Well, there's a couple things related to employment:
- "At-will" employment isn't a thing. Unless you get fired for gross negligence or criminal reasons, you're going to get severence pay, which will help bridge the gap while you look for a new job. Anecdotally, I've seen people get fired for going on swearing rants at the owner, and the Labour Board required the owner to pay severence.
- Continuing with that, employers also understand the labour board's interpretation of what it takes to let someone go for being bad at their job. If you're past your probation period (nominally 3 months), you're probably going to have a good idea that you're going to get fired. There's going to be written documentation, Performance Improvement Plans, etc. You get a hint that the writing's on the wall and you should start looking elsewhere.
- Maternity/Paternity leave is federally mandated, and for a long time (35 weeks? 50 weeks? I'm not entirely sure, haven't gone through it). Having a kid isn't going to result in you losing your job, unless your employer really likes to live dangerously. The pay while on leave comes from the gov't, not the employer.
- If you're legitimately laid off (e.g. didn't quit), Employment Insurance benefits are apparently reasonably straightforward to get (I've never used this myself). They're capped and probably won't cover extravagant housing, but you'll be able to get by, especially if you've saved a bit of money.
- No real concern about healthcare costs bankrupting you.
Going back to the parent comment and projecting my current city (Regina, SK) onto it... if you go ahead and get an IT/Software job in the provincial gov't or one of the large employers here, there's a pretty good chance that you could carry on there for 20-30 years. There's occasionally layoffs and things, but as a whole there's a decent amount of stable ok-paying employment around if you want it. Projecting my own take on it: it'll probably be uninspiring and mind-numbing, but if you're looking for a 9-5 salary that can pay the bills and contribute to an RRSP... go for it.
- "At-will" employment isn't a thing. Unless you get fired for gross negligence or criminal reasons, you're going to get severence pay, which will help bridge the gap while you look for a new job. Anecdotally, I've seen people get fired for going on swearing rants at the owner, and the Labour Board required the owner to pay severence.
- Continuing with that, employers also understand the labour board's interpretation of what it takes to let someone go for being bad at their job. If you're past your probation period (nominally 3 months), you're probably going to have a good idea that you're going to get fired. There's going to be written documentation, Performance Improvement Plans, etc. You get a hint that the writing's on the wall and you should start looking elsewhere.
- Maternity/Paternity leave is federally mandated, and for a long time (35 weeks? 50 weeks? I'm not entirely sure, haven't gone through it). Having a kid isn't going to result in you losing your job, unless your employer really likes to live dangerously. The pay while on leave comes from the gov't, not the employer.
- If you're legitimately laid off (e.g. didn't quit), Employment Insurance benefits are apparently reasonably straightforward to get (I've never used this myself). They're capped and probably won't cover extravagant housing, but you'll be able to get by, especially if you've saved a bit of money.
- No real concern about healthcare costs bankrupting you.
Going back to the parent comment and projecting my current city (Regina, SK) onto it... if you go ahead and get an IT/Software job in the provincial gov't or one of the large employers here, there's a pretty good chance that you could carry on there for 20-30 years. There's occasionally layoffs and things, but as a whole there's a decent amount of stable ok-paying employment around if you want it. Projecting my own take on it: it'll probably be uninspiring and mind-numbing, but if you're looking for a 9-5 salary that can pay the bills and contribute to an RRSP... go for it.