[30 April, 2009 by Dominque Gross in The Globe and Mail] Canada's temporary foreign worker program, until 2002, allowed only skilled workers, seasonal agricultural workers and live-in caregivers to come. As the economy was expanding in the late 1990s, several industries, particularly in Western Canada, started to voice concern about the difficulties of finding workers, and the federal government extended the program to low-skill workers. Since then, it has become increasingly easier to hire temporary foreign workers through an accelerated hiring procedure and a lengthening of the employment contract from 12 to 24 months. These changes substantially decreased the cost for employers to hire such workers relative to reaching for resident workers beyond the local market or through training.

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