constraining in the more liberal established mainframe churches and less so for the more conservative or fundamental churches. The Mennonites are usually classified in the latter, although there are great variations between their own different conferences.

From Table 4 one can see that there is some differences between the three groups in terms of the percentage of people with some income. Mennonite women are clearly the lowest. Only 84.7% have some income. This is 8% less than the next lowest group, the Ukrainian women at 91.4%. Jewish males and Jewish women are nearly identical at 92.5 and 92.9% respectively. Next highest at 97.5% and 98.6% respectively are Ukrainian and Mennonite males. The low Mennonite female percentage reflects their lower labour participation rate (Hecht, 1994) which may also explain the lower values for Ukrainian women. On the other hand, the lower Jewish male rate compared to the Ukrainians and the Mennonites, a good 5% lower, probably reflects their greater investment in education as many of them are continuing to study past 25 years of age which is the cut off age in this analysis.

A look at the average income of the three groups (for those with positive incomes) shows major differences (Table 4). It should be noted here that only income derived from wages and salaries and from self-employment are presented here. Other income like investment income and government transfers to individual income is excluded. What is striking in the data is the differences between men and women. Women have only about 60% of the income that men have. Furthermore, in every case, except for the Jewish males, the average self-employed income is lower than that derived from wages and salaries. It should be pointed out that an individual could have income from both sources. Mennonite women have the lowest overall average income, only $17,116 per year. Their wage and salary income of $16, 438 is even lower and their self-employed income is only $12,171. Both of these values are substantially lower than the comparable values for the Ukrainian women and only about 57% of that of Jewish women income. No doubt part of this is due to lower full-time labour participation of Mennonite women, but there is no doubt that a lower education level, and a different occupational mix account for much of the remaining differences. That religious commitment with its low value for the permit of earthly goods is also a factor that should be discounted.

The rather large income differences between the men of the three groups, Jewish $58,178, Ukrainians $36,380 and Mennonites $33,648 is somewhat puzzling. Only in Winnipeg are Mennonites ahead of Ukrainians if one uses average income per person which includes males and females (Table 4). Some sociologists (Redekop 1989, Fretz 1989, Driedger 1990), have claimed that Mennonites, have made good economic advances in Canadian society. This 1991 data repudiates this. The same was true in 1981 (Hecht 1993). Why the lower income for Mennonites? Since the full-time labour participation rate is higher for Mennonites than for Jews and Ukrainians this can not be the cause. It probably goes back to their lower education level, their lower metropolitan status, where wages tend to be higher, and their lower level of use of English as the home language. But one should not neglect their strong religious commitment which did not allow them to enter some of the more lucrative professions, eg, law in the past and to some extent even today. Strong church support and its high level of church giving may also be a factor. The great differences between males and females is of no small interest. In fact it would seem that this difference within the Mennonite group is larger than between itself and the other two groups. Certainly this is the case between Mennonites and Ukrainians. Probably the greatest cause of the large income difference is the differences in the full-time labour participation rates between Mennonite men and women.

Occupational Variation between Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians

Differentiations in occupational structures as shown in Table 5 between Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians are quite pronounced. They, no doubt, reflect differences in the value structures towards particular kinds of work. Most striking is the fact that about 30% of Jewish males are in managerial/administrative positions and related occupations at all three geographic levels of analysis. Mennonites, in contrast, have only about 12% of their people employed in these occupations in Canada and the Prairies and some 17.6% in Winnipeg. The comparative percentages for the Ukrainians are 12.0 in Winnipeg and 15.2 in Canada as a whole. Similar differences exist between the women of each group. Mennonite women have less than half the percentages that Jewish women have while Ukrainian women are a couple of percentage points above the Mennonites. Since such occupations normally pay relatively well is not surprising that Jewish income is higher.

The percentage of people employed in natural sciences/engineering/mathematics occupations by the Ukrainian males is higher than that of the Mennonites at all three geographic scales and is even higher than for the Jewish males for the Prairies and Winnipeg. Oddly, the percentage of Jews employed in these occupations in Winnipeg (2.5%) is substantially lower than for the Prairies (5.8%) and for the nation (7.1%). It may represent a cultural subsystem within the Jewish community. For women of all groups these percentages are substantially lower for the men but the rank order of the groups are nearly the same: first are Jews, followed by Ukrainians and Mennonites (Table 5).

Occupational concentration in the social sciences exhibit a pattern similar to the managerial one. Jewish males have 10% of their members working in these professions, the Mennonites about 2%, except in Winnipeg where it is 5%, while the Ukrainians have only about 1%. In contrast Jewish women have 7 to 8% depending on the region, Mennonites 3 to 4%, and Ukrainians just a little lower. This reversal between the natural sciences and the social sciences between Ukrainians and Mennonites is interesting and may reflect the strong human/Christian emphasis of Mennonites on service to humanity.

