Canada Had Its Highest Unemployment Rate Ever Last Month But It's Not All Bad News

Another effect of the COVID-19 pandemic. The unemployment rate Canada recorded in May was the highest its ever been. Despite that, there is still some hope for anybody who is looking for a job right now.

Statistics Canada released new data about how the Canadian labour market was impacted by the pandemic in May based on the Labour Force Survey.

Even though provinces started reopening last month, a lot of people were still out of work.

In May, the unemployment rate reached a record-breaking 13.7%.

That's the highest one ever recorded since comparable data became available back in 1976.

According to The Canadian Press, before this, the biggest number of people without jobs was 13.1% in December 1982.

This year, unemployment was at just 5.6% in February before shutdowns began, then 7.8% in March and 13% in April.

During the last month, unemployment grew slower than the two months before for an increase of 8.3% or 201,000 people.

StatCan stated that the growth was driven by an increase in people seeking jobs because before, some people didn't meet the definition of unemployed because they weren't actively looking for a job.

The majority of people looking for work in May were those aged 25 to 54 and youth aged 15 to 24 who were entering the summer job market.

There are also some more promising and hopeful statistics.

In May, the number of jobs rose by 290,000 as people got back to work.

The number of people who worked less than half of their regular hours dropped by 292,000.

StatCan stated that those two changes combined show a 10.6% recovery of all the employment losses and absences related to COVID-19 in the two previous months.

Quebec accounted for almost 80% of the overall employment gains in May with an increase of 231,000.

In Ontario, however, employment declined again in May.

It's actually the only province in Canada that saw a continued reduction in jobs though it was at a significantly slower pace than in March and April.

Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Canada has introduced a bunch of benefits for people to use to get through this time.

That includes the CERB, the CESB, the summer jobs program and the wage subsidy for businesses.