March 9, 2001

Ontario sees biggest monthly job loss in 10 years; more turbulence expected

TORONTO (CP) -- More Ontarians lost jobs in February than in any single month during the last 10 years, but Finance Minister Jim Flaherty insisted Friday the drop was expected and cautioned that more economic unrest is likely on the way.

"Yes, we do have some economic turbulence in some sectors of our economy," Flaherty said in response to Statistics Canada employment numbers released Friday.

"That was expected. I don't think it's a surprise to anyone." Ontario saw its jobless rate creep up 0.4 percentage points to 6.1 per cent last month, which means about 38,000 Ontarians lost their jobs. It's the province's first decline of sustained growth in four years. The last time the province experienced a loss of similar magnitude was in February 1991, when there was a decline of 50,400 jobs in the Ontario market. The numbers are not surprising, said Flaherty, in light of a recent economic downturn in the auto and information technology sectors. "The slowing of growth in the auto sector was fairly well known," he said. "(Consumers should expect) slower growth, but still steady growth. We're not at five or six per cent growth now, we're at more sustainable long-term growth." Marc Levesque, a senior economist at the Toronto Dominion Bank, says February's unemployment dip simply mirrors what is happening in the U.S. "What we're seeing is the unmistakable slowdown in the U.S. spilling over to Canada," he said. "Ontario is very heavily exposed to (that) slowdown . . . I think there's more weakness in the job picture to come." Overall, the national unemployment rate held steady at 6.9 per cent in February, Statistics Canada said. The number of full-time jobs was virtually unchanged in February, in spite of the economic slowdown. Employment for men rose slightly, about 15,000 part-time jobs in February, while youth aged 15 to 24 saw their employment slip by about 31,000.

That follows about five months of steady employment growth at the end of 2000, totalling about 187,000 jobs. The number of self-employed workers was little changed in February, the agency said. The manufacturing sector lost 22,000 jobs in February, bringing total losses in manufacturing to 32,000 in the first two months of 2001, Statistics Canada said.

In the final five months of 2000, the sector saw about 73,000 new positions as the economy still enjoyed strong growth. About 1.1 million Canadians were looking for work

http://www.canoe.ca/OntQueTicker/CANOE-wire.Ont-Jobs-Slowdown.html

-- Martin Thompson (mthom1927@aol.com), March 11, 2001