GLOOMY JOBS REPORT

Unemployment rate in city hits 13 per cent

Alberta’s unemployment rate rose to 15.5 per cent in May just as the province began to allow some businesses closed by the COVID-19 pandemic to reopen.

That’s an increase of 2.1 per cent over the month of April, according to the Labour Force Survey released Friday by Statistics Canada.

Unemployment numbers do not include those who have stopped looking for work. As people began job hunting again, the unemployment rate rose even as the province saw the number of employed Albertans grow by 28,000 in May. The employment increase in the province was entirely driven by the services-producing sector, according to the survey.

The Labour Force Survey results for May were gathered the week of May 10-16. Alberta began Phase 1 of its relaunch on May 14, allowing some businesses to open and restaurants to resume dine-in services after being shut by public health orders due to the pandemic in March.

Alberta Premier Jason Kenney said he’s pleased more people are getting back to work and will take whatever good news he can get.

“I believe that actually we’ve seen the bottom of the trough and that we’re going to see employment continue to come back,”

Kenney said Friday at a news conference. “The challenging part is that as more jobs are created more people will move back into the labour force and so the overall 15 per cent unemployment stat will probably continue, I suspect, for some time.”

Kenney estimated that if the people still not looking for jobs were counted, Alberta’s unemployment rate would be closer to 25 per cent.

“It’s going to be a longtime before we’re out of the woods,” he said.

Mike Holden, chief economist at the Business Council of Alberta, said Alberta regained about eight per cent of the jobs that were lost during the pandemic.

“This is what bottoming out looks like in terms of the labour numbers,” Holden said. “We saw a tiny improvement and we should hopefully see steady improvement.”

Approximately 48,200 jobs were lost in Edmonton in the month of May. Unlike the provincial and national unemployment rates, which are calculated at one point in time, municipal unemployment rates use a three-month rolling average. The latest numbers, using data from March, April and May, show Edmonton’s unemployment rate jumped to 13.6 per cent, up from 10 per cent reported the month before. That’s slightly higher than Calgary’s rate of 13.4 per cent.

Edmonton has the third-highest unemployment rate of cities measured by Statistics Canada, behind only Windsor and Montreal.

Janet Riopel, president and CEO of the Edmonton Chamber of Commerce, called the latest numbers “devastating news.”

“Edmonton now has the highest unemployment rate in the West, and the third highest unemployment rate of any major centre in Canada,” she said in a statement. “Our economy is not improving — we need all orders of government to stay the course and continue providing supports to our struggling job creators.”

On Friday, the government announced small and medium businesses can get a one-time payment of up to $5,000 to help with relaunch costs due to the pandemic.

Across the country unemployment hit a record high of 13.7 per cent but the economy added 289,600 jobs in May as more people started to look for work.

YOUNG PEOPLE CONTINUE TO STRUGGLE

Holden said the Business Council of Alberta is keeping an eye on how young people’s employment was impacted by the pandemic, particularly young women.

The council has already pointed out that young women were more seriously hit by the pandemic job loses. Now young women appear to be rebounding more slowly, Holden said.

Young men between the ages of 15 and 24 have recovered 22 per cent or their jobs and young women have recovered 12 per cent, he said. That works out to just under 10,000 jobs for young men and just over 7,000 jobs for women.

“Considering that women had been harder impacted, that smaller rebound is a bit of a concern,” Holden said.

He said he doesn’t have a clear explanation for the discrepancy but that the council will be keeping an eye on daycares. The daycares that are open are not working at full capacity and are often only offering full-time spots, he said.

“If you’re working part time, which is where most of these job gains are, and you’re a single mom, it’s very easy for daycare to cost more than you make working. That could be one of the issues.”

Edmonton now has the highest unemployment rate in the West, and the third highest ... of any major centre in Canada.