Greater Victoria may have shed jobs over the past year, but it remains one of the tightest employment markets in the country, according to Statistics Canada’s monthly labour force survey.
The region’s total employment dropped by 5,600 positions since March 2018, according to Statistics Canada. But the unemployment rate remained the second lowest in the country at three per cent, an improvement from the 3.2 registered in February, and significantly better than the 4.5 per cent recorded in March 2018.
Guelph continues to have the lowest unemployment rate in Canada at 2.2 per cent.
Victoria felt the job loss mainly in the services sector, which employed 5,000 fewer people compared with March 2018, while the goods-producing sector lost only about 600.
Though some corners of the Victoria economy saw job growth — transportation and warehousing added 3,400 positions over the last year, and business, building and support services added 2,800 — they were offset by decreases.
The finance, leasing and real estate sector shed 4,600 jobs and the information, culture and recreation sector dropped 4,200 positions.
The province had the lowest unemployment rate in Canada in March at 4.7 per cent as 79,400 more people were employed in B.C. last month compared with March 2018.
“British Columbia’s economy continues to lead the country in growth and opportunity with the biggest job gains in the country, showing we can have strong economic performance while investing in people,” said B.C. Jobs Minister Bruce Ralston in a statement. “In March, people's wages continued to increase and unemployment in B.C. was the lowest in Canada for the 20th month in a row.”
Across the country a streak was broken as the Canadian economy’s six months of continued job creation came to an end in March.
Employment last month dropped by 7,200 net jobs, the bulk of which were full-time positions, Statistics Canada said.
The unemployment rate held firm at 5.8 per cent.
The March result followed a pair of big gains in January and February, and together the three-month period still gave Canada its best quarter of job creation since late 2017.
The six consecutive months of rising employment, that began in September, added around 300,000 jobs.
“Was I terribly surprised to see a small pullback after the run we’ve seen? Probably not,” said Brian DePratto, senior economist with Toronto-Dominion Bank. “As it stands, we’ve had a pretty good run. March doesn’t really change that materially. The six-month trend is still pretty strong.”
Employment has been one of the most-resilient areas of an economy that has shown signs of slowing down in recent months.
In March, the number of employee positions in the private sector fell by 17,300, while public sector-employee jobs increased by 4,200 and self-employed occupations rose by 6,000.
Employment for women in the core working age group of 25 to 54 saw a decrease of 47,600 for its biggest month-to-month decline since the start of the data series in 1976. The jobless rate for the category rose to 4.7 per cent from 4.5 per cent.
The March decline followed monthly increases of 66,800 net new jobs in January and 55,900 in February — the country’s best two-month start to a year since 1981.
Compared with a year earlier, the numbers showed that Canada added 331,600 jobs for an increase of 1.8 per cent.
