The formerly commonplace notion of someone starting a position with a company out of school and staying there for decades, steadily climbing the ranks until retirement, is already quite outdated.
New data from ADP Research’s Canada Pay Insights continues to show us why.
Base pay for “job-stayers” in Canada is up 3% year-over-year. That’s barely keeping up with inflation, and the figure is also well below the pay difference for “job-changers”—nearly 6%.
The figures for gross pay paint an even wider divide: job-stayers averaged a boost of 4.4%, less than half of the nearly 10% jump experienced by job-changers.
Indeed, job-changers have been winning the pay-raise war versus job-stayers since ADP Research started tracking the comparison back in early 2023.
No wonder half of all professionals were searching for new opportunities in 2025, according to research from Morgan McKinley.
And it’s not just talk, either, especially among the younger crowd: Half of Gen Z has changed roles multiple times within the past three years, IWG data shows, typically seeking higher salary or enhanced flexibility—which is apparently the right strategy.
Rewards for such behaviour are evident, especially at one’s prime: those aged 25-34 saw the biggest pay jump at 3.6%, while those 55 and older saw the smallest jump at 2.8%.
Interestingly, increases in compensation were consistent across company sizes, ADP data shows, from startups to enterprises (although that doesn’t speak on total compensation in absolute terms, or include equity considerations).
The Atlantic Canadian provinces saw the highest raises geographically speaking, with Nova Scotia posting 3.7%, New Brunswick 3.5%, and Prince Edward Island 4.2%—compared to just 2.5% for Yukon.
ADP aims to make the future of work more productive through data-driven discovery. Founded in 1949, the company today services more than one million clients across over 100 countries.
