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EI claims rose 9.2% in the year to November with Alberta hardest hit
More than 31,000 new jobless in Alberta as EI rolls climb to 544,200
There have been several rounds of layoffs in the oilpatch since 2014, with trades, transport, technical support, finance and management affected. (Todd Korol/Reuters)
The number of Canadians receiving employment insurance benefits rose 9.2 per cent in the year ending in November 2015, according to new data from Statistics Canada, with most of the newly unemployed in Alberta.
There were sharp increases in new applicants from Saskatchewan, Alberta and Manitoba, bringing the total receiving EI to 544,200 people. The unemployment rate in Canada last November was 7.1 per cent.
- Fort McMurray’s workers desperate to find jobs during economic slump
- Alberta has lost 35,000 oilpatch jobs, petroleum producers say
About two-thirds of the increase in the past year has been in Alberta, with 31,030 people applying for benefits in the year to November.
The pain has been spread equally between Edmonton and Calgary, with just over 20,000 new people on the EI rolls in each city.
Alberta has suffered several rounds of layoffs related to the low price of oil, with companies cutting back first contract workers, then long-time employees as the world market price fails to cover the cost of crude production.
Job losses in Saskatchewan, Manitoba
There’s been a 16 per cent increase among workers in trades and transport or equipment operation and a 17 per cent increase in natural and applied sciences, a term Statistics Canada uses to apply to more skilled workers including geologists and mine technicians.
Alberta has also seen job losses in finance, administration and management categories.
Statistics Canada says the number of new claimants has levelled off in the past few months.
Despite that, Saskatchewan saw a 4.6 per cent rise in claimants in November, Alberta was up 2.7 per cent and Manitoba was up 1.9 per cent.
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What’s Coming Unglued Now in Canada?
What’s Coming Unglued Now in Canada?
Canada lumbered through the first half of 2015 in a “technical recession,” Statistics Canada confirmed this week, as GDP shrank in both quarters. Among the culprits: the swooning energy sector and an investment slump.
Now everybody is lining up behind the hope that a sudden acceleration will put the economy back on track in the third quarter, despite oil that has re-crashed and despite the ongoing collapse – and that’s what it is – of the all-important energy sector.
To get to this acceleration, the once booming residential and commercial construction sectors have to hold up, or else Canada’s economy is in real trouble. Alas….
“Canada is also in the midst of an ill-timed supply surge that caused vacancy rates to rise even in markets with positive absorption” in the second quarter, warns a new report by commercial real estate firm Colliers International cited by the Financial Post. It paints a picture of an epic office boom turned into an even more epic office glut, particularly in Calgary and Edmonton, Alberta, the epicenter of Canada’s oil patch.
This office glut comes on top of Calgary’s housing meltdown. For the first eight months, total home sales in Calgary plunged 25%, according to the Calgary Real Estate Board. Condo sales collapsed 39% in August and 30% year-to-date. Inventory sits a lot longer on the market before it sells, if it sells. And pressures are building on prices: the average condo price was down over 10% in August from a year ago.
Commercial real estate is heading in a similar direction. Only worse. Calgary was a boom town. Office towers have been sprouting like mushrooms. In recent years, commercial real estate costs downtown were “going through the roof” and “accelerating at a pace far beyond the Canadian average,” Calgary Chamber of Commerce director of policy and research Justin Smith told the Financial Post. But it takes years to plan and build office towers, and now no one can just turn off the flow.
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