CanWCC is pushing to get the care economy added to Canada's Major Projects Office portfolio
The federal government classifies unpaid caregiving as a social expense rather than an economic asset, according to a May 2026 Canadian Women's Chamber of Commerce proposal.
Yet in 2019, it was worth between $517bn and $860bn, more than the mining and oil and gas sectors combined.
CanWCC is calling on Ottawa to designate a Canadian National Care Economy Strategy as a nation-building project under the Major Projects Office (MPO), the federal mechanism established under the Building Canada Act to coordinate large-scale infrastructure investments.
MPO-designated projects have focused exclusively on physical infrastructure such as transportation corridors, energy systems, and resource development.
The proposal calls that omission "dangerously asymmetrical."
The stakes for employers and plan sponsors are concrete.
Healthcare and social services already employ approximately one in four Canadian workers, according to Statistics Canada data cited in the proposal, and paid care work contributes roughly 12 percent of Canada's GDP.
Ontario alone is projected to need more than 50,000 additional personal support workers and 33,000 nurses by 2032, according to a 2024 CBC News report cited in the document.
According to Statistics Canada projections revealed Canada's population aged 85 and over is projected to rise from 951,833 in 2025 to between 3.3m and 4.2m by 2075.
Those demographic pressures are already hitting the workforce.
Women make up approximately 75 percent of paid care workers, according to Statistics Canada data cited in the proposal.
They are also more likely to reduce paid work hours, exit the labour force, and accumulate lower lifetime earnings and pension contributions due to caregiving responsibilities.
Nearly 72 percent of artists and arts workers report turning down work due to caregiving, a 2019 University of Toronto study found.
Almost 65 percent of women in film and television report losing work because of unaffordable or inaccessible childcare, a 2021 Women in Film and Television Canada Coalition report found.
The proposal argues that treating care systems as annual operating expenditures — rather than long-term capital investments — subjects them to short-term fiscal pressures and leaves them chronically underfunded.
It cites a 2025 article in the Oxford Review of Economic Policy arguing that care investments generate measurable long-term returns by increasing labour-force participation, reducing healthcare system strain, and strengthening economic resilience.
The ILO, OECD, the World Bank, and UN Women all define care systems as core economic infrastructure, the proposal notes.
Using the ILO Care Policy Investment Simulator, CanWCC modelled a Canada-specific scenario in May 2026.
Reaching ILO-recommended investment levels by 2030 would require approximately US$75bn per year in additional spending, with 30.13 percent recouped through increased tax revenue.
The return on investment for parental leave and early childhood care and education policies alone came to US$1.58 per US$1 invested, with projected net job creation exceeding 1m jobs — 87.25 percent going to women.
The proposed strategy covers five areas:
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Caregiver income supports — pension credits for unpaid caregiving periods and portable benefits for self-employed workers
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Universal affordable childcare
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Aging-in-place and home care
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Workforce stabilisation — competitive wages, credential recognition, and immigration pathways for care workers
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Mental health and preventive care — including advancing Bill C-201 to add mental health and addiction services under the Canada Health Act
The federal government has already acknowledged the care economy through Budget 2024's Sectoral Table on the Care Economy and a commitment to develop a National Caregiving Strategy.
CanWCC is asking Ottawa to move from consultation to formal MPO designation and long-term federal investment.
CanWCC will host a public online town hall on May 28.
