Anyone trying to figure out the number of jobs represented by the construction and operation of the Northern Gateway Pipeline and a tanker terminal at Kitimat is instantly stopped by the figures slung back and forth by economists and business experts representing Enbridge, and those representing the opposition.
Most estimates use the term person-hours and person-years of employment, a vague term that the general public often interprets to mean "jobs." But this is not the case.
A person-hour of work is the amount of work performed by an average worker in one hour. A person-year is defined as the amount of work done by an individual during a working year, on a specific job. The terms are used by companies to estimate the budget for projects or the impact of staff changes on specific tasks. They are also used to estimate the employment benefits of proposed projects.
Person-hour seems like a simple term. If it takes one person two hours to dig a ditch or two persons one hour to dig the same ditch it means the company must pay two-person hours of labor to get that ditch dug no matter how many people they pay to do it.
However, when we move to person-years of employment things become a bit more complicated. First, how many hours are in a working year? In 2007, the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) reported that the Netherlands established 1,389 hours of work was a year of employment while South Korea established 2,316 hours. Exxon Mobil uses 2,080 hours of work per year and in Canada the average is set at 1,770 working hours. This means that if we use Netherlands' number, we would have one person paid for 26.7 hours per week for 52 weeks while in South Korea it would be 44.5 hours. For Exxon it would be 40 hours of work and for Canada 34.
In their projections for the construction of the pipeline, Enbridge states how many hours are used to define a person-year of employment for on-site employment only. For direct employment, indirect employment, and induced employment they do not uniformly apply person-years. Nor do they in their financial projections tie person-years in with specific rates of pay for various jobs, or with a definition of what a pipeline construction job actually is.
Here, the terms "direct" and "indirect" are used to describe the general nature of the jobs being talked about. According to the US Department of Transport, indirect employment includes the people required to produce the ore and coal used in the production of the steel, in this case the pipe itself and anything else that might be needed in the production of the pipeline. According to the Business Directory this includes everything that makes production possible. Direct employment would be the laying of pipe into the ground, digging the trenches for the pipe and so on. These workers are also known as "onsite workers" though it's not clear whether an onsite worker would include the person in the coffee wagon bringing lunches or the mandatory first aid attendants.
Some interpretations of the proposal include "induced employment." This includes money spent on goods and services by the people who work at or near construction sites and is comprised of the grocery store clerk, the gas station attendant, the accountants, the security guards and the janitors.
Employment numbers, estimated by Stats Canada, were taken from the figures submitted by Enbridge in their application to the National Energy Board, Volume 6C. The person years of employment for the entire Gateway project are divided up as follows: 22,764 person-years of direct employment, 13,251 person-years of indirect employment and 26,679 years of induced employment. If estimates combine indirect and induced employment, that leaves us with approximately one-third direct employment and two-thirds, indirect (including induced) employment.
To the non-economist, it would seem that indirect hours would generally pay less than direct. It also seems that mostly locals would be getting the lower-paid hours, especially the induced hours. No one seems to be saying, either, how many of the higher paying direct hours would go to Canadians and how many would go to professionals and trades people imported by Enbridge.
On its website, Enbridge uses these results to claim that they will provide 62,700 person years of direct and indirect employment for Canada, during the construction phase of the project. Fifty-seven percent or 35,739 person-years of employment will be in British Columbia, but again, only for the construction period.
But these numbers are not in agreement with another study Enbridge commissioned for Volume 2 of its application. Here we are told, through direct and indirect employment, 30,049 person years of construction will occur in Canada over the course of the entire pipeline project which is roughly half of the 62,700 person years of employment that they state on their website.
If we take the 30,049 person years of employment in Canada as their projection rather than the 62,700 then, as stated in the same report, BC would get 15,589 person years of employment during the construction period. If this is the case and we divide 15,589 by five years, it means we would have 3,118 person years of employment each year.
Person-years of employment are not jobs. If a person works for a company for three years as its manager, we call that one job but Enbridge calls it three person years of employment.
Enbridge has not provided sufficient background information to do a complete assessment of the analyses; in other words, there is no way we can estimate the number of jobs we are going to get.
The public assumes that the person-years represent jobs lasting the duration of the construction. It seems few jobs would last long.
Most would last hardly any time at all.
Vivien Loughheed of Prince George is the author of numerous travel guides. Her most recent book is Sidetracked: The Struggle For B.C.'s Fossils, published by Creekstone Press. More of her work can be found at www.chickenbustales.com.
