Canadian workers can expect a pay raise next year.
Thanks to cautious optimism among Canadian companies, salary budgets are slowly moving back to pre-recession levels, Towers Watson reports in its annual salary survey.
For 2011, 97% of employers reported increasing or planning to increase employee salaries an average of 2.9%. Salaries are expected to increase even more in 2012, with 99% of employers projecting an average salary increase of 3.2%.
The survey also revealed salary increase variances between industries. Employees in the energy services and insurance sectors saw the lowest salary increases in 2011 at 2.6%, while employees in the transportation and oil and gas exploration industries saw the highest salary increases at 3.1%. In 2012, employees in oil and gas exploration can expect to see increases of 3.4%.
As well, fewer companies are implementing salary freezes. In 2009, 30% of companies froze salaries, whereas only 1% are planning to do so in 2012.