Posted Jan 11, 2014, 5:13 PM
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Join Date: May 2009
Location: Ottawa
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Here's the article in the TJ today about the unemployment numbers....
LOCAL
Unemployment rate falls again
KARISSA DONKIN Telegraph-Journal
January 11, 2014
The tourism industry was one of several sectors that saw growth in 2013.
Photo: Cindy Wilson/Telegraph-Journal
SAINT JOHN – The city’s economy finished the year on a high note, recording a 7 per cent unemployment rate in December.
That’s down from 8 per cent in November, according to new jobs data released by Statistics Canada on Friday morning.
The data reports about 66,600 Saint Johners were employed in December, compared to about 65,500 in November.
The city’s unemployment rate has been edging down steadily since reaching a high of 11.2 per cent in June. December’s 7 per cent unemployment rate is the lowest number the city has seen since November 2011.
It’s also better than the unemployment numbers posted province-wide (9.8 per cent) and nationally (7.2 per cent).
“It’s pretty encouraging,” said Yves Bourgeois, director of the University of New Brunswick Saint John’s Urban and Community Studies Institute.
He’s hesitant to put too much stock in monthly numbers, which only offer a snapshot of unemployment at a given time.
“It’s like trying to say has it been a cold winter based on a couple days.”
But he’s noticed a trend of what he describes as hat tricks over the last few months – low unemployment, high employment and a high participation rate.
The participation rate, a measurement of the number of people engaged in the labour force, has been edging up steadily over the last six months, reaching 67 per cent in December. That’s the highest it’s been since September 2012.
That number is important because it indicates how many people are participating in the labour force. When it drops, it indicates people have become frustrated and stopped looking for work.
When it rises, it suggests the opposite – that people who were once discouraged may have started looking for a job again.
The positivity continues in Enterprise Saint John’s monthly labour force analysis, which says the city has added at least 3,000 jobs since this time last year.
The report reveals that half of the employers surveyed by Enterprise Saint John have open job opportunities, with 90 per cent of those companies planning to increase or hold pat their employment levels during the next three years.
“It’s been a strong end to the year,” Enterprise Saint John investment attraction officer David Thomas said. “We’ve seen growth across many of our key sectors in the city.”
They include financial, insurance and professional services. In a survey with companies in those fields, Enterprise Saint John found nearly three quarters were forecasting an increase to their workforce during the next three years.
“When you have six months of consistent increases, six months of growth, that is a trend. The numbers are significant,” Thomas said. “It’s what we’re hearing from the companies that we speak to.”
Bourgeois examined data from Statistics Canada spanning December 2012 to 2013 and discovered much of the job growth has been in full time, rather than part time, work.
He looked at the Census Metropolitan Area of Saint John-St. Stephen, which takes into account people who may not live in the city but work here every day.
His analysis, too, reveals the new jobs added in the last 12 months are in a diverse range of sectors.
Bourgeois found the tourism sector, including the accommodation and food and beverage industries, grew by about 70 per cent in the last year.
“There (also) seems to be growth in nursing jobs, administrative, food, childcare, construction, even manufacturing activities have been going up,” he said.
“It’s a bit of a mixed bag. Some of them are relatively low-paying jobs and some of them are relatively high-paying jobs.”
When Thomas analyzes Statistics Canada’s numbers, he focuses on the number of jobs being created in the community. The numbers he’s crunched suggest Saint John is outperforming.
“Over the last six months, Saint John has at least matched or exceeded the performance of most (Census Metropolitan Areas),” Thomas said.
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