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Résumé (français)

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Résumé (anglais)

There is a general consensus that economic inequality increased in Canada between 1996 and 2006. However, few studies examine the multi-dimensional causes of this trend at the sub-national scale. Chakravorty (1996, 2006) and others (Morrill, 2000; Martin, 2001, Drennan, 2005) argue that an understanding of what influences national-scale inequality requires in-depth consideration of urban and regional socioeconomic processes. Using microdata drawn from the most recent 20-percent samples of the Canadian Census of Population (1996, 2001, and 2006), this thesis examines the spatial and socioeconomic dimensions of earnings inequality among individuals in Canada’s labour force. The thesis makes two main contributions to the literature. first, it provides a detailed analysis of the key socioeconomic determinants of earnings inequality across Canadian urban areas using regression analysis. The findings provide new evidence that substantial changes have occurred in the contribution of specific factors to inequality since 1996. Second, spatial data analysis points to changes in the geographic distribution of earnings inequality. Between 1996 and 2006, high levels of inequality across Canada’s census divisions have increasingly clustered in Alberta and Newfoundland, and results from spatial regression models shed further light on changes in the nature and structure of earnings inequality.