The survey was conducted twice previously, in 1985 and 1991. It has documented the ongoing spread of computer use across Canadian business establishments and the increasing intensity of use within establishments since the early 1980s. By the late 1980s, computer use had begun to shift to include higher proportions of data and communications networks. The intensity of computer use has increased steadily through time, rising from an establishment mean of 16 per cent of employees working with computers in 1985, to 37 per cent in 1991, to 43 per cent in 1994. A process of skills upgrading within business establishments is occurring as a result of this intensification of computer use.
Skills upgrading is evident in two ways.
The first is in terms of occupational upgrading. Professional positions accounted for over half of the jobs that were created but for only 7 per cent of those that were eliminated. With respect to occupation type, positions in the natural and applied sciences and engineering accounted for the great majority of positions created, with most of these consisting of positions for computer professional, technical, and managerial workers. In contrast, just over half of the job-types that were eliminated consisted of clerical occupations, predominantly those requiring general office skills, office equipment operators, and finance and insurance clerks. Upskillling is evident within jobs as well.