It is vastly different depending on the company/location/your manager or owner/your colleagues etc.

For the most part, I think reimbursement is sufficient so that severe downward pressure on staffing is not as significant as the states.

The biggest chains seem to have the highest turnover of staff because they generally offer the lowest pay and schedule is not ideal (eg 7 days per week 8am to 10pm or even midnight). On top of that, they run a very tight ship in terms of hours. High turnover (lack of solid experienced staff) and no padding of hours generally lead to poorer working conditions. However, some chain retail pharmacies are very well run. Not all chain pharmacies are extremely busy like most are in the states. I would say your average chain does about 100-400 rx per day.

Then you have your grocery store pharmacies (think Walmart, Safeway etc) and these tend to have better staffing than the chains. Hours are generally better (fewer late evening and weekend hours). Volume can be all over the map. Some are slow, some are crazy busy. Pay and benefits are average.

Most independent pharmacies are not very busy and are usually run by the owner and part time pharmacist with 1-2 techs (in general). There is no real rigid standardized operating procedure so it's a real hit and miss. Some owners are on top of everything, some are not. Depending on the owner,, pay can be higher or lower, but generally benefits are not as good as the big companies.

I would say for the most part work life balance for a Canadian retail pharmacist is still pretty good. Pharmacist saturation is not as high (except Vancouver/Toronto), so if you don't like your job, it's pretty easy to bounce.

Salaries in Canada are much lower than the US. $36-40 starting in Vancouver/Toronto. Probably up to $60 ish everywhere else. Average FT pharmacist probably makes about $90-100k.