​November unemployment rate drops to 3.2%, says labour market planning board

In November, the unemployment rate for the Stratford-Bruce Peninsula Economic Region further decreased by 0.6 percentage points to 3.2 per cent. The region’s unemployment rate remains the second lowest in the province. Meanwhile, the provincial unemployment rate decreased by 0.4 percentage points to 6.8 per cent, both unadjusted for seasonality.

That’s the word from the Four County Labour Market Planning Board.

Last month, the region’s overall population increased by 300 but the labour force size decreased by 1,000, to 169,300, pushing the size of population not in the labour force up by 1,300 people. This also brought the region’s participation rate down by 0.4 percentage point to 60 per cent.

The region experienced a slight decrease of 100 in overall employment with approximately 900 full-time losses and 800 part-time gains.

The number of goods-producing sector employees decreased by 1.8 per cent (-1,200) in November, with the biggest percentage loss in the utilities sector (-1,100, -9.6 per cent). Manufacturing losses were 800 employment (-3.9 per cent), followed by agriculture (-300, -2.2 per cent).

On the other hand, employment in construction increased by 1,000 people (+5.2 per cent) last month.

Employment in the services-producing sector saw increases by 1.1 per cent (+1,100) in November. With 1,900 additional employment, health care and social assistance experienced the biggest percentage gain (+9.9 per cent), followed closely by other services (except public administration; +700, +9.5 per cent).

Wholesale and retail trade (+800, +4.5 per cent) and information, culture and recreation (+200, +4.1 per cent) also experienced employment gains in November.

However, public administration saw the biggest percentage loss in employment (-500, -11.4 per cent), followed by accommodation and food services (-1,100, -10.9 per cent), and finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing (-500, -7.4 per cent).

“We saw a slight dip in our unemployment rate this month which is consistent with the local trends,” said Dana Soucie, executive director of the planning board. “We are encouraged to see a gain in the health care, social assistance and other services sectors, and will continue to monitor participation rate changes over time.”

Current job postings for the Bruce, Grey, Huron, Perth region have increased over time since the COVID-19 pandemic and can be found at www.connect2JOBS.ca. The current number of job postings reaches 1,499.