Employment increased by 67,000 (+0.3%) in October, the second consecutive monthly increase, and the employment rate rose 0.2 percentage points to 60.8%. The unemployment rate declined 0.2 percentage points to 6.9%. Employment growth was concentrated among men aged 25 to 54 years old (+33,000; +0.5%) and youth aged 15 to 24 years old (+21,000; +0.8%). There were more people working in wholesale and retail trade (+41,000; +1.4%), transportation and warehousing (+30,000; +2.8%), information, culture, and recreation (+25,000; +3.0%), and utilities (+7,600; +4.6%). On the other hand, employment declined in construction ... (full story)

Canada’s labour market added a net 66,000 jobs in October and the unemployment rate dropped to 6.9 per cent in a second straight month of unexpectedly positive data, according to Statistics Canada data released on Friday. Economists had expected the Canadian economy to drop 20,000 jobs last month and the unemployment rate to rise to 7.2 per cent, according to consensus estimates published by the Bank of Montreal. In September, Canada gained 60,400 jobs, far above the near-stagnant result observers had expected. The unemployment rate nonetheless held at 7.1 per cent, in part because of an increase in the proportion of ... (full story)