​June unemployment rate increases to 4.3%, says labour market planning board

In June, the unemployment rate for the Stratford-Bruce Peninsula Economic Region increased by 0.4 percentage points to 4.3 per cent. The region continues to sit at the second lowest unemployment rate in the province. Meanwhile, the provincial unemployment rate decreased by 0.1 percentage points this month to 7.8 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; whereas, the labour force size grew by 1,800 people, resulting in the number of people not in the labour force to drop by 1,500. This pushed the region’s participation rate up slightly by 0.6 percentage points to 59.7 per cent.

In addition, the region experienced an increase of 1,100 people in overall employment, with approximately 400 full-time employment gains and 600 gains in part-time employment from May.

The goods-producing sector saw modest growth in overall employment numbers in June (+1,700, +2.7 per cent), with the biggest percentage gains in construction (+1,000, +6.3 per cent), followed closely by manufacturing (+1,400, +6.2 per cent). Agriculture saw an increase of 100 in employment (+1.2 per cent).

On the other hand, utilities experienced an employment decrease in June (-400, -2.5 per cent).

Overall employment in the services-producing sector saw a decrease of -0.6 per cent (-600 people) in June. With -800 drop in employment, information, culture and recreation experienced the biggest percentage loss this month (-15.7 per cent), followed by business, building and other support services (-500, -12.5 per cent) and finance, insurance, real estate, rental and leasing (-900, -9.2 per cent).

Wholesale and retail trade (-1,300, -5.2 per cent) and educational services (-300, -4.0 per cent) also had employment losses.

On the other hand, transportation and warehousing experienced the biggest employment gains in June (+500, +18.5 per cent), followed by public administration (+500, +11.1 per cent) and professional, scientific and technical services (+1,000, +9.7 per cent).

Current job postings for the Bruce, Grey, Huron, Perth region have increased over time since the pandemic and can be found at www.connect2JOBS.ca. The current number of job postings exceeds 1,300.