Stats Canada released its Labour statistics this morning revealing that employment changed little in June: the total net losses for Canada during the last three months was 13,000, much smaller than the 273,000 decline in the first three months of the year. The unemployment rate edged up 0.2 percentage points to 8.6% in June, as more people looked for work.
Manitoba's unemployment rate is still well below the national average, but did rise in June to 5.2% (up from 4.9% in May) as the province lost nearly 2,000 jobs during the month. Many of those jobs however are part-time, as the number of full-time jobs in the province continues to grow.
There were 495,600 full-time jobs in Manitoba in June, which is 100 more than there were in May and almost 6,000 more than there were in June 2008.
Manitoba's unemployment rate is the second-lowest rate in the country behind only Saskatchewan.
Ontario continues to be hardest hit by the economic downturn - Canada’s most-populous province has accounted for 64 per cent of the total national employment losses since the beginning of the market downturn.
Another hazard of job loss
UCS/CALM
A new study has found that losing your job may make you sick.
A researcher at the Harvard School of Public Health recently analyzed employment and health data from more than 8,000 persons surveyed over six years.
The researcher, Kat W. Strully, found that workers who lost a job through no fault of their own were twice as likely to report developing a new ailment like diabetes, heart disease or high blood pressure over the next 18 months, compared with people who suffered no job loss.
Even if a terminated worker found a new job quickly, the study found, the health risks still remained.