The only growth more impressive than Canada’s population is its surging unemployment. Statistics Canada (Stat Can) data shows the economy stumbled in March. It was such a minor decline, it wouldn’t be worth noting if not for the population growth. The country only lost a couple thousand jobs, but managed to add tens of thousands of unemployed people to its labor force.
Canada Added 26 Workers For Every Job It Lost Last Month
Canada’s rapid population boom of prime aged workers helped its labor force expand rapidly. The country added 57.7k workers for a grand total of 21.72 million in March. Unfortunately the economy also lost 2.2k jobs over that same month. More bluntly put, 1 job was lost for every 26 workers added in March—a very unusual combination.
The working population growing much faster than job creation has become a trend. Over the past 12 months, the country added 571.3k workers but only 324.4k jobs. That’s a shortfall of 246.9k jobs, pushing the number of unemployed people in Canada to 1.32 million.
Unemployment Rate Soars As Canada Struggles To Create Jobs
Speaking of unemployed people, the rate has now climbed very sharply since its record low. The unemployment rate rose 0.3 points to 6.1% in March, about 1 point higher than last year. It’s now at the highest level since January 2022, and the rate is now higher than pre-2020.
Canada Is Adding A Lot More Workers Than Jobs
Canadian seasonally adjusted unemployment rate.
Source: Statistics Canada.
For context, a 0.5 point increase is typically enough to trigger a recession—it rose more than half that in a single month.
The latest data highlights how Canada has one of the most unusual economies in recent history. Typically population growth and an economic boom go hand-in-hand. People move to a region due to the robust opportunities, contributing to demand, and thus creating more jobs. That’s not what’s happening.
Instead, people are attracted to a stagnant economy in such a large volume, it has an inflationary impact on shelter. An impact that’s so great, shelter costs are eroding general output on a per capita basis.
