Stagnant Job Picture in February

Stats Canada announced on Friday that the Canadian economy’s ability to create jobs is still lacking. The opening statement in the Labour Force Survey for February 2014 sums it up very nicely:

Employment was little changed in February, and the unemployment rate remained at 7.0%. There has been little overall employment growth in Canada since August 2013.

If you look at year over year there are 95,000 more jobs than February 2013, however, not much good has happened lately in terms of continuous job growth.

The other scary note is that Men between age 25 and 54 jobs decreased and there are less jobs in the Public Service. The Public Service thing is a good thing (in my humble opinion). The Canadian Economy relies far too heavily on “government jobs”, there is a real need to have the private sector create more jobs.

Unemployment remained the same month over month (the rate of unemployment, which of course, is a hard number to nail down).

The Big Table

Remember to read the post from Statistics Canada and look at the data, don’t just believe what the talking heads (or even bloggers) tell you on this topic.

Labour force characteristics by age and sex Seasonally adjusted

	Jan 2014	Feb 2014	Std error1	Jan to Feb 2014	Feb 2013 to Feb 2014	Jan to Feb 2014	Feb 2013 to Feb 2014
	thousands (except rates)			change in thousands (except rates)		% change
Both sexes, 15 years and over
Population	 28,870.4	 28,893.5	…	23.1	367.2	0.1	1.3
Labour force	19,130.5	19,133.4	29.1	2.9	102.6	0.0	0.5
Employment	17,797.3	17,790.3	28.9	-7.0	94.7	0.0	0.5
Full-time	14,424.7	14,443.6	39.2	18.9	69.6	0.1	0.5
Part-time	3,372.6	3,346.7	36.1	-25.9	25.1	-0.8	0.8
Unemployment	1,333.2	1,343.1	24.9	9.9	7.9	0.7	0.6
Participation rate	66.3	66.2	0.1	-0.1	-0.5	…	…
Unemployment rate	7.0	7.0	0.1	0.0	0.0	…	…
Employment rate	61.6	61.6	0.1	0.0	-0.4	…	…
Part-time rate	19.0	18.8	0.2	-0.2	0.0	…	…
Youths, 15 to 24 years
Population	4,436.8	4,433.8	…	-3.0	-20.0	-0.1	-0.4
Labour force	2,815.1	2,803.1	17.2	-12.0	-40.0	-0.4	-1.4
Employment	2,423.4	2,420.7	15.8	-2.7	-36.3	-0.1	-1.5
Full-time	1,242.8	1,268.4	18.6	25.6	-17.1	2.1	-1.3
Part-time	1,180.6	1,152.2	19.7	-28.4	-19.3	-2.4	-1.6
Unemployment	391.7	382.4	14.6	-9.3	-3.7	-2.4	-1.0
Participation rate	63.4	63.2	0.4	-0.2	-0.6	…	…
Unemployment rate	13.9	13.6	0.5	-0.3	0.0	…	…
Employment rate	54.6	54.6	0.4	0.0	-0.6	…	…
Part-time rate	48.7	47.6	0.7	-1.1	-0.1	…	…
Men, 25 years and over
Population	11,966.6	11,980.0	…	13.4	196.3	0.1	1.7
Labour force	8,654.7	8,654.5	15.1	-0.2	94.7	0.0	1.1
Employment	8,124.1	8,110.0	16.4	-14.1	62.7	-0.2	0.8
Full-time	7,486.2	7,478.1	22.0	-8.1	31.7	-0.1	0.4
Part-time	637.8	631.9	18.0	-5.9	30.9	-0.9	5.1
Unemployment	530.7	544.5	14.5	13.8	32.0	2.6	6.2
Participation rate	72.3	72.2	0.1	-0.1	-0.4	…	…
Unemployment rate	6.1	6.3	0.2	0.2	0.3	…	…
Employment rate	67.9	67.7	0.1	-0.2	-0.6	…	…
Part-time rate	7.9	7.8	0.2	-0.1	0.3	…	…
Women, 25 years and over
Population	12,467.0	12,479.7	…	12.7	190.8	0.1	1.6
Labour force	7,660.7	7,675.9	16.6	15.2	47.9	0.2	0.6
Employment	7,249.9	7,259.7	16.4	9.8	68.4	0.1	1.0
Full-time	5,695.7	5,697.1	25.7	1.4	54.9	0.0	1.0
Part-time	1,554.1	1,562.5	24.0	8.4	13.3	0.5	0.9
Unemployment	410.8	416.2	13.3	5.4	-20.5	1.3	-4.7
Participation rate	61.4	61.5	0.1	0.1	-0.6	…	…
Unemployment rate	5.4	5.4	0.2	0.0	-0.3	…	…
Employment rate	58.2	58.2	0.1	0.0	-0.3	…	…
Part-time rate	21.4	21.5	0.3	0.1	0.0	…	…

…

not applicable

1. Average standard error for change in two consecutive months. See “Sampling variability of estimates” in the section “About the Labour Force Survey” at the end of the publication Labour Force Information (Catalogue number71-001-X) for further explanations.

Note(s):

Related CANSIM table 282-0087. The sum of individual categories may not always add up to the total as a result of rounding.