by Strac Ivanov

Canada’s economy created 18,000 new jobs in the month of December. The unemployment rate edged up to 7.5% (from 7.4% in November) - but only because more people joined the labour force. Ironically, this is actually good news: It indicates that more unemployed people feel that they have decent enough chances to find work. But there is less to December’s employment growth numbers than meets the eye.
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Statistics Canada released its monthly Labour Market Survey for November. It shows that, following a notable decrease last month, Canada’s economy lost 19,000 jobs again in November, raising the unemployment rate to 7.4 percent.  However, despite recent declines, employment still remains up 1.2 percent from November 2010.  And in Ontario, employment actually increased, and unemployment declined. (more…)

Two economic reports released in the first half of January 2011 paint a confusing, somewhat contradictory picture of Canada’s prospects for economic recovery this year. But both of them agree that any recovery will be subdued, a far cry from the solid recovery many were hoping to see. (more…)

On November 5th, 2010, Statistics Canada published the October result of its monthly labour market survey. It seems to indicate that the job market recovery has almost stalled, at a time of the year that is normally be characterized by steady job creation. The Vicinity Jobs hiring demand numbers from October also show that hiring pulled down sharply from its peak a month ago. What is unusual this time around is that other economic indicators – such as stock price indices – point to an overall economic recovery.

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According to Statistics Canada there was little change in employment in September. Full time gains were offset by part-time losses. The rate of unemployment went down 0.1 point to 8.0 percent – but for the wrong reason: Some job seekers, mostly youth, seem to have given up looking for work and dropped out of the labour force altogether. This is disappointing, as economists had expected 10,000 new jobs to be created. This did not quite happen as expected.
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Statistics Canada released its latest labour force survey on Friday (read the full survey here: http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/100507/dq100507a-eng.htm ), and it seems to be all good news. Employment grew in April at a rate not seen since 2002. In fact, the rate of employment gains in April was comparable to the magnitude of monthly employment losses that we were seeing in the early months of the recession.
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Statistics Canada released its regular monthly Labour Force Survey report today (October 9, 2009) and it contains good news: Employment in Canada increased in September by 31,000 jobs, and unemployment dropped for the first time since the fall of last year. The increase marked the second month in a row in which employment increased in Canada. Unemployment now stands at 8.4% in Canada, at 9.2% in Ontario, and at 7.4% in British Columbia. (more…)

On September 3^rd (with a federal election looming) Steven Harper announced his Government’s decision to “invest” 80 million dollars into Ford’s future. Everyone looked happy: The Government of Ontario, the Opposition, the CAW… The Opposition and the CAW said that this decision was long overdue. Canada’s Industry Minister Jim Prentice claimed that this “investment” will help make the Canadian automobile industry more competitive and will “create or sustain” up to 750 jobs. A week later came another sobering announcement: Ford announced the elimination of one of its shifts and the layoff of 500 workers from the same plant where Jim Prentice had made his announcement the week before.

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This year’s G8 summit in Japan resulted in a commitment from the leaders of some of the world’s largest economies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2050. It is ironically symbolic that this resolution was made in a place not far away from another Japanese city where a similar – but much stronger – commitment had been made a decade ago. If the Kyoto treaty failed to produce the results it was intended to produce, why should the G8 summit’s resolution be any better? (more…)