Canada churns out ‘astounding’ 54,500 jobs in May

Canada’s economy generated a surprisingly strong wave of new jobs last month as the country churned out 77,000 full-time positions, Statistics Canada said Friday.

Overall, 54,400 jobs were added in May after accounting for declines in other categories including part-time work, the latest labour force survey says. Economists had been expecting the economy to add about 15,000 jobs during the month.

The agency found that the national unemployment rate edged up to 6.6 per cent, a rise of 0.1 of a percentage point, as more people entered the job market in search of work.

Derek Holt, VP & Head of Capital Markets Economics at Scotiabank, said Canadian job growth has been “astounding.”

“Since last August’s report that marked a turning point, Canada has created a seasonally adjusted and whopping 331,000 new jobs,” Holt wrote in an analysis note to clients.

At an annualized rate, that is just shy of 400,000 new jobs and the last time Canada registered 400,000 or more jobs created in a single calendar year was way back in 1979, Holt said.

Soft wage growth

However, Canadian wages continue to be soft despite the fact that the annual growth in permanent employee wages rose to 1.0 per cent from the all-time low 0.5 per cent increase in April, economists warned.

“Strip away low inflation, and the average Canadian’s pay cheque is still falling somewhat,” Holt said.

The fresh numbers added to several positive labour-market gains since the middle of 2016 and the report says the latest monthly number means overall employment was 1.8 per cent higher compared to a year earlier.

The labour force participation rate is close to all-time highs, said Nathan Janzen, senior economist at RBC.

“Strengthening in labour markets and stronger recent GDP growth numbers increasingly argue that current ultra-low interest rates may no longer be needed to support the economy,” said Janzen.

By province, the agency says Ontario, British Columbia and Quebec saw the biggest job gains last month.

Quebec’s unemployment rate dropped 0.6 percentage points to six per cent — its lowest level since Statistics Canada started collecting the data in 1976.

Manufacturing jobs pick up

By industry, the services sectors gained 31,300 jobs last month, manufacturing 25,300 jobs, the professional, scientific and technical services category gained 25,900 jobs, and transportation and warehousing added 17,100 jobs.

The sectors that registered big declines included finance/insurance/real estate, which lost 17,400 jobs, information/culture/recreation sector with 15,800 job losses, and public administration, which lost 12,300 jobs.

A closer look at the data also shows healthy gains in some of the survey’s more-desirable categories — with 59,400 new jobs created in the private sector and 68,500 new paid employee positions.

With files from The Canadian Press