Teaching related occupations were and are highly valued as a service profession by Christian service-oriented groups. Some 6% of Jewish males are in these professions, 5% of Mennonites, except in Winnipeg where it is 7%, and between 3-4% of Ukrainians. Not surprisingly the percentage of women in these professions of all groups is substantially higher than their male counterparts. For Canada as a whole they are nearly double. It is interesting that the Jewish female percentage is higher than that of the Mennonites and Ukrainians for Canada as a whole and for the Prairies but it is the lowest for Winnipeg. In contrast Ukrainians and Mennonites in Winnipeg have substantially higher proportion of women in these professions than for the country as a whole.

Another group of professions with a high service to society component and relatively good pay are the medical related occupations. Differences between the groups are again quite large. Whereas around 10% of Jewish males are in these occupations the percentages are much much lower for Ukrainians and Mennonites. The percentages for the three women groups, however, differ little except in Winnipeg where the Mennonites have proportionally twice as many as the Ukrainians and nearly three times as many as the Jews employed in this profession. Again, Winnipeg seems to have developed a local subculture for all three groups.
The above discussed occupations can be referred to as the "thoughtwave" occupations. In other words, knowledge is sold. It is clear that people of Jewish faith have proportionally more of their people in these occupations than Mennonites and Ukrainians. These occupations, however, can only be practised once extensive training and education has taken place. Obviously people of Jewish faith must have an embodied emphasis in their upbringing that values the acquisition of such knowledge.

It is therefore not surprising that Jews whether, male or female, have proportionately fewer people employed in clerical and service jobs (Table 5). Interestingly their proportion in sales, an occupation not normally associated with high educational background, are still higher than those of the Mennonites and Ukrainians. In fact, in Winnipeg Mennonite have less than half the percentage that Jewish woman have, 6.3% versus 15.7%, and a few percentages below the Ukrainian, 6.3% versus 11.3%. Again, one has to ask if the concept of a "separate people" or a "people apart" (Fretz 1989) still holds for Mennonite women in the 1990's and thus accounting for the low sales occupation.

Table 5 also clearly points out the strong rural nature of Mennonite and Ukrainian life styles. Some 16.6% of all Mennonite males in Canada are in farming occupations and nearly 20% in the Prairies. For the Ukrainians these percentages are 8.4% and 13.4% respectively, while those of the Jewish are basically zero. Female participation in these occupations are about half of those of the males. That these percentages will continue to decline over time goes without saying. It also suggests that these two groups will experience substantial changes in their occupational structure. On the other hand the Jews who are seemingly completely urbanized, in fact nearly completely metropolarized, should experience few changes.

Most of the remaining occupations listed in Table 5 are what are usually referred to as blue colour worker occupations. Both Mennonites and Ukrainians have between 10 and 14% of their male workers employed in the manufacturing and processing occupations. In contrast, the Jews have only a couple percentages. Interesting, the proportion of women in these occupations is quite low in all three groups.

Another big difference between these groups occurs in the percentage of males employed in the construction trades. Both the Mennonites and Ukrainians have from 10 to 12% of their work force employed in them depending on geography, while the Jews have only 3% in Canada as a whole, only 1% in the Prairies and 0% in Winnipeg. Similarly the Jews have less than 3% of their males employed in transportation occupations while Mennonites and Ukrainians have around 8%.

In total one can clearly see that the occupational structure of the Jews clearly reflects a high educational and training background, especially for the men. In contrast, Mennonite and Ukrainian males still show some of the rural nature of their background as seen by their concentration in the blue colour occupation. For women these same trends are there but not as strong since only a few are employed in blue colour jobs. They are, however, strongly represented in the service jobs which are relatively low skilled, low paying occupations.

Income Variation Explained in a Multiple Regression Analysis of Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians

In order to account for the income variation of individuals in each group, some 18 stepwise multiple regression equations were run. The independent variable was positive income of self-employed and wages and salaries income expressed in natural logs. A log transformation had to be performed in order to have a normal distribution. Variables that were hypothesized to explain income variation are surrogates for human and geographic capital attributes of individuals. Specifically the following variables were used: years in labour force, weeks worked in 1991 (in logs), years in labour force squared to represent experience in the labour force, full-time employment, professional/managerial employment, employed in manufacturing/construction/ transportation occupations, farming occupations, self-employed, level of education, university degree, English as home language, living in the Prairies, living in a metropolitan area and being married (Table 6). As can be seen most of the variable are dummy variables. The selection of the variables followed the pattern of earlier studies (Hecht 1993; Tomes 1983, 1984, 1985). In all some 14 independent variables were entered into each of the 18 equations. They represent some of the most obvious explanatory variables for income variation in Canadian society. It was hypothesized that variations between them in explaining income variation in the groups would bring out the differences in the socio-economic value structures inherited through religious or ethnic backgrounds of our three groups.

