Unemployed down, but not all for right reasons

The number of unemployed people in Saskatchewan decreased in October, but that’s partly because fewer people were looking for work.

“In Stats Canada’s world, you can be unemployed as long as you’re looking for work,” said statistician Doug Elliott, publisher of Sask Trends Monitor.

“What we’ve seen in the last three or four months is people being discouraged from the lack of job opportunities … and just not looking anymore, which means the unemployment rate and the number of unemployed people go down, but not because they’re finding work — it’s because they’ve quit looking.”

Saskatchewan has its lowest labour force participation rate since 2005.

In October, according to Statistics Canada, 9,600 fewer people were looking for work compared with the year before.

The province’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate was 5.9 per cent; it was seven per cent last October.

“We continue to see the impact of low resource prices on our labour market,” Economy Minister Steven Bonk stated in a news release.

Bonk said there is reason to be optimistic about the economy, as Saskatchewan has the thirdlowest unemployment rate in Canada.

The NDP sees it another way. “There were 3,400 fewer people working in Saskatchewan last month than a year ago. Even more upsetting, 3,300 of them are women,” said NDP jobs critic Vicki Mowat.

“Last month we learned that 28 per cent more Saskatchewan women are relying on employment insurance and now we see the problem is getting worse, not better.”

She added that Saskatchewan was one of only two provinces to see job losses in the past year.

Elliott said there is some reason for optimism.

The construction and manufacturing sectors are two “bright lights,” but “if you look at the broad picture … we’re not out of the woods here yet.”