Critical analysis of nurses' labour market effectiveness in Canada: The hidden aspects of the shortage

This article proposes a critical analysis of the effectiveness of the nurses' labour market by addressing the classic dimensions of a labour market: supply, demand, and the impact of wages. Specifically, this work aims to (1) clarify the various concepts of labour shortage and present the evidence and (2) provide a critical analysis of the literature in terms of the efficiency of the nurses' labour market, while presenting descriptive statistics relevant on the supply and demand of nurses' labour. Such work elucidating the concepts and bringing a critical retrospective and prospective analysis on the subject at the pan-Canadian level constitutes an important contribution to the literature on the trends in the nursing labour market. The results suggest that this shortage in Canada was around 2.6% in 2012; it would continue until 2022 but would be reduced to 1.3% on average (corresponding to more than 46 000 nurses). Quebec would be the province with the highest vacancy rate. Besides, the analysis suggests that the postrecession period of 2008 was managed more effectively than that in the early 1990s. Measures particularly related to the provision of health services and adequate management of the workload by the institutions are to be prioritized in order to solve the shortage problem.