TORONTO – The Canadian economy, which created 40,000 jobs in December, isn’t the only victor in a recent decline of unemployment rates – the manufacturing city of Hamilton, Ont. stood out among major cities in the province for its decline in unemployment.
Hamilton, often referred to as the steel capital of Canada due to its profitable steel industry, saw the unemployment rate drop from 6.1 to 5.9 per cent month-to-month – the lowest of all major cities in Ontario.
The city with the second lowest unemployment rate was Guelph at 6.3 per cent.
According to the data released by Statistics Canada on Friday, Ontario accounted for about three-quarters of the jobs added across Canada in December.
But despite the low unemployment rate, Statistics Canada said that Hamilton has not seen very much change in terms of employment.
“It’s not a big drop – from November to December – but it’s within the standard. I’m not seeing very much change in terms of employment and unemployment in Hamilton,” said labour analyst for Statistics Canada Jennine Yuslcas.
“Year over year there are less people employed in Hamilton. I see a drop of 2.3 per cent over the year – close to nine thousand people.”
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According to Yuslcas this may be due in part to fewer people participating in the labour market. Rich industries, in areas such as financing, insurance and manufacturing are showing a decline – large areas of employment opportunities in Hamilton.
“Despite fewer people participating, it’s still a low unemployment rate,” said Yuslcas.
But, according to a local employment centre, there are still a lot of jobs in manufacturing in Hamilton despite an overall decline.
Most clients at the employment centre landed jobs in the health sector and the service industry in recent months.
“It’s not a dead industry, but certainly not a climbing industry,” said Eckart.
According to Eckart, December typically sees a lower number of people obtaining jobs, but noted that the center saw a 53 per cent increase in the number of people who got jobs for November of 2012.
“It’s a really difficult time of year for us to assess that, thanks to the holiday season,” said Eckart. “We did see a pattern for an increase in jobs for November, into the end of November, but not so much in December.”
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