EI (Employment Insurance)
AE (Assurance-emploi) in French
Quick definition
Employment Insurance (EI) is the federal program that replaces part of your income when you lose your job, have a child, fall ill, or care for a gravely ill family member. It is funded by premiums deducted from almost every paycheque in Canada.
What you pay: EI premiums
If you are an employee, EI premiums come off every pay automatically and appear in box 18 of your T4 slip, right alongside your CPP contributions. For 2026, employees pay $1.63 per $100 of insurable earnings (as of July 2026), on earnings up to the maximum insurable earnings (MIE) of $68,900. That caps the employee premium at $1,123.07 for the year. Your employer pays 1.4 times whatever you pay, so the program is majority employer-funded.
Québec workers pay a lower rate, $1.30 per $100, because Québec runs its own parental insurance plan and EI does not cover maternity or parental benefits there; more on that below.
| Item | Amount |
|---|---|
| Employee premium rate | $1.63 per $100 ($1.30 in Québec) |
| Employer premium rate | 1.4 times the employee rate |
| Maximum insurable earnings (MIE) | $68,900 |
| Maximum employee premium | $1,123.07 ($895.70 in Québec) |
| Benefit rate | 55% of average insurable weekly earnings |
| Maximum weekly benefit | $729 |
Regular benefits: when you lose your job
Regular EI benefits replace 55% of your average insurable weekly earnings, up to $729 per week for 2026. Because of the earnings cap, anyone who earned more than the MIE gets the same $729 maximum; EI replaces a much smaller share of a high salary than of an average one.
To qualify, you must have lost your job through no fault of your own (a layoff or shortage of work, for example) and have worked enough insurable hours in the previous 52 weeks: between 420 and 700 hours, with the exact number set by the unemployment rate in your region. Higher regional unemployment means a lower hours requirement. Quitting voluntarily without just cause, or being dismissed for misconduct, generally disqualifies you from regular benefits.
How long benefits last also depends on your hours and your region's unemployment rate: anywhere from 14 to 45 weeks. One practical note: benefits are taxable income, but the tax withheld at source is often less than what you will actually owe, so an EI year can end with a surprise bill in April.
Special benefits: parental, sickness, caregiving
EI is also Canada's income support for life events. Maternity benefits pay the birth parent up to 15 weeks at 55%. Parental benefits can be shared between parents, and here you face a choice: the standard option pays up to 40 weeks shared (maximum 35 for one parent) at 55%, while the extended option pays up to 69 weeks shared (maximum 61 for one parent) at only 33%. Sickness benefits pay up to 26 weeks at 55% if you cannot work for medical reasons, and caregiving benefits support people caring for a critically ill child, adult, or a family member at end of life.
Choose the parental option carefully, because the election is irrevocable: once the first parental payment is issued, neither parent can switch, and the first parent's choice binds both. Extended leave stretches roughly the same total money over more weeks at a much lower weekly rate, which surprises families who assumed 69 weeks meant more money rather than thinner money. Run the weekly numbers against your budget before you file the claim, not after.
Québec: QPIP instead of EI for parental leave
Québec residents do not use EI for maternity or parental leave. The Québec Parental Insurance Plan (QPIP) replaces those benefits with its own, generally more generous versions: higher replacement rates, a higher earnings ceiling, and a dedicated paternity leave. That is exactly why Québec workers pay the reduced $1.30 EI rate plus a separate QPIP premium on their paycheques, the same split-program logic as QPP replacing CPP in the province. EI regular, sickness, and caregiving benefits still work the same in Québec as everywhere else.
The clawback on regular benefits
High earners who collect regular benefits can be asked to pay some back at tax time. If your net income for the year exceeds 1.25 times the MIE, about $86,125 for 2026, you repay 30% of the lesser of the regular benefits you received or the income above that threshold. This catches people who were laid off, collected EI for a stretch, then landed a well-paid job in the same year. There are exemptions, including for first-time claimants.
Maternity, parental, sickness, and caregiving benefits are never clawed back, no matter how high your income. Only regular (and fishing) benefits are subject to the repayment.
In Canada
EI coverage is automatic for almost all employees in Canada; unlike private insurance, you cannot opt out, and premiums are owed from the first dollar of insurable earnings. Self-employed workers are outside the program by default but can register voluntarily for special benefits (maternity, parental, sickness, caregiving), though not for regular benefits; in Québec, self-employed workers are covered by QPIP automatically. Unlike CPP, paying more EI premiums never increases your benefit beyond the cap, and most people pay in for decades without claiming. That is the nature of insurance, but it makes the premium feel like a tax, which is why the line appears next to income tax on every pay stub.
Worked example
Nadia is laid off from a job paying $900 per week. Her regular benefit is 55% of that, about $495 per week, for a duration set by her hours and her region's unemployment rate. Her colleague Marc earned $1,600 per week, well above the insurable ceiling, so his benefit is capped at $729 per week for 2026: about 46% of his old pay, not 55%. Both should set aside extra for taxes, since EI withholds less at source than their usual rates. When Marc lands a new job in the fall and finishes the year with net income above roughly $86,125, he repays 30% of the benefits above the threshold through his tax return.
Related terms
Reviewed by Alexandre Bernier, CFP®, CIM®, PFP®·Updated July 2026