Long-lasting changes to employment

Statistics Canada has been dutifully measuring monthly employment changes practically since time began.

The reports come out the first Friday of every month — neutral commentary on a mass of numerical data, compiled through

100,000 interviews.

They follow the same standardized template, so there isn’t much room to expound on the enormity of what happened to this country last month.

There’s scarcely a need to — the numbers themselves show the pandemic’s impact.

The agency has never measured anything like this.

The biggest previous job losses in modern times were in the 1981-82 recession.

Some snapshots: The national unemployment rate jumped to 13%, a rate not seen in almost 40 years.

It would have been much higher if jobless people who didn’t search for work were counted.

Canada has now lost about three times as many jobs in three months as were lost in the 1981 recession over 17 months.

Since the crisis began, youth employment dropped by 34%.

B.C.’s unemployment rate has more than doubled in three months, to 11% from 5%.

The same has happened in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver. (Even Victoria’s rate, which has been among the lowest for years, has more than doubled to 7.2% .)

The strongest word the statisticians use is “exceptional.” It wasn’t enough for Finance Minister Carole James.

On Friday she said the report was “staggering.”

The cumulative effect raises questions about the fundamental life-altering changes the ongoing health crisis is going to have.

One of them is the concept of working from home. For the higher-earning office and professional class, it has been an option for years. Now it’s mandatory for a big share of that category of workers.

StatsCan broadened its survey to delve into that change. More than three million people started doing so in April, bringing the total number to five million, a big share of the total workforce.

But it’s not an option for the accommodation and food sector, or wholesale/retail. Those are already lower-paying sectors, so it compounds the disparity between higher and lower sectors.

There’s one paradoxical point in the survey. The average hourly wage rose by 11% in April.

That sounds positive, but it’s because so much employment collapsed in the lower-paying industries, it drove the average up.

Working from home is going to continue indefinitely. It could lead to more permanent arrangements that would make for big changes in how society functions.

There are also long-range implications for students, many of whom are at jobs where working from home is not an option.

Student unemployment increased to 32% in April, “signalling that many could face difficulties in continuing to pay for their studies.”

In B.C. the unemployment rate in the 15 to 24 age range jumped by half in one month.

The post-secondary world will be dealing with this for years to come.

There’s a marked difference between private- and public-sector jobs. B.C. recorded a 6% drop in the “public administration” sector last month.

That’s higher than the rest of the country, but minor compared to the hits taken in private-sector categories.

How long governments can maintain employment levels in the face of revenue shortfalls is an open question. It’s striking that this collapse was “intentional,” a direct result of curtailing the economy to protect health. All the other recessions were unintended or out of governments’ control.

Massive aid programs by all governments have eased some personal aspects of the job losses. They’ve also mitigated the losses themselves.

Unemployment would be much higher if federal subsidies used by many employers were not in place.

The best hope is that April will be rock bottom, since restrictions are easing.

But the impact was so dramatic that even if COVID19 is suppressed, employment is going to take time to recover. A big chunk of B.C.’s economy does not have a firm reopening schedule.

It’s going to be a different world, no matter what course the pandemic takes.