Jobs and politics

You may have noticed it happening already but a lot of the political messaging coming from the federal government is trying to convince voters that it is focused on job creation. Here's a good example: A new round of corporate tax cuts are about to swing into effect but you will probably not hear a Conservative suggest that tax cuts are going to a corporate fat cat — no, sir — those tax cuts are going to “job creators”. Why, here's the newly-minted Minister of State for Finance Ted Menzies doing just that Tuesday at an Ottawa press conference:

We are reducing taxes for the job creators in this country. There are many people that are still unemployed … We are trying to create the economy where our job creators, our employers, will be hiring new people.

Menzies, yesterday, was in front of reporters because he was announcing a $10 million boost to a $107-million dollar-a-year program to help employers create summer jobs for students.

Today in Windsor, Que., the first phrase from Prime Minister Stephen Harper has he announced a $25-million investment in a local pulp-and-paper plant was: “”Our government is committed to protecting and creating jobs in all of Quebec’s region.” My guess is you will see the same boilerplate on everything the government announces this spring.

Now there are a lot of metrics voters – and journalists — might use to measure the effectiveness of a particular administration. In some cases, budgetary surpluses or deficits are good proxies in understanding a government's effectiveness. Others might measure the size of the civil service over a given period. Some will focus on the number of daycare spaces. Personally, I think there's nothing more important to most Canadians than being able to count on meeting this month's mortgage or rent and that means being able to count on having a job. So, for example, if it comes to find a way to boost employment or cutting debt levels, I'm going to choose more jobs.   So I pay a lot of attention to job numbers and, as a result, am particularly interested to watch how the Conservatives and their political opponents “position” themselves on this file and I'm also interested the statistics and yardsticks we use to measure job creation.

Today, TD Bank's deputy chief economist Derek Burleton and economist Sonya Gulati are out with their look at Canada's job creation record [PDF] in 2010 and their forecasts for 2011:

Tomorrow’s release of December employment numbers will close the books on a solid 2010 job market performance.  Even with no change in employment in December, 2010’s tally would still reach 264K net new jobs—the strongest turnout since 2007 and enough to break through the pre-recession level of employment by 24K positions.  The jobless rate fell from 8.3 per cent to an estimated 7.6 per cent.

Current labour market conditions are not as robust as meets the eye.  Job creation has been concentrated in part-time positions, the public and self-employed sectors, and lower-paying industries.  The good news is that 2010 saw less of a reliance on these areas.

Heading into 2011, job market conditions are expected to improve gradually, suggesting that employers will continue to meet moderate demand through increased productivity, rather than adding to their payrolls.  We expect 250K net new jobs in 2011, with the Prairies doing much of the heavy lifting.

The jobs yardstick is also going to be a significant factor, in my opinion, in the six – count 'em [PDF] – six provincial or territorial elections scheduled for this fall. Back to Burleton and Gulati:

Four provinces (AB, NB, NS and ON) have yet to recoup all of the jobs lost.  Five provinces (NFLD, PEI, QC, MB and SK) have yet to regain their full-time jobs lost.

Those provincial elections are happening in Alberta, Ontario, Newfoundland, PEI, Manitoba and Saskatchewan — all provinces which, at the end of 2010, were still underwater when it comes to those key job creation yardsticks.