3 unemployed people for every vacant job in Canada: StatCan

FILE: A worker speaks on the phone at a construction site. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Christopher Katsarov

There were 3.3 unemployed persons for every job vacancy in October, Statistics Canada revealed Thursday.

The ratio, which the department calls unemployment-to-job vacancy, increased by 0.5 year-over-year. That’s due to a decrease in job vacancies (-64,800 or -12.2 per cent, excluding the territories) and an increase in unemployed people.

October’s unemployment rate was 6.9 per cent.

Job vacancies drop

In October, job vacancies in Canada decreased by 19,100 (-3.9 per cent) to 467,000, offsetting the uptick in September when the country logged 11,000 additional openings.

Finance and insurance, administration, waste management and remediation, real estate and leasing, as well as information and cultural industries all saw decreases in available jobs.

Vacancies increased in mining, quarrying, and oil and gas extraction.

Weekly earnings rise

On a year-over-year basis, average weekly earnings were up 2.2 per cent to $1,312 in October, following a 2.9 per cent increase in September. Looking month-to-month, October saw little change regarding weekly earnings.

“In general, growth in average weekly earnings can reflect a range of factors, including changes in wages, composition of employment, hours worked and base-year effects,” reads the report.

On average, Canadians worked for an average of 33.3 hours per week.