As most readers know, a regressions analysis links independent explanatory variables with a dependent variable, one whose variation the researcher wants to explain. In this paper the independent variable is yearly income derived from wages and salaries and/or from self employed income (Table 4). Some 14 human and geographic capital variables of individuals are listed in Table 6. The most important elements in a multiple regression analysis are the partial regression coefficient which link the strength of an independent variables with that of the dependent variable holding all other conditions constant. All significant ( =.05) partial regression coefficients are shown in the table. Besides these significant coefficients the table also gives the number of individuals in the sample, the value of the regression constant and the adjusted R2, the latter telling the reader the proportion of total income variation explained or accounted for by the 14 independent variables.

The analytic question, therefore, to be raised is how do the various human and geographic capital attributes contribute to explain income variation in each group and how do they vary between the groups.

One of the most important variables accounting for income variation in society is the number of years in the labour force. Usually a person entering the labour force will receive less income than a person who has been in it for a while, especially if one holds constant occupations. What seems to go against this generality is the fact that after a while, a person has reached his/her upper level in a given job and no further increases occur. Also, changing jobs may not always result in credit for years worked earlier.

Of the 18 regression equations the partial regression coefficient of years in the labour force was significant in 10 of them, i.e., as years in labour force increased so did income. It was significant at the Canadian level for five out of six equations, the exception being for Mennonite women, where it was not significant. Interestingly, the size of the coefficient for women at the Canadian level is only half of that for males. This, when combined with the insignificance for Mennonite women, suggests that society does not value experience as much for women as for men. The question to be raised would be, are women proportionally more in jobs where experience does not count as much? The answer probably is yes. This notwithstanding, the differences between the three groups seem to be less than the differences by sex.

Weeks worked during the year is thought to be very important in determining total yearly income. This is in fact true. In 17 out of 18 equations the coefficient is significant (Table 6). The only exception being Jewish males in Winnipeg. Yet most of the remaining coefficient for Jews are higher than for Ukrainians and Mennonites. No major differences seem to be present between women and men.

By squaring the variable years in the labour force we get a new variable which exaggerates the experience of older workers substantially, it in fact measures the return on the human capital experience. As can be seen from Table 6 in 5 out of 18 equations it is significant. The negative sign tends to indicate that experience is not paid for indefinitely. Earlier studies by Jones (1993) on Canadian Jews, Catholics and Protestants had a similar scale and sign.

Full-time work is thought to be an independent variable for income variation. For most firms a full-time position signifies commitment and importance to the position and the individual involved. Pay is usually, therefore, higher than for part-time work. The latter frequently involves only fixed "time and energy" sold to the firm by a worker while full-time employment implies greater commitment to the employee and the employee to the job. In this analysis full-time work is measured by a dummy variable. Except for Jewish males in the Prairies and Winnipeg, income does increase significantly with full-time work in all other settings. This non-significance for Jews in the Prairies and Winnipeg is certainly different. In fact, Jews in the Prairies and specifically Winnipeg seem to have a different income equation than all other groups. Especially strong is the association between full-time work and income for Mennonite males in Winnipeg. It suggests a possible seasonality effect and it may be due to the heavy involvement of Mennonite males in the construction industry. This is in part also supported by the relatively high value of Ukrainian males who again are highly represented in construction jobs in Winnipeg.

It is normally thought that professional and managerial jobs pay well. Again this is measured by a dummy variable. In 14 out of 18 cases the result is as expected, a positive partial regression coefficient. Except for Winnipeg which is insignificant, all Jewish male coefficients are higher than those of Mennonites and Ukrainians. In other words Jews are paid more when they are performing such tasks. Since Jewish males have very high education levels, they probably perform more skilled jobs in these occupations, accounting for the higher income.

Manufacturing, construction and transportation occupations correspond with the traditional blue collar worker tasks. In the past they were very well paid jobs. In 1991, however, in only 3 out of 18 equations were these occupations associated positively with income. In all other cases it is not significant.

As expected having an agriculture-related occupation reduces the income of an individual in half of the equations. In the others it was insignificant. That costs associated with the rural areas of many of these workers (lower rent, more home grown/raised food) probably contributes to the lower absolute pay.

