“We have set out these bold goals and we are reaching our targets. I’m going to run in the next election on the strong economy. I’m going to run on (being) number one in job creation.”
– Christy Clark to her party’s convention in Whistley, BC, October, 2012
This morning, Statistics Canada released the final report card before Tuesday’s general election in B.C. on Clark’s 17-months-old Jobs Plan. BC is unequivocally not “number one” in job creation. In fact, it is not number one in any employment measurement used by Statistics Canada. And yet, it could be a lot worse, I suppose. So I’m giving the BC Jobs Plan a “C-” at this point.
BC Liberals will point to the unemployment rate,currently at a very healthy 6.4% compared to 6.7% when the Jobs Plan was announced. But that unemployment rate is the highest unemployment in the four Western provinces. Moreover, the size of B.C.s Labour Force has hardly grown at all. In, fact B.C. is dead last among all provinces when it comes to the rate of growth of its labour force in the last 17 months.
Since the Jobs Plan was announced in Sept. 2011:
- The unemployment rate in April 2013 is 6.4%. As Jobs Plan was announced it was 6.7%. On Clark’s first day on the job as Premier in March, 2011, it was 8%.
- BC is 5th among all provinces, with 17,600 full-time and part-time jobs created. BC trails Ontario, Alberta, Quebec and Saskatchewan in total number of jobs created.
- The only job growth has come in public sector jobs (+42,200) and self-employed (+21,000). The province has lost more than 45,000 private sector jobs.
- On a percentage basis, BC ranks 8th among all provinces. Total full-time and part-time jobs have grown by just 0.77% in the last 17 months. Only Manitoba and New Brunswick have done worse. Saskatchewan is tops with 4.77% job growth.
- So far as full-time job creation goes, BC ranks 3rd in absolute terms (+38,500 new f/t jobs) and 5th in relative terms. (+2.16%)
- BC ranks 5th (+11,500) in absolute terms in growth of its labour force (all employed plus all unemployed) but dead-last among all provinces in relative terms (0.46%)
- Across the country, 66.5% of Canadian “participate” in the labour force as either full-time employed person, part-time employed persons or unemployed persons. In B.C. the labour force participation rate is 64.3%, below the national average and fourth worst among all provinces.
Background: On September 22, 2011 the BC Government released its “BC Jobs Plan”. Read the press release: “Premier releases Canada Starts Here” Here’s the transcript of the speech Premier Clark gave to the Vancouver Board of Trade on September 22, 2011 titled “Premier Christy Clark introduces Canada Starts Here: The BC Jobs Plan”. So all comparisons in this piece on how the Canada Jobs Plan changed employment in BC start with the month of September, 2011. All the jobs data in this post comes from Statistics Canada Table 282-0087. The month-to-month calculations are mine.
Great summary of actual statistics. Too bad her campaign can’t use statistics and when they do, its spinning bad ones into good ones. Her campaign has gone off-track of late, as I highlighted in my latest blog post on http://www.rameshranjan.com. Its been humourous but has also shed light on what is wrong with politics today.
42,000 public service jobs? loss of 45,000 private sector jobs? who needs the NDP when these morons creat 42,000 public sector jobs. With a defecit of 64 billion dollars who the hell is going to pay all these people and their benefits? Did CC not say in her TV adds that she was positive she could reduce government spending? what an idiot, please take your party and get the hell out of BC, you have caused enough grief for the next decade!!