EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The labour market prospects facing Aborigi-nal Canadians are much worse than for other Cana-dians. Many Aboriginal people are unlikely to find consistent employment in their lifetime. The poten-tial costs of high unemployment extend beyond the social sphere. The economic future of a region is greatly diminished when a growing percentage of its workforce is unemployed. The threat to econo-mic well-being is especially grave for the Prairies. There is probably no single more important issue for the economic future of the Prairies, particularly Manitoba and Saskatchewan, than the advancement of its Aboriginal human resources. Table i presents basic demographic data for the working age population (i.e., the population 15 and older) of Aboriginals and other Canadians in 1991 and 1996. The data refer to the ‘Aboriginal identity ’ population, meaning people who identify themselves as Aboriginal or Registered Indian. The number of people of working age who identified themselves as Aboriginal grew by 33.3 percent between 1991 and 1996, an astonishing six times greater than the non-Aboriginal working age popu-lation’s 5.7 percent increase. While some of this growth may be a statistical artifact, much of the increase in population simply reflects the much younger age structure of Canada’s Aboriginal popu-Table i Aboriginal and Non-Aborigina