Surprisingly, few of the self-employed partial regression coefficients are significant. Only 3 of the 4, and of these, 3 are negative. Only the Jewish males for Canada is positive. In other words, being self-employed is not generating the monies it is frequently thought to generate.

Education is usually thought to be associated positively with income. Holding many other variables constants as is done in a regression equation, however, makes this less obvious. If we take years of education and having a degree together, 13 of 36 equations have positive significant relations. It is interesting that Mennonite women have no positive association. Jewish men only with a degree at the Canadian level. Jewish women even have a negative associative with years of education, but positive with degree at the Winnipeg scale level. It seems that much of the education effect was captured in the professional and managerial profession occupation category earlier.

It is imperative that any person living in Canada speaks at least one of the official languages. The use of English at home was used as the surrogate for such a need. Table 6 shows that income increased significantly in nine of 18 equations where English was the home language. Yet in Winnipeg's case this was only true for Ukrainian males, in all others (5 cases) it was insignificant. It either means the need for "good" English is not as great in Winnipeg as elsewhere in Canada, or very few, if any, people speak a language other than English at home here.

As expected the Prairies do show lower income than the rest of Canada. For Jewish males, for Mennonite females and for Ukrainian females there is a significant statistically negative value associated with living in the Prairies. In the other cases, Jewish women and Mennonite males, it is neutral.

That most metropolitan areas have higher income and normally higher cost of living is generally known in Canada. That there is significant variations within the Canada CMA's is also true but not analyzed here. In the above analysis in 8 of a possible 12 equations have significant CMA coefficients. Only in the case of Jewish males is there no positive coefficient at the Canadian level, all others are. For the Prairies, there is no positive correlation with Jewish males and females, and for Ukrainian males. The high urbanization of Jews may, in part, cause some of these results.

Being married also seems to help Jewish and Ukrainian males (5 out of 6 equations) more than Mennonite males and women, none of whom have significant correlates. The high marriage rates of Mennonite males may mean that no variation is there between the few who are not married and the others. Why there is no effect for women is not clear.

A short comment should be made about the regression constants. It is the intercept, or income value, when all the variables listed are zero. It is in fact a measure of the impact of other variables not included in the equation. Usually the higher the value of the constant the poorer is the predictability of overall regression equations. From Table 6 it can be seen that the Canada-wide coefficients tend to be lower and the Winnipeg higher given any particular group.

Overall, the 14 variables, (measures of human and geographic capital), explain or account for somewhere between 62% (Jewish/female/Winnipeg) and 23% (Jewish/male/Winnipeg) of the income variation. Ukrainian and Mennonite male regression explanations seem to explain more of the income variation than the Jewish ones. For females the reverse seems to be true. On the other hand, the regression equations for women seem to have higher explanation levels than those for men. In other words, explaining women income variation is more logical than that for men.

Summary and Conclusion

Much is frequently made of the fact that the major immigration periods of Mennonites, Jews and Ukrainians took place at the same time, came from the same part of the old world and settled initially in the same regions of Canada. It is assumed that because of this there would be many similar present day socio-economic characteristics. This paper could not substantiate this. Of these groups major differences exist in where they now live, in their income variation, their occupational structure, their labour participation rates, marriage rates and recent immigration origins. When an attempt was made to explain their income variation with the help of a regression model, it was found that there were major differences in the explanatory variables, especially at the Winnipeg and Prairie scale of analysis. It is assumed that these differences are the outcome of different value structures, acquired through their human capital and geographical attributes, which in turn are grounded in the religious and ethnic background of each group.

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Prof. Alfred Hecht, Department of Geography, Wilfrid Laurier University, Waterloo, Ont., N2L 3C5, Canada

[1] I would like to thank Wilfrid Laurier University for their financial help in the preparation of this paper (Grant # 5181)

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[2] All of the data used in this paper comes from various years of the Canadian Census. Most however is taken from the 1991 Census. Detailed socio-economic data of individuals were retrieved from the Census of Canada, 1991: Individual public use micro data files. This is a 3% sample of the total Census. Because of confidentiality needs the data is however only available for Canada as a whole, the provinces and Metropolitan areas.

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[3] To what extent have Jews, Mennonites and Ukrainians intermarried? A very coarse overview can be given from the following. Of the people claiming single Ukrainian ethnic background 4% claimed Mennonite religious faith and .2% Jewish. For Ukrainians with multiple ethnic background these percentages were 9% and .7% respectively. Only .2 % of people with Jewish faith claimed Ukrainian ethnic background. For Mennonites this figure was .9%. As can be seen these figures are small. In none of these cases is the percentage as high as the groups' percentage of the total Canadian population. It clearly points to a less than random chance of any individual having one or more parents from the other groups.
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