150,000 Jobs Added to Canadian Economy in January

For the second consecutive month, the Canadian economy outperformed expectations by adding 150,000 new jobs in January.

More than 120,000 jobs, according to Statistics Canada’s data on Friday, were full-time positions.

The increases follow a similarly large increase the month before. Additionally, they were 10 times higher than the number of employment that economists had anticipated would have been created.

The majority of the job increases were in Ontario and Quebec, although every province except Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island, and New Brunswick increased jobs.

And the private sector, which added 132,000 new employees, accounted for the majority of the jobs.

Jobs are still being created in Canada.

An important driver of growth, the construction sector added 16,000 new jobs in January. The data agency reported that the construction sector created 114,000 new positions in the last year, an increase of more than 7%, making it “one of the fastest-growing businesses over the preceding 12 months.”

Jenna Wood, director of human resources at TSX-listed construction company Aecon Inc., is unsurprised by the surge in demand in the construction industry.

Even before the pandemic began, the company was in need of employees, which is why it developed a training programme geared towards women, who are normally underrepresented in the sector.

Prabhnoor Kaur