Surqualification chez les diplômés des collèges et des universités : comparaison Québec-Canada

Over-qualification of workers is an issue widely discussed in the literature. Contemporary phenomenon, it reflects the following concerns. On the economic front, over-qualification can be a waste of resources the company devotes to education, as well as under-use of the national productive capacity, since the skills of overqualified workers are not fully utilized. On a personal level, over-qualification can be a source of frustration and low motivation because it is often associated with lower wages and less use of skills learned at school. Organizationally, it can increase turnover, which generates costs in terms of hiring and training new employees. It can also lead to counterproductive behavior by overqualified workers, which penalizes organizations.
 What about the situation in Quebec? Quebec performs well compared with other Canadian provinces. However, over-qualification rates observed are high and this concerns all actors in society. Therefore what can be done to mitigate the phenomenon of over-qualification and allow the Quebec economy to make the best use of its resources?
 This article is based on a report entitled “The professional-qualification for graduates of colleges and universities: State of the situation in Quebec.” Report has received financial support from the Commission of Labor Market Partners (CPMT) as part of a grant program to applied research (PSRA). There are different ways to measure over-qualification. We favored the approach called “objective”, based on the skill levels that the National Occupational Classification (NOC) associated with each occupation and another, subjective, based on the assessment that are workers their position in relation to over-qualification. The data we used are obtained from censuses of 2001 and 2006, the National Household of 2011 and the National Graduates Survey Survey (NGS) conducted in 2013 among graduates of 2009 and 2010.
 Here are the highlights and some policy recommendations that we believe are able to mitigate the phenomenon of over-qualification in Quebec. [googletranslate_en]