Canadian Business Blog » economy

June’s Job Surge

Courtney Wilson — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 13:03:53 +0000

Across Canada in the month of June, employment rose through 93,000 new jobs. (Full-time employment rose through 48,900 new jobs; part-time employment rose through 44,200 new jobs.) This resulted in a total decrease in unemployment by 0.2 per cent (bringing the unemployment rate throughout Canada to 7.9 per cent). This was nearly five times the jump that economists had predicted for the month, and is the lowest that the unemployment rate has been since January 2009.

This is how unemployment rates ended up looking from province to province:

Alberta: 6.7 (rose 0.1 per cent)
British Columbia: 7.8 (rose 0.3 per cent)
Manitoba: 5.3 (dropped 0.4 per cent)
New Brunswick: 9.3 (rose 0.5 per cent)
Newfoundland: 14.7 (rose 0.9 per cent)
Nova Scotia: 8.8 (rose 0.1 per cent)
Ontario: 8.3 (dropped 0.6 per cent)
Prince Edward Island: 12.3 (rose 1.6 per cent)
Quebec: 7.8 (dropped 0.2 per cent)
Saskatchewan: 5.5 (rose 0.5 per cent)

As you can see, most of the employment gains were in Ontario, Quebec and Manitoba. Most of these new jobs were through retailers or wholesale companies.

Sources: Canada adds 93,000 jobs in June, Where the jobs are: Provincial job statistics for June

The 2010 G20 Toronto Summit: Halving Deficits

Courtney Wilson — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 13:38:50 +0000

This past weekend, Toronto hosted one of the G20 summits that have been occurring twice a year since 2008. One of the hot topics on the agenda was economic recovery after our recent recession, and due to the European debt crisis that is currently underway.

While there was a divide among attendees about which was better – more stimulus spending to help the economy recover, or more conservative spending and balanced budgets – all countries involved in the G20 summit have agreed to reduce their deficit by half by 2013. By the year 2016, these countries are all hoping to have stabilized their debt loads.

So what does that mean for Canadian businesses?

While nothing official has been announced as to what Canada will be doing to reduce its deficit, Canada was agreeing with the European countries that what is required to reach the goal of cutting back stimulus spending, so we can speculate that stimulus spending will be reduced. And that could mean, unfortunately, that a lot of programs small businesses get assistance from would not be able to provide as much fiscal support as we have become used to.

Of course, we don’t know what will happen for certain yet. But we will definitely be keeping an eye on what is decided about Canadian stimulus spending, and will be keeping you up-to-date with any announcements that are made that could have an effect on the way you run your business.

Self-Employment on a Rise During Recession

Courtney Wilson — Mon, 29 Mar 2010 18:01:56 +0000

Statistics Canada just released the results of a survey on self-employment in the recent recession – apparently there was an increase of people who are self-employed by over 4.3% between October 2008 and October 2009.

Surprisingly, this is not solely a result of people being laid off, as paid employment fell by 3.3%. As well, most of those who were laid off were originally working in the manufacturing industry, whereas those who are now self employed are in the services industries.

Another interesting thing to note is that those who were involved in the growth in self-employment were mostly women (58%), even though it was mostly men who were self-employed before October 2008.

Signs of a Recovering Economy

Courtney Wilson — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 17:39:57 +0000

In the fourth quarter last year, Canadian labour productivity experience its largest gain since the first quarter of 1998 (1.4 per cent). As well, manufacturing sales were up 2.4 per cent in January – this was unexpected, as economists had been expecting a 0.6 per cent gain. (Source)

So what does this mean for us? It is definitely a good sign, but there is always a chance we expect more of this than there actually is. By just taking a look at what happened in the fourth quarter, one may think that it’s time to start hiring more workers for the expected increase in business – however, if businesses try to grow to the size they were previously too quickly, it may once again result in strains on those businesses. While the growth is definitely something to embrace, stay cautious about getting too far ahead of what your business can handle at its current state.

Recovery of Economy

Courtney Wilson — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 20:18:39 +0000

According to a release from TD Economics today, the world economy is expected to expand by 3.8% in 2010. While this is positive, they also mention that
the road to recovery will not happen easily, or overnight.

While the recovery is underway, the report suggests that it will not develop the “head of stream” that was typical of past recoveries. As a rule of thumb, growth in real economic output during the first year of a recovery is generally two to three times greater than the decline in output was over the course of the recession. But when a recession is driven by a banking crisis, as was the recent global recession, an economy’s output grows more slowly for a number of years after the recovery has taken hold than is typically the case.

Canada’s economy is expected to grow at 2.7% next year.