Alberta Continues to Slip in National Wage Rankings
After a decade of declining real wages, Alberta continues to lag the rest of Canada in repairing wages and living standards for the province’s workers. That is the finding of new research released by the Centre for Future Work.
Alberta once boasted the highest wages and the strongest labour market in Canada. This was a key component of what was once caused the ‘Alberta Advantage’. Unfortunately, the economic tides have turned dramatically over the last decade. Once a promising place for workers to find jobs, earn decent wages, and support their families, Alberta has more recently demonstrated among the weakest labour markets in Canada. Unemployment is relatively high, wage growth has been far below other provinces, and yet the cost of living is among the highest in Canada.
Alberta is no longer the highest wage province in Canada: payroll data for hourly employees shows Alberta was passed by B.C. in 2023, and more recently by Quebec in 2024 (now ranking third). Average hourly wages in 2024 were under 2% higher than the Canada-wide average – whereas in 2013 they were 17% above the national average.
During 2024, when wages in most of Canada were finally recovering from the effects of post-pandemic disruption and inflation, average hourly wages in Canada continued to lag behind inflation. Average hourly wages, adjusted for inflation, fell by another 0.8%. That’s the fourth consecutive year, and ninth year in the last eleven, that average hourly real wages declined (with wages lagging behind inflation). In contrast, real wages in most of Canada were rebounding briskly in both 2023 and 2024.
Since 2019 (when the current UCP government came to power), real hourly wages have fallen by a cumulative total of 4.5%, by far the worst of any province. Including salaried workers, and adjusting for average working hours, real weekly earnings have also performed worse than any other province: falling 3.4% in inflation-adjusted terms since 2019. In fact, Alberta is the only province where average real weekly earnings were lower in 2024 than in 2019.
In sum, where wages are concerned, workers now face an ‘Alberta Disadvantage.’ Wages continue to go backward, and real living standards are in crisis. This is partly the result of economic challenges and disruptions beyond anyone’s control – like the pandemic, fluctuations in global energy prices, and inflation (which gripped all industrial countries after 2021). Ironically, that inflation was worse in Alberta in 2024 than any other province last year – despite the weakest wage growth of any province.
However, much of Alberta’s wage disadvantage is self-inflicted: the intended outcome of deliberate policies to suppress wages, and shift income to corporations and investors, away from workers. No single policy reveals that anti-wage bias than Alberta’s shameful freeze in the provincial minimum wage: now tied for lowest in Canada, having been frozen through 6 years of rapid inflation. The resulting 17% decline in real earnings for the lowest-paid workers in the province is economically destructive and morally bankrupt.
The effects of this cruel minimum wage policy are amplified by other wage suppression measures – including:
- the most restrictive limits on trade unions and collective bargaining of any province;
- uniquely austere provincial public sector wage settlements in 2020 and 2021 (which produced especially severe declines in real wages across health care, education, and public administration).
The new report updates earlier research published by the Centre for Future Work in 2024. Unfortunately, the conclusions of that earlier report are ratified in this update: Alberta workers still confront the weakest wage growth, the biggest decline in real earnings, and the most aggressive wage-suppressing policies anywhere in Canada.
Deliberate efforts to suppress wage growth in Alberta have resulted in a widespread decline in real living standards for millions of workers and their families. Wages have not kept up with inflation and Alberta’s high cost of living. While workers elsewhere in Canada are now experiencing robust improvements in real wages, wages in Alberta continue to go backwards. Meanwhile, corporations and investors in Alberta have been uniquely profitable – enjoying the highest share of profits in total GDP of any province.
To reverse these trends, the provincial government can take obvious measures to alleviate the downward pressure on wages, and support workers in rebuilding their real incomes. These include:
- Immediately raising the minimum wage by 17% (to reverse the effects of inflation since 2018), and then increasing it in future years to at least match inflation.
- Relaxing unique restrictions on union organizing and collective bargaining in the province.
- Reaching fair settlements with workers in Alberta’s broader public sector, to repair real wage loses experienced since 2020 and protect against future inflation.
Please see the full report, The Alberta Wage Disadvantage: Evidence on Alberta’s Continuing Suppression of Wages and Salaries, by Jim Stanford. The report was published in collaboration with the Alberta Federation of Labour.

Jim Stanford
Jim Stanford is Economist and Director of the Centre for Future Work, based in Vancouver, Canada. Jim is one of Canada’s best-known economic commentators. He served for over 20 years as Economist and Director of Policy with Unifor, Canada’s largest private-sector trade union.