Canadian Labour Data: Instant Fourth Dimension Lucky

The do-over for the July Labour Force Survey for July 2014 was much amend than the outset instruct - 42,000 jobs were created inwards this version, instead of simply 200. But equally the nautical chart inwards a higher house shows, the year-on-year increment charge per unit of measurement for exercise is nevertheless below 1%. And the details of the study are less buoyant the aggregate labor seat out suggests, equally increment was dominated past times part-time positions.

The seat out of full-time positions has virtually stopped dead, spell part-work is expanding. Although 1 could seek to pretend that this is the lawsuit of voluntary decisions, it looks similar weak need for workers to me. The bottom panel of the nautical chart inwards a higher house shows the percent of positions that are amount time, in addition to this percent has a designing of next the cycle. This is a sign that at that topographic point is considerable spare capacity inwards the labour market, inwards the shape of underutilised workers.

The unemployment charge per unit of measurement ticked downward to 7% again. As StatsCan notes, this figure is non straight comparable to the headline (U-3) Unemployment Rate inwards the United States. Expressed on a U.S.-equivalent basis, the unemployment charge per unit of measurement inwards July was 6.1%, which is slightly below the U.S. degree of 6.2%. Meanwhile, Canada did non sense the collapse of the Participation Rate that the US did (chart below), which flatters the U.S. unemployment rate.

As an aside, although the drib of the Participation Rate may reverberate a somewhat soft labour market, it likewise reflects demographics. I accept non dug into the data, but the Canadian sense casts approximately farther doubtfulness on the robustness of the theory that demographics explains the much larger drib of the Participation Rate inwards the United States.

(c) Brian Romanchuk